When I heard last week's news that Warren Buffett's decision to resign from his powerful Berkshire Hathaway Empire reminded me of what has bothered me for years.
It involves the annual letters of great investors to Berkshire shareholders. For decades, they have been one of the most insightful, cheerful and best reading documents in the financial world. Endless quotes. Collected in the book. Great education.
Buffett really helped. Financial journalist Carol Loomis edited the letters. Even so, how did so many other financial heavyweights with so many assistants and so many resources repeatedly generate letters of the year that match Buffett’s? Of course, many people are keen. But why not deploy more simplicity, wit and humility that makes Buffett's omission so successful?
I guess a lot doesn't want to.
One of the greatest advantages of Buffett's letters is the number of times he acknowledges or intoxicates that others pay to others' groups, pay Wall Street PR staff and lawyers buried a few: a mistake.
"During the 2019-23 period, I used the word "error" or "error" 16 times in my letter to you," he wrote in his latest letter in February.
In fact, he has been writing about him “unmandatory mistakes”, stupid decisions and expensive mistakes. But it's a 2021 classic, about "the ugly $11 billion written," he said almost all because of Berkshire's 2016 purchase of the Precision Castparts Manufacturing Group. “I paid too much,” he wrote, adding: “This is far from my first mistake.
You might say that if you spend sixty years making your numerous shareholder millionaires earn sixty years, this kind of admission is easy. Despite all his confessions, readers can still see Buffett's results astonishing.
But, you can also say that going to the wrong steps helps explain this success. Either way, it breeds a certain level of trust and does not always give the financial greatness and benefits of meetings in Davos every year - Buffett never attended a meeting.
Blackrock's Larry Fink's latest annual letter is more typical of the cautious fare offered to shareholders.
It begins with a faint Buffett-like charm. “Since 1976, when I showed up on my first Wall Street job – long hair, turquoise jewelry and the ugliest brown suits in the world – the investment has become more stylish (and thankfully, so do I).
It also has admirably no jargon and does have the word “error”. But that refers to what Fink said is that it repeats the "historical mistake" in the financial world because he or his huge company may have made any mistakes.
On the other hand, the latest shareholder letter from JPMorgan Chase is the “I made a mistake” part. It reveals that he underestimated the importance of cloud technology and refers to a businessman known as the London Whale, who lost at least $6 billion to the bank in 2012.
Alas, this section cannot be reached until the 53rd page of the document runs to the unforgivable page 58. Even Fink manages to curb his idea to be only 27 years old this year. Over the past decade, Buffett has had an average of only 17 pages.
A CEO of a sprawling global company is commendable for the short, readable annual letters that do include occasional failed enrollment.
It is Andy Jassy of Amazon, who continues in the style of Jeff Bezos, replaced by the founder of the company, Jassy, in 2021.
I can't imagine any of these leaders being as memorable as Buffett, though, because no one seemed happy to show it even though they shared his sense of humor.
My favorite line was in a 2007 Buffett letter: "If Kitty Hawk had a far-sighted capitalist, he would have been a huge help to his successor by knocking Orville down."
I also like his 1982 observation that “investors can always buy toads at the price of toads.” There are others.
But letting his 2023 remind some of how the investment champions outweigh the feeling of disappointment makes him feel easy to end. “As the flowers bloom, the weeds withered,” he wrote. “And, yes, it helps to start early and live into the 90s.”