Warren Buffett Berkshire Hathaway Earnings

Buffett: still rolling (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Berkshire Hathaway dips after lackluster Q2 results, $3.8 billion hit on Kraft Heinz stake

Both operating earnings and revenues fell year on year, and Berkshire didn’t buy back any stock for the fourth consecutive quarter.

Matt Phillips, Luke Kawa

8/2/25 12:55PM

Berkshire Hathaway, the company built up by investing icon Warren Buffett over the past six decades, reported mediocre to underwhelming Q2 results Saturday, punctuated by a big write-down of a company that it’s far and away the single largest shareholder in.

Shares are down nearly 1% in premarket trading.

The insurance, investment, and commercial conglomerate reported:

Operating earnings of $11.2 billion, down 3.8% from $11.6 billion reported in Q2 2024, driven by softness in its insurance business. However, that was still above the $10.74 billion average estimate from the two analysts polled by Bloomberg.
Total revenues of $92.515 billion, down 1.2% from $93.653 billion reported during the prior year period and well below the analysts’ average estimate for $95.135 billion.

The big headline from this release: Berkshire is (finally) marking the carrying value of its massive stake in ketchup maker Kraft Heinz to be in line with its market value, prompting a $3.8 billion hit to earnings. Berkshire owned 27.4% of Kraft Heinz as of June 30.

Edward Jones analyst Kyle Sanders suggested this write-down could be a prelude to the conglomerate reducing or completely exiting its position in the company going forward.

While seemingly every other US company is attempting to offer some insight on how changes to trade policy affect its outlook, Berkshire isn’t even bothering.

“Changes in macroeconomic conditions and geopolitical events, including changes in international trade policies and tariffs, may negatively affect our operating results and the values of our investments in equity securities and of our operating businesses,” per the earnings report. “We are currently unable to reliably predict the nature, timing or magnitude of the potential economic consequences of any such changes or the impacts on our Consolidated Financial Statements.”

Berkshire shares have badly lagged the market since the man known as the Oracle of Omaha announced in early May that he would cede the CEO job at Berkshire to top lieutenant Greg Abel on January 1. (Buffett will stay on as chairman.)

Berkshire is down roughly 12% since then, while the S&P 500 is up about 10%.

The Buffett-led company also refrained from any share repurchases for the fourth consecutive quarter, despite this bout of underperformance.

Nia Warfield, Luke Kawa

S&P 500 closes at record as tech heavyweights flex (besides Apple)

The Magnificent 7 did the heavy lifting, performing better than any S&P 500 sector ETF on Tuesday.

Matt Phillips

Oracle rips as backlog builds, but company misses on top and bottom lines

Oracle shares shot higher after-hours as the company reported a growing backlog, even though its fiscal Q1 results fell slightly short of expectations. The company reported:

Adjusted earnings per share of $1.47 vs. expectations of $1.48.
Revenue of $14.93 billion vs. expectations of $15.04 billion.

Shares were up 21% in after-hours trading, which is a pretty crazy stock move for a company with a market cap of more than $675 billion.

The market was likely impressed by a giant build in the company’s “remaining performance obligations,” or RPO, which is how the company measures the value of signed cloud computing deals that haven’t yet been reported as revenue. In a statement, CEO Safra Catz said:

“We signed four multi-billion-dollar contracts with three different customers in Q1. This resulted in RPO contract backlog increasing 359% to $455 billion. It was an astonishing quarter — and demand for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure continues to build. Over the next few months, we expect to sign-up several additional multi-billion-dollar customers and RPO is likely to exceed half-a-trillion dollars.”

Oracle Announces Fiscal Year 2026 First Quarter Financial Results

“We signed four multi-billion-dollar contracts with three different customers in Q1. This resulted in RPO contract backlog increasing 359% to $455 billion. It was an astonishing quarter — and demand for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure continues to build. Over the next few months, we expect to sign-up several additional multi-billion-dollar customers and RPO is likely to exceed half-a-trillion dollars.”

Matt Phillips

Robinhood rides index inclusion rally to record close

Robinhood Markets notched a new closing high Tuesday, as the crypto, stock, and options brokerage continued to ride a rally set off by the announcement that it would be added to the S&P 500 Index.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions.)

Robinhood appears to be benefiting from the so-called inclusion effect, a market phenomenon where companies that are added to major market indexes can see a price move as index funds — whose holdings must mirror the membership of the index — rush to buy the stock.

For what it’s worth, it seems like Robinhood will upon entry (effective prior to the market open on September 22) be the top-performing member of the index, as its roughly 220% gain this year is more or less double that of the current leader, Seagate Technology Holdings.

Luke Kawa

GameStop posts impressive Q2 results with big sales beat

Don’t call it a comeback!

GameStop is jumping aftermarket as the video games and collectibles retailer posted an impressive set of second-quarter results.

Net sales: $972 million (estimate $823 million).
Adjusted diluted earnings per share: $0.25 (estimate $0.16).

Note: these consensus estimates, compiled by Bloomberg, are from only two analysts.

The sales beat is particularly noteworthy, as the company had already done an exemplary job of expense control to help protect its bottom line. Revenues were up more than 20% versus the year-ago quarter, the biggest annual jump in sales since the company (and the world) was emerging from the pandemic in 2021.

The options market implies a move of plus or minus about 9.4% on earnings.

For a while, GameStop’s ability to generate positive net income was purely a function of the interest earnings on its substantial cash hoard. But now, GameStop has strung together five consecutive quarters of positive operating cash flows for the first time in its history!

This was the quarter when the company began to act on its bitcoin treasury strategy, raising money through the sale of convertible notes and using some proceeds to purchase the crypto asset.

Because of how much market value has been ascribed to potential for GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen to use its significant cash holdings to transform the company, the prospect of converting cash into bitcoin initially did not sit too well with investors following the announcement of this new strategic push in March.

Shares of the once-upon-a-time meme stock really didn’t get too much love during retail frenzies earlier in the summer, and were down about 25% year to date heading into this release.

As of the close of the quarter, its bitcoin holdings were valued at $528.6 million.

Western Digital Seagate Technology Rise to top of S&P 500

Data storage is so hot right now

A rapid turnaround in profitability helps explain how Seagate Technology and Western Digital have clawed to the top of the S&P 500 this year.

Matt Phillips11h