Tesla CEO Elon Musk commented on Warren Buffett’s decision to sell nearly half of Berkshire Hathaway’s Apple stock.
According to Benzinga, Berkshire Hathaway announced its second-quarter financial results last Saturday, with operating income increasing by 15.5% to $11.6 billion and net profit decreasing by 15.5% to $30.35 billion compared to the previous year. During this period, the company continued to reduce its holdings in Apple, selling approximately 390 million shares. As of June 30th, Berkshire Hathaway still held approximately 400 million shares of Apple stock, valued at $84.2 billion.
A user on social platform X shared the news that Berkshire Hathaway now holds nearly $277 billion in cash reserves (cash, cash equivalents, and short-term bonds) after selling the stocks. The user jokingly suggested that Buffett could use this cash reserve for bold full-scale investments and acquire any company such as Netflix, Salesforce, Toyota, Adobe, or Hermes.
In response to this, Musk stated:
Musk also criticized the Federal Reserve for not lowering interest rates, stating that the current rates are too high. He said, “The Fed needs to lower interest rates. It’s foolish that they haven’t done so.”
Global financial markets experienced significant volatility on Monday, according to the Nikkei. The Tokyo Stock Price Index (TOPIX) fell by 8% at one point, triggering a temporary halt in TOPIX futures trading on the Osaka Exchange. The Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) fell by over 8% in a single day, triggering a circuit breaker during trading. The Taiwan Weighted Index also fell by 1807.21 points, a decrease of 8.35%, marking the largest point and percentage drop in history.
The cryptocurrency market also experienced a significant decline in the past 24 hours, with Bitcoin (BTC) falling by over 15% and briefly dropping below the $50,000 mark. Ether (ETH) also experienced a sharp decline of over 22%. At the time of writing, the trading price of Bitcoin was approximately $51,000, while Ether was priced at around $2,250.
