- Berkshire Hathaway said Monday that it had poured more cash into Japan’s five largest trading houses.
- The holdings of Warren Buffett’s conglomerate in the stocks now average over 8.5%.
- Buffett first disclosed his bets on Japan in August 2020 – and the country’s flagship index has soared since then.
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has poured more money into Japan’s top five trading houses, pressing ahead with its big bet on the Asian country where stocks are trading near three-decade highs.
Berkshire said in a news release that its stakes in the five stocks now averaged over 8.5% – up from the 7.4% figure it had disclosed in May.
Buffett’s conglomerate, which mostly invests in the US, surprised many close followers when it reported 5% stakes in five Japanese trading houses – Itochu, Marubeni, Mitsubishi, Mitsui, and Sumitomo – in August 2020.
But Japanese equities have surged since, with the country’s flagship Nikkei 225 stock-market index up around 50% and hitting a 33-year high earlier this month.
The five Japanese companies owned by Berkshire are known as “sogo shosha” – or general trading houses – and tend to serve as intermediaries for a wide range of products including materials and food.
Buffett intends to hold the stocks for the long-term and eventually up his stakes to a maximum of 9.9%.
At Berkshire’s annual meeting in May, the billionaire investor said the five Japanese companies were “ridiculously” cheap, had a long-term focus, and were big enough to have a material impact on the conglomerate’s earnings.
Tokyo has also been pushing for the country’s listed companies to return more money to investors, likely boosting their appeal to Buffett.
Read more: Warren Buffett’s Japan bets have nearly tripled in value to north of $17 billion in under 3 years
