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Looking for an excuse to eat more cupcakes? Krissa Hillman, 11-year-old Maryland native, has a good one.

Hailing from Bollman Bridge elementary school in Jessup, the fifth-grader is the creative genius behind Cupcakes for Literacy. It’s a business that was created to sell baked goods in order to benefit reading programs, libraries and local schools.

“Literacy is a big part of life. You have to read everything,” Hillman said. “So what better way to help people understand than though something everyone likes?”

Hillman’s wonderful idea provided her a spot as a finalist in Warren Buffett’s Secret Millionaires Club “Grow Your Own Business Challenge.” This is a national competition looking to help young entrepreneurs cultivate smart habits financially. It also wants them to come up with unique and fresh new business concepts. About 4000 contestants between the ages of 7 to 16 entered into the competition this year.

Helen is going to fly to Omaha, Nebraska, this weekend with four more individual finalists, as well as three teams. They are going to personally present their business ideas to Warren Buffett himself. The winner of the competition will receive $5000. This is a business dream come true for Hillman.

“Everything about this has been exciting. I get to actually meet Warren Buffett,” she said. “It all sounds like something only someone high up in the business world would get to do.”

Last fall, when Ms. Hillman saw a cupcake recipe book that she wanted to buy at a book sale at school, helped inspire the idea for Cupcakes for Literacy. It was an expensive book, so her mother told her that she’d only buy it if she promised to put the book to good use. Hillman enjoys reading just as much a she really enjoys baking, so she came up with ways that she could combine both of these loves. Everything started to fall into place from there

“Six years ago I made a website called Storytime with Krissa to upload videos of her reading aloud,” said Hillman’s mother Sabrina Wilson. “When she got the cupcake book, we decided to put a new spin on it.”

Hillman wants her website storytimewithkrissa.com to run in conjunction with Cupcakes for Literacy. The website will be a place where people can listen to stories and also pursue other opportunities for literacy. Her friends are even involved in the project, and they have formed a Board of Directors consisting of students.

The business venture has been very successful so far. She had a bake sale during a parent-teacher conference and was able to raise $258 during the six hours that it took. The money was given to the school’s library.

“It was neat to see an idea that sparked from a book turn into something that was able to give back to the school,” said Bollman Bridge’s media specialist Sandy Sneeringer. “The money she raised is going towards purchasing more books that our students like to read.”

Hillman’s great success is all due to her business practices, according to her mother.

“Krissa has learned to go where the people are, sell the best products and treat the customer’s great. That’s exactly what she’s doing with this,” Wilson said.

Hillman is putting together another bake sale that will take place over the summer, but at this time she is focused on her presentation to Warren Buffett.

“I have a script I’m going over,” said Hillman. “Part of the competition is an exhibit where we can explore each other’s business ideas, so I’m also practicing communication and how to shake hands.”

If Hillman does win the grand prize and earns the $5000, she is going to put the money toward purchasing business licenses. That way she’ll be able to operate Cupcakes for Literacy on a much broader scale. It’s her goal to eventually partner with grocery stores and farmers markets so she can bring her cupcakes to a much wider audience.

Even though it’s tough to run a business, Hillman says that it’s simple for someone her age as long a she’s doing something that she loves, just like baking cupcakes.

“You just have to be really into whatever you’re doing,” she said. “Find programs to get involved with and talk to other people with businesses to get help. Just try it out and see what happens!”

Warren Buffett, billionaire investor, encourages young workers to seek out jobs of which they are passionate about. This is career advice that he offered to youngsters online this Tuesday when he spoke about a number of topics.

Every year, Mr. Buffett takes time out of his busy schedule and he meets with students from roughly 40 colleges. He does this to answer questions about business and life. This Tuesday he did so in an online forum, and he had the opportunity to offer his advice to a much wider audience.

Buffett often chooses to compare the things he does as CEO and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway to painting a canvas with a masterpiece. He also regularly tells us that it doesn’t feel like he works because he loves what he does.

“I love painting on my canvas, and you’re lucky in life if you can find your passion,” said Buffett.

The 82-year-old Oracle of Omaha was fortunate that he figured out what he wanted to do early on in his life when he read books that he found lying around at his dad’s securities brokerage. Now his daily routine consists of finding the best deals for Berkshire Hathaway by reading five or six hours a day, speaking with his friends and playing online bridge.

Buffett tells us that he does not often do things that he doesn’t enjoy, and he’s been able to hand off almost all of the day-to-day tasks of running his company that has 285,000 employees, and other people take care of this for him.

“I have delegated like nobody has ever delegated with a company of this size,” said Buffett.

Berkshire Hathaway actually owns more than 80 subsidiaries, and they include furniture stores, jewelry stores, clothing stores and railroads. They are also in the insurance and utility business, which makes up about more than half of the income that Berkshire Hathaway enjoys. Plus, the company has large investments in businesses such as Wells Fargo, IBM, American Express and Coca-Cola.

Berkshire’s Class A shares, which actually make up the majority of Warren Buffett’s fortune, are still currently the most expensive stock in the United States of America. At Tuesday’s closing, the stock finished the day at $164,690 per share.

Money is not the only way you should measure the success of Warren Buffett. Did you know that he continues to live in the home in Omaha that he bought in 1958? Buffett’s lifestyle could allow him to live on $100,000 a year very easily, with the exception of the private jet that he really enjoys.

Last weekend alone, Warren Buffett spent over five hours answering questions for more than 30,000 people at the annual shareholder meeting held by Berkshire Hathaway. He even entertains groups of shareholders at events and steak dinners during the weekend.

This Tuesday Buffett spent around an hour responding to questions sent to the Levo League website. They help young professionals find job opportunities and mentors early in their career.

“It’s really important in life to have the right heroes,” said Buffett.

Buffett also mentioned that being able to study at Columbia University under Benjamin Graham, and working for Graham’s investment firm for two years, helped solidify his understanding of Graham’s investment techniques that Buffett used to create his huge fortune. Buffett also mentions that his first wife and his father’s influence also played a major role in his success because they taught him about life.

Buffett encourages the younger generation to try and work for and associate with those that they admire.

“If you’re working for somebody that makes your stomach turn, maybe you have to keep doing it for a while to eat, but don’t settle for it,” said Buffett.

For the most part, the annual meeting hosted by Berkshire Hathaway is usually a lovefest for the Oracle of Omaha.

Things are going to be different this Saturday, when a hedge fund manager picked directly by Warren Buffett himself tries to add a measure of skepticism to the otherwise happy-go-lucky proceedings.

“It’s fair to say that I’m Daniel in the lion’s den,” said Douglas Kass this past Thursday during the middle of his trip to Nebraska. He is the head of Seabreeze Partner’s Management. “But I’ve prepared intensely.

Mr. Kass is openly bearish on Berkshire Hathaway and he believes that the stock price is going to fall. He is the latest addition to a shareholder meeting formula that has been in place for decades at this time. In early May of each year, over 18,000 shareholders head to Omaha in order to listen to what beloved CEO and Chairman Warren Buffett has to say.

Throughout the years, the majority of the questions asked of Warren Buffett have been relatively soft. People ask about his religious beliefs and sometimes they may ask about the global economy.

This year, Buffett has chosen to try and toughen up the questions at the 2013 annual meeting. This is the exact opposite of what most publicly trading companies attempt to do. He also asked analysts and reporters to ask tougher questions this year as well.

But the boldest move yet is to invite Douglas Kass. He is a hedge fund manager that is known frequently for his contrarian positions. He often voices his opinions in appearances on television shows that talk about business, and he also has a column on TheStreet.com. It’s also known that Douglas Kass spent time working for Ralph Nader during his student years.

“See if you can drive the stock price down to 10%,” teased Warren Buffett while talking to his new foil in March during an interview on CNBC.

Over the years, Douglas Kass has repeatedly looked into the weaknesses of Berkshire Hathaway. He even wrote an article about them on TheStreet.com. The weaknesses mentioned at the time were the advanced age of Warren Buffett plus the company’s slow growth.

Douglas Kass has a short position on the shares of Berkshire Hathaway. He didn’t disclose the size of the position, but said it is an average size for him. Over the past month, Kass has thoroughly read up on Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway, and he’s whittled 25 attention grabbing questions down to just six.

If Buffett answers two of the six questions, it will generate seriously big news. The four others have never been asked of Buffett before.

At the same token, Douglas Kass says that he is actually a strong admirer of Warren Buffett, who some people refer to as the Oracle of Omaha. Since Kass first began his research, he said he found a number of similarities between himself and Buffett. One similarity is that they both have been treated for prostate cancer, and another is they both used to collect discarded horseracing tickets during their younger years.

Douglas Kass is bringing his son and a group of friends to his first Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting.

“I’m psyched,” said Kass. “It’s like the financial World Series to me.”

Apart from Douglas Kass, many of the usual elements that you’d find at a Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting will still be in place this year. Buffett is still likely to say that his company – a major conglomerate that owns running shoes, railroads and private jets as part of its holdings – has a full plan for succession in place when he finally does decide to retire from his position. (Don’t be surprised if he doesn’t say who he plans to have succeed him as CEO.)

It’s also probable that Buffett will discuss his burning desire to make bigger deals, which is his major claim to fame at this point. Oddly enough, neither of his acquisitions so far this year qualifies as giant takeovers. Along with a Brazilian investment firm, Berkshire Hathaway bought H.J. Heinz for $23 billion. Berkshire also purchased 20% of IMC, the Israeli tool maker. It already owned the other 80% of the company, and they paid $2 billion for the last 20%.

“It’s back to work; Charlie and I have again donned our safari outfits and resumed our search for elephants,” wrote Buffett in his annual letter to shareholders. The Charlie he’s referring to is his longtime investment partner and vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, Charles T. Munger.

It is also expected that Warren Buffett will discuss buying out newspapers recently, since he has bought 28 dailies over the last year and a half for a total of $344 million. This campaign for acquisitions is definitely not his most expensive to date, but Buffett describes it as an addiction because he sees such value in local newspapers.

It’s uncertain as of yet if anyone will ask Buffett about a future move to social media. At 11:20 AM on Thursday, Omaha time, Buffett decided to overcome his aversion to technology and posted his first Twitter message. He wrote “Warren is in the house,” and a cameraman from Fortune magazine caught the whole thing on video.

The tweet was reposted over 25,000 times later that same afternoon, and his Twitter account already has over 176,000 followers. Douglas Kass is among them, and he is also a prolific Twitter user. He is using the micro blogging platform to document his passage to Omaha.

This was a major surprise to everyone, since Buffett once said that he missed an important message about Lehman Brothers because he had no idea how to check the voicemail on his phone.

“I guess he’s not as much of a Luddite as he professes,” said Kass.

Buffett hinted that Twitter was a little bit more of his style than some of the other social media platforms.

“The co-founder came from Nebraska, so it can’t all be bad,” said Buffett in reference to Evan Williams, Twitter co-founder.

Yes, you read that correctly. A young group of entrepreneurs have won the opportunity to present their business pitches to billionaire investor Warren Buffett.

The children making their pitches are between the ages of seven and 16 years old. The chosen few come from a group of 4000 entrants into the online competition.

This contest is directly tied to “The Secret Millionaires Club” cartoon. This is the cartoon where Warren Buffett appears in each episode and teaches the financial lessons to the children.

The Fairholme Foundation is sponsoring this contest and the By Kids For Kids Co. is overseeing the competition.

Three teams and five individuals are being flown into Omaha where they will present their ideas to Warren Buffett as well as a panel of judges.

There will be an online vote that takes place between May 6 through May 13, and this will help the finalists in their effort to win the grand prize in the amount of $5000. Each runner-up will receive $500 worth of prizes.

Warren Buffett, the most famous investor in America, really holds himself to a much higher standard than most. That’s why he describes the business year of 2012 as “subpar” even though Berkshire Hathaway made a total of $24.1 billion for its shareholders. Buffett pointed out that only for the ninth time in Berkshire Hathaway’s 48 years, their book value of 14.4% was actually less than the S&P’s gain of 16%. This is basically how Buffett kicks off his annual letter, which he released on Friday, March 1. If you are interested in investing, then this document is a must read for you and anyone else interested in this field. It’s filled with plenty of Warren Buffett’s homespun, wry style.

Putting aside the “subpar” performance of Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett’s other major regret was the “inability” to achieve a major accomplishment during 2012. “I pursued a couple of elephants, but came up empty handed,” wrote Buffett. He did find his mojo again during the early part of 2013, being part of a blockbuster 23.3 billion-dollar acquisition of H.J. Heinz Co., the ketchup giant. Berkshire Hathaway is putting up $12 billion to purchase half of the company, along with another group of investors led by Brazilian businessman Jorge Paulo, who is buying the other half of the company.

Buffett wrote that now that this deal is done, it’s time for more big game hunting. “Charlie and I have again donned our safari outfits and resumed our search for elephants.” (Charlie Munger is long-time partner to Warren Buffett and friend of many years.)

Without question, the Buffett annual letter to shareholders is quite educational in regards to his philosophy of value investing, which he learned from Benjamin Graham, his mentor and author of The Intelligent Investor, a classic business tome.

Buffett’s investing philosophy is quite simple: Invest in easy to understand companies, for the long-term, with managers who love their business, and the businesses are currently undervalued. Always disregard all flavor of the month trends.

Buffett personally loves to invest in large, extremely reliable American businesses. This explains why the four biggest Berkshire Hathaway investments are in Wells Fargo, Coca-Cola, IBM and American Express. He increased Berkshire Hathaway’s ownership stake in all of these companies during 2012. The Omaha, Nebraska-based investment firm now owns 8.9% of Coca-Cola, 6% of IBM, 13.7% of American Express and 8.7% of Wells Fargo. “Berkshire’s ownership interest in all four companies is likely to increase in the future,” wrote Buffett. “Mae West had it right: ‘Too much of a good thing can be wonderful.’”

Let’s now take a look at some of the major highlights of the Berkshire Hathaway annual letter:

Guessing about Succession: The question asked most frequently in American capitalism is this: Who is going to finally replace the 82-year-old Warren Buffett? Buffett has made it quite clear that his duties are going to be divided among an investment manager – who is responsible for the allocation of Berkshire’s money – and a CEO, ultimately in charge of running the entire $170 billion empire that is Berkshire Hathaway. Warren Buffett confirmed last year that Ted Weschler and Todd Combs, two relatively unknown hedge fund managers, will be replacing him on the investment side. Buffett was very pleased with their performance during 2012.

Weschler and Combs “have proved to be smart, models of integrity, helpful to Berkshire in many ways beyond portfolio management, and a perfect fit,” wrote Buffett. “We hit the jackpot with these two. In 2012 each outperformed the S&P 500 by double-digit margins.” Buffett then added mischievously, in a very tiny font: “They left me in the dust as well.” As a result of this excellent performance, Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway have decided to increase their investment funds to around $5 billion. “Todd and Ted are young and will be around to manage Berkshire’s massive portfolio long after Charlie and I have left the scene. You can rest easy when they take over,” wrote Buffett.

On the side of management, Warren Buffett didn’t provide any clues, but he did heavily praise Ajit Jain, a longtime favorite of Buffett who manages the reinsurance group of Berkshire Hathaway worth in the multi-billions. He is widely looked upon as one of the top candidates to take over the CEO position at Berkshire. “From a standing start in 1985, Ajit has created an insurance business with float of $35 billion and a significant cumulative underwriting profit, a feat that no other insurance CEO has come close to matching,” wrote Buffett. “He has thus added a great many billions of dollars to the value of Berkshire. If you meet Ajit at the annual meeting, bow deeply.”

Newspapers: We all know that Buffett loves newspapers, “and if the economics make sense, [Berkshire] will buy them even when they fall far short of the size threshold we would require for purchase of, say, a widget company.” Over the last 15 months, Berkshire Hathaway has acquired 28 daily newspapers and paid $344 million for the privilege, he wrote, even with his long-standing prediction that “the circulation, advertising and profits of the newspaper industry overall are certain to decline.”

Here’s Warren Buffett’s logic: “News, to put it simply, is what people don’t know that they want to know,” wrote Buffett. “And people will seek their news – what’s important to them – from whatever sources provide the best combination of immediacy, ease of access, reliability, comprehensiveness and low cost.” Buffett will readily admit that the Internet has been a disruption on the traditional newspaper business model, causing a drastic decline in revenues and readership. But there’s one particular area in this industry where Buffett sees an opportunity:

Newspapers continue to reign supreme, however, in the delivery of local news. If you want to know what’s going on in your town – whether the news is about the mayor or taxes or high school football – there is no substitute for a local newspaper that is doing its job. A reader’s eyes may glaze over after they take in a couple of paragraphs about Canadian tariffs or political developments in Pakistan; a story about the reader himself or his neighbors will be read to the end. Wherever there is a pervasive sense of community, a paper that serves the special informational needs of that community will remain indispensable to a significant portion of its residents. [...]

Charlie and I believe that papers delivering comprehensive and reliable information to tightly-bound communities and having a sensible Internet strategy will remain viable for a long time. We do not believe that success will come from cutting either the news content or frequency of publication. Indeed, skimpy news coverage will almost certainly lead to skimpy readership. And the less-than-daily publication that is now being tried in some large towns or cities – while it may improve profits in the short term – seems certain to diminish the papers’ relevance over time. Our goal is to keep our papers loaded with content of interest to our readers and to be paid appropriately by those who find us useful, whether the product they view is in their hands or on the Internet.

Uncertainty: In one of the more surprising parts of the annual Berkshire letter, Warren Buffett called out a few of his fellow US CEOs who have “cried ‘uncertainty’ when faced with capital allocation decisions (despite many of their businesses having enjoyed record levels of both earnings and cash).” Buffett is an optimist for America, who wrote that he is not in agreement with their concerns. “If you are a CEO who has some large, profitable project you are shelving because of short-term worries, call Berkshire. Let us unburden you,” wrote Buffett.

American business will do fine over time. And stocks will do well just as certainly, since their fate is tied to business performance. Periodic setbacks will occur, yes, but investors and managers are in a game that is heavily stacked in their favor. (The Dow Jones Industrials advanced from 66 to 11,497 in the 20th Century, a staggering 17,320% increase that materialized despite four costly wars, a Great Depression and many recessions. And don’t forget that shareholders received substantial dividends throughout the century as well.)

Since the basic game is so favorable, Charlie and I believe it’s a terrible mistake to try to dance in and out of it based upon the turn of tarot cards, the predictions of “experts,” or the ebb and flow of business activity. The risks of being out of the game are huge compared to the risks of being in it. My own history provides a dramatic example: I made my first stock purchase in the spring of 1942 when the U.S. was suffering major losses throughout the Pacific war zone. Each day’s headlines told of more setbacks. Even so, there was no talk about uncertainty; every American I knew believed we would prevail.

The country’s success since that perilous time boggles the mind: On an inflation-adjusted basis, GDP per capita more than quadrupled between 1941 and 2012. Throughout that period, every tomorrow has been uncertain. America’s destiny, however, has always been clear: ever-increasing abundance.

Omaha, Nebraska, Next Stop: The Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholders meeting is known as the Woodstock of capitalism – and for very good reason. Each year, tens of thousands of the Berkshire Hathaway faithful make a pilgrimage to the annual meeting of the company, which takes place in Omaha, Nebraska on May 4 this year. It is quite the spectacle: imagine for a moment a Grateful Dead concert populated by hard-core, and in certain cases, the very wealthy, true believers in capitalism. Everyone is always in a great mood. Among this year’s highlights are:

• Berkshire Hathaway’s second annual international newspaper tossing challenge. “Last year I successfully fought off all challengers,” wrote Buffett. “But now Berkshire has acquired a large number of newspapers and with them came much tossing talent (or so the thrower’s claim). Come see whether their talent matches their talk.”
• The “Berkshire 5K” race will start at CenturyLink Center, the arena that holds 19,000 seats and is also the location of the annual meeting. “We will have plenty of categories for competition, including one for the media,” wrote Buffett. “Regretfully, I will forgo running; someone has to man the starting gun.”
• On Sunday, May 5, they hold the Borsheims Fine Jewelry gala. (Berkshire has owned Borsheims, the Omaha-based company, since 1989.) “Around 1 PM on Sunday, I will begin clerking at Borsheims,” wrote Buffett. “Last year my sales totaled 1.5 million. This year I won’t quit until I hit the $2 million. Because I need to leave well before sundown, I will be desperate to do business. Come take advantage of me. Ask for my ‘Crazy Warren’ price.”

The annual Berkshire Hathaway meeting is always a very memorable experience. Buffett can seem like he’s ageless at times, but unfortunately, that just isn’t the case. So if you happen to be a Berkshire Hathaway shareholder in the area of Omaha during the first weekend of May, you never know who you’re going to run into at Piccolo’s or Gorat’s. “These restaurants are my favorites, and I will eat at both of them on Sunday evening,” wrote Buffett. If you decide to go to Piccolo’s, “order a giant root beer float for dessert,” advises Buffett. “Only sissies get the small one. (I once saw Bill Gates polish off two of the giant variety after a full course dinner; that’s when I knew he would make a great director.)”

Warren Buffett once told us that avoiding dividends during the early years of Berkshire Hathaway gave him the ability to refocus the company’s money on better businesses, just like a person would overcome “a misspent youth.”

The billionaire Warren Buffett, now 82 years old, is focusing on his legacy as he prepares Berkshire Hathaway for new management as his time with the company winds down to a close. Using the annual letter being published on March 1 as a way to outline a dividend plan could show shareholders a way for the next leaders of the company to look at the challenge of allocating profits.

“It may ease the burden on the successors” if they have the ability to pay a dividend, Richard Cook tells us, co manager of the Cook & Bynum Fund, which has Berkshire Hathaway as one of its largest holdings. Berkshire and its subsidiaries “generate a lot of cash.”

Buffett’s annual letter is there to teach Berkshire Hathaway shareholders about corporate governance, investing and business, as well as the annual meetings in Omaha, Nebraska, where the company is located. As Berkshire grew through acquisitions and investment gains, so did its rather large pile of cash, which by the end of September 2012 amounted $47.8 billion. This large sum has made it very difficult to allocate the funds, since it is often difficult to find large investments that are worthwhile, we learned from Buffett himself.

The CEO and Chairman started buying back Berkshire shares in 2011 and used part of the most recent annual letter to explain when share repurchasing made sense. Last May, while on CNBC, he said that he would probably discuss the makings of a logical dividend policy in the upcoming annual letter.

Buffett’s Blessing

“It’s a very sensible move” to discuss when the company should begin paying a dividend, so the next CEO of Berkshire Hathaway will appear to have a Buffett’s blessing, we learned from Tom Russo, currently a partner at Gardner Russo & Gardener, overseer of more than US$5 billion, and that includes Berkshire Hathaway shares. After Warren Buffett is gone, many will have “a tendency to second-guess,” said Russo.

In 1965, Warren Buffett took over Berkshire Hathaway and changed it from a company that made men’s suit linings and textiles, and turned it into a $251 billion company that currently has retail businesses, lots of manufacturing companies, subsidiaries that generate electricity, they sell insurance and haul freight among many other things. His opinions about investments, due to his excellent record of accomplishment, make his annual letters a must read on Wall Street.

In his 1985 letter, Warren Buffett said that dividends make sense when a company’s managers cannot generate adequate returns when keeping the money inside the business. Berkshire Hathaway never paid a dividend because it’s always been able to earn better rates on retained profits, he told us at the time.

Averting Disaster

Buffett once wrote that paying a significant amount of money to his investors could have actually been “disastrous” in the beginning because the three businesses that he and Charlie Munger oversaw in the beginning had very little money. They also incurred losses and were only a fraction of their original size just 20 years later.

“It’s been like overcoming a misspent youth,” said Buffett of the Berkshire Hathaway effort to expand their chocolate making, newspaper publishing and insurance businesses. “Clearly, diversification has served us well.”

Buffett continually finds the best ways to invest the extra cash that Berkshire Hathaway has on hand. Over the last 30 years, he’s amassed tremendous stakes in large companies including IBM, Coca-Cola and Wells Fargo & Co. He even buys whole companies such as General Re reinsurer and Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad.

Just this month, he teamed up with Jorge Paulo Lehman’s 3G Capital in a deal worth $23 billion to purchase H.J. Heinz Co. and make it a private company. The deal will provide Berkshire Hathaway with $4.1 billion worth of equity and $8 billion in preferred stock that pays a dividend of 9%, we learned from the regulatory filing.

Charles Munger’s Wish

Warren Buffett points out his own mistakes in his annual letters, and he also uses them to praise his managers like Ajit Jain, his reinsurance chief, and the CEO of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Matt Rose. Warren Buffett relies heavily upon the subsidiary heads to oversee the day-to-day operations of these businesses. This leaves him and Charlie Munger the time they need to allocate the profits properly.

I believe that some of the people reading this article will live to see the day when Berkshire Hathaway pays a dividend. But hopefully it isn’t in the very near future.

The enormous size of Berkshire Hathaway could very well make a dividend a necessity at some point in the future since they may not have a better way to invest the accumulated funds, we heard from Munger at a meeting during 2011 in Pasadena, California.

“I think that some of you will live to see Berkshire pay a dividend, but I hope I don’t,” said Munger, 87 years old at the time, responding to the question of a member of the audience. “You’re saying, ‘Do you predict failure?’ And I suppose I do.”

During last year’s annual letter, Warren Buffett told us that the board chose a manager to take over as the next CEO, but they chose not to identify this individual. For a while now, Mr. Buffett has been allowing his investment managers Ted Weschler and Todd Combs to oversee more of the company’s $88 billion worth of stock.

Stock Rally

As of this morning, Berkshire Class A shares gained 0.5% to reach the amount of $152,650 at the opening around 9:35 AM in New York. Over the last 12 months, Berkshire has rallied for a 29% gain due to the gains in their operating units, a buy back in stock and Bank of America Corp. investment. In the same period of time, the S&P 500 index only gained 10%.

One roadblock to potentially paying a dividend now is that Warren Buffett, as the largest shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway, would have to do something with the payments he earns, said Russo. You probably know that he has pledged the majority of his wealth to charity, but he still has stock in Berkshire Hathaway worth more than $50 billion.

“Warren doesn’t want cash. He doesn’t need it. He doesn’t want the burden of investing it,” said Russo.

Paying a dividend could certainly makes sense once Buffett is no longer leading the firm, and more of the current shares he has passed over to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as well as his children’s philanthropic endeavors, Russo said. These charitable organizations are obligated to spend the money generated by a dividend, Russo also said.

The mutual fund manager, Cook, said he’d rather Berkshire skip paying a dividend and hold onto the cash for the time being.

“You’ve got a 50 year track record of being the best capital allocator in the world,” said Cook of Buffett. “As long as he’s alive, we think we’re generally better off with him” handling the money.

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett will release his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders in the near future on March 1.

Buffett likes to release his Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letter, along with the company’s annual report, over the weekend on a Saturday. But due to regulatory deadlines, he will be forced to release the report instead on a Friday afternoon. This is the first time it’s happened since 2008.

As far as business documents are concerned, the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letter is the best read and most quoted business document. Warren Buffett uses great skill and humor when explaining the very complicated subject matter of investing. The chairman and CEO also talks about other topics besides the financial results of the company.

Investors like to read Warren Buffett’s annual letter hoping to find insight into what Berkshire Hathaway will buy next, and it’s a great way to see if you can figure out who’s going to lead the conglomerate based out of Omaha, Nebraska once Mr. Buffett is no longer with us.

Warren Buffett is a billionaire investor who has taken out stakes in some of the largest United States banks, who tells us that the lenders have rebuilt their capital to the levels where they aren’t a possible threat to the economy any longer.

“The banks will not get this country in trouble, I guarantee it,” said Buffett – the CEO and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, based out of Omaha, Nebraska – in an interview that he gave over the phone last week. “The capital ratios are huge, the excesses on the asset side have been largely cleared out.”

Major lenders including Citigroup Inc. and Bank of America Corp. have sold off their assets, bolstered their balance sheets and cut many jobs after they repaid the 2008 taxpayer bailouts, when these companies were truly overwhelmed by losses on housing market related securities. All of those actions helped raise the value of Berkshire Hathaway’s holdings, and increase financial stocks at the same time.

Berkshire Hathaway has invested in at least four of the seven biggest lenders in the United States of America by assets, and has also taken out more than a $14 billion stake in Wells Fargo and Co., based out of San Francisco. They have a $5 billion stake in Bank of America, and they have $5 billion worth of warrants to purchase shares of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Berkshire Hathaway has a stake in U.S. Bancorp as well.

“Our banking system is in the best shape in recent memory,” said Buffett.

Past bank regulators and executives tell us that the biggest lenders still pose some risk to the United States economy even four years after the bailout, plus 2 1/2 years since legislators passed the largest major reforms to regulation on Wall Street since the Great Depression.

Trading Loss

Last year, J.P. Morgan Chase and Co. took a trading loss of $6.2 billion, which reminded America of our concerns for the banking industry. Sandy Weill, former CEO of Citigroup, mentions that lending money and taking deposits should be split off from investment banking as a way to prevent another major financial crisis.

Other investors have also spoke about their doubts and the accounting of banks. Even after the stock rally last year, J.P. Morgan, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup are all trading at less their book value, which is a calculation of how much a company’s assets should be worth if you subtract their liabilities.

There were mergers taking place during the financial crisis that brought about criticism, saying that too big to fail banking companies are getting even larger. Buffett mentions that this shouldn’t worry investors at all. Canadian banks managed to get through this crisis a lot better than other banks in many nations, as the biggest firms in Canada took hold of more market share than their counterparts in the United States did.

U.S. Advantages

“We do not have an unusually concentrated banking system compared to the rest of the world, and there are certain advantages in the largest capital market in the world to have banks that are somewhat consistent with the size of those markets,” said Buffett.

The biggest United States banks are going to face another round of Federal Reserve stress tests to figure out whether or not they have enough capital to raise dividends and buy back shares of their stock. Brian T. Moynihan, CEO of Bank of America, tells us that he’s confident BOA is going to pass even though they failed in 2011, when he did not receive the approval to increase the dividend.

Buffett also lent Bank of America credibility by providing the bank capital during 2011, after the company saw a 45% decline in share price during an eighth month period. This trade also followed moves during 2008 that Warren Buffett made by helping out General Electric Company and Goldman Sachs during the financial crisis. Both of the companies bought back the preferred shares that they sold to Warren Buffett. He also expects that Bank of America may potentially do the same.

Improved Condition

“Their condition has improved so significantly, and interest rates are so low, that they have the chance to do a number of things in that respect,” said Buffett. “I may like to keep it, but if it makes sense for them to call it, they’re going to call it.”

The preferred shares that Berkshire Hathaway owns of Bank of America pay an annual dividend of 6%, and they can redeem them at any time for the amount of $5.25 billion, according to the terms of the deal that was made. The deal also gives Warren Buffett 10 year warrants to buy 700 million shares of common stock from Bank of America at $7.14 apiece. Bank of America recently closed at $11.43 per share. If Warren Buffett were to exercise that option at those prices, he would make about $3 billion.

Buffett mentions that Berkshire Hathaway is most likely going to wait toward the end of the contract before they exercise that option.

“We’re in no hurry,” said Buffett. “Nine years from now I would think that Bank of America as well as Wells Fargo and probably the other major banks will be worth considerably more than they are now.”

A spokesman for Bank of America named Larry DiRita chose not to comment on Warren Buffett’s Bank of America investment.

Their Tier 1 capital ratio has almost reached 9% as of September 30 based on the newest standards internationally, and it’s up from about 8% just three months earlier. Their long-term debt dropped to $286.5 billion by the end of the third quarter, and this is down from $399 billion just one year earlier.

Does Warren Buffett know something that the rest of us don’t?

Well, it wouldn’t be surprising since he is the second wealthiest man in the United States of America, and he is estimated to be worth $46 billion at this time. If I was a betting man, I’d say that he definitely knows a lot more than I do.

That’s why I’m really interested in his latest business purchase: Oriental Trading Co., which is a mail order business that sells novelties, supplies, crafts, school supplies and toys.

But why did he make this purchase? Is it just a matter of buying a local business? Oriental Trading Co. and Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. are both located in his hometown of Omaha, Nebraska.

Or is Warren Buffett, 82-year-old billionaire, just a fun-loving and happy party animal?

He does own a lot of party related businesses. First up, we have International Dairy Queen Inc., so he has the snack portion of the Obama victory party covered already. Let’s not forget about See’s Candies, which would make excellent party favors. If he wants to go all out and really take care of the partygoers, he can always give them some Helzberg Diamonds. Last but not least, if one of the partygoers happens to get into some kind of an accident, he can help them out by allowing them access to his Geico Insurance Company.

Let’s also remember that he bought most of the newspapers under Media General Inc.’s banner, and he even bought the Omaha World-Herald, which is his hometown newspaper. So he can easily get as much publicity as he wants, and even put his picture in the paper with his favorite party hat on…

There is no question that Warren Buffett is ruling the 21st-century party scene, just like the John D. Rockefeller/Standard Oil of yesteryear.

But this latest Oriental Trading Co. deal shows us that there are some good things on the horizon for America in the future. If the second richest man in the United States of America feels that buying a party supply company is a good bet in our current economy, then he also thinks that Americans are going to have plenty of reasons to celebrate in the near future.

I might be going out on a limb with this next statement, but does Warren Buffett’s latest move come off as a good omen for President Obama? Obama and the rest of the Democrats were thrilled when Warren Buffett told the world that he was in favor of the rich paying more money in taxes – which was later dubbed the Buffett rule. On the other hand, he did not make any new friends in the Republican Party when he made that statement.

So we have to presume that Warren Buffett thinks America is ready to start partying once again, and the party is going to get started by the current president that’s already in power. At least that’s my take based on his current purchase of Oriental Trading Co.

But obviously I could be wrong.

On the other hand, Mrs. Buffett may have just asked him to pick up some party supplies, and since Warren Buffett always think big, he may have just gotten a bit carried away.

Ted Weschler is already proving his value to Berkshire Hathaway as much more than a stock picker. He has a knack for finding value in distressed companies. Since Ted joined Berkshire Hathaway this past January, the former hedge fund manager, at 51 years old, has already gone above and beyond the call of duty.

He’s made a bid for a mortgage business in bankruptcy, brought Berkshire Hathaway further into the newspaper publishing business through one of his negotiations, and he has reviewed potential takeover targets – all while running an equity portfolio worth multiple billions of dollars.

Ted Weschler and Todd Combs, Berkshire Hathaway’s other investment manager, oversee their own chunk of the $86.2 billion stock portfolio that Berkshire Hathaway owns. This past July, Warren Buffett gave each man $4 billion and the sole responsibility to invest it the way they choose.

Weschler is currently expanding his role with the company, and because of it, and the experience that he has, makes him an excellent candidate to take over as head of the company once the 82-year-old Warren Buffett decides to retire. We learn this from Alice Schroeder, the author of The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life.

“He has a background in broad capital management, including private equity, mergers and acquisitions, owing businesses, and being directly involved in their management,” she said. Schroeder also mentions that takeovers are going to continue to be a very integral part of Berkshire Hathaway in his future if the company plans to continue growing at its current pace.

Just like Warren Buffett, Ted Weschler has created a style of investing that heavily relies on patience, knowing the ins and outs of any potential investment’s financials, plus a wide range of interests in many industries. We gathered this information through dozens of interviews with business acquaintances, friends and former colleagues of Weschler.

And just like Warren Buffett, Weschler created the bulk of his fortune away from Wall Street. The majority of his 30 year career was spent in his hometown of Charlottesville, Virginia, where he built a private equity firm and then started his own hedge fund later on – named Peninsula Capital Advisors. As you know, Warren Buffett decided to keep the home of Berkshire Hathaway in his hometown of Omaha, even through the entirety of its expansion. The company now employs more than 250,000 people, and it’s worth more than $200 billion.

Ted Weschler divides his time between Charlottesville and Omaha, as he collaborates with the heads of the Berkshire Hathaway operating units, and helps look into potential takeover targets, according to someone familiar with the role that wants to keep his or her identity private.

Weschler did not comment for this story, but he has helped Warren Buffett buy 63 newspapers from Media General (including the Richmond Times-Dispatch), as well as refinance its debt. He also handled the negotiations when Berkshire Hathaway bid on the assets of mortgage lender Residential Capital, which is a bankrupt unit of Ally Financial.

Associates and friends of Ted Weschler – whose father was an executive at A&P – has had a long desire to make lots of money. He wrote in his middle school yearbook that he wanted to become a millionaire, we learned from Chris Hagerty, director of advancement at Cathedral Preparatory School in Erie, Pennsylvania. Weschler also sold cigars to his fellow classmates while in high school, as they traveled to watch the school’s basketball team compete to win the state championship.

Weschler earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, where he went on to work for chemical maker W.R. Grace. For two years, he served as the assistant to J Peter Grace, who led the company for over four decades.

In his role as assistant, Weschler had to attend every budget and operating review meeting with the head of the company, as well as looking over capital requests from natural resources, restaurant, healthcare, chemical and retail operations, which we learned from Terry Daniels, then vice chairman of Grace. “It was a tremendous learning experience. You got to see executives and how they responded,” said Daniels.

Weschler joined Daniels in 1989 when he started his private equity firm, which is now named Quad-C Management, based out of Charlottesville, Virginia. Just like Warren Buffett, Ted Weschler focused on only a handful of companies for his investments, and he held those investments for many years. Before Berkshire Hathaway announced Ted Weschler’s hiring during the second quarter of 2011, the entire hedge fund’s portfolio was only spread out among nine different companies, according to filings. Peninsula owned five of those stocks just three years earlier.

Ted Weschler was responsible for Peninsula, and managed their $2 billion dollar US stockholdings from a small two room office above a Charlottesville Virginia bookstore. He often went to work in shorts and short sleeve T-shirts, we learned from Michael David, a friend and former colleague that currently runs a hedge fund in Akron, Ohio. “He’s still stunned by the fact that he’s become incredibly wealthy,” Hawes Spencer said (Weschler backed him when he started a weekly newspaper in 2002 in Charlottesville, Virginia named Hook). “If I saw a Rolex on his wrist, I would faint.”

Also like Warren Buffett, Weschler made it a point to study lots of company filings and industry publications so he can get an overall edge in any industry. He once told Michael David that he wouldn’t invest in a company unless he studied them and the idea for at least 500 hours. “He’d go on vacation and take 10-Ks and 10-Qs with him,” David said, referring to SEC reports of publicly traded companies. “He still does.” It’s not surprising that he was able land a job with Berkshire Hathaway with that approach. It also didn’t hurt that he won two charity auctions in both 2010 and 2011, which he paid $2.63 million each time to have meals with Warren Buffett.

During 2001, workers claimed that Grace’s asbestos products were causing illnesses and forms of cancer, so they declared bankruptcy. Weschler amassed a stake of roughly 15% of the chemical maker by the end of that year.

He worked with the plaintiff’s attorneys and the company, and he was able to help broker a settlement in 2008 that will create trusts that take responsibility for the asbestos claims, while protecting the shareholders from being wiped out.

“He understood the issues for my clients weren’t all dollars and cents,” says Joe Rice, one of the attorneys working on the case on behalf of the injured workers. “He was a catalyst.”

The company stock has risen around 40 times over since the initial bankruptcy filing, and it was one of the main reasons why Peninsula Capital Management gained over 1000% during the years 2000 through 2011, which is the time that Weschler closed the fund.

As of October 19, 2012, Weschler owns $3.74 million worth of Grace shares, and it’s estimated that they would currently be worth about $225 million.

Warren Buffett mentioned last year that Ajit Jain, 61, his reinsurance lieutenant, would most likely have the support of the board to become the next CEO if he decided that he wanted the job. Schroeder believes that Weschler is also a very good long-term choice if he can prove himself to Buffett. “Warren keeps describing him as an investment manager,” she says. “But the reality is his skills are more comparable to those of Warren himself.”

Here’s the bottom line: as well as overseeing a large part of Berkshire Hathaway’s $86.2 billion stock portfolio, Weschler also reviews takeover targets and negotiates deals.