Buffett Goes Big on Oil and Gas
Although in the aftermath of our reporting Nancy Pelosi’s recent moves this is further validation of our theory to track big players in Washington and on Wall Street, this is likely to prove a rare appearance.
Buffett simply hasn’t been nearly as active as the Speaker of the House lately. He hasn’t made many new large-scale investments in recent years, as his investment conglomerate has grown its cash pile to record levels waiting for better opportunities.
But last week’s purchase of Occidental Petroleum definitely stands out. And it represents a bet that energy stocks will stay hot for years to come.
It seems a particularly prescient move by the Oracle of Omaha, as crude’s recent surge reached new levels on reports the U.S. Congress is considering legislation to ban the import of Russian oil.
Welcome to The Hot Corner
Berkshire spent more than $4.5 billion building its entire stake last week. The first 30 million shares weren’t reported because the filing requirement had not yet been triggered. But Berkshire confirmed the purchase earlier in the week.
It now owns more than 11% of OXY’s outstanding common stock, and that percentage could go a lot higher in the future. Berkshire also owns warrants that can be converted into approximately 84,000,000 more shares.
Here’s The Hot List with data through March 4, 2022:
OXY gained over 45% on the week and tacked on 17% on Friday alone after news of Berkshire’s stake hit the wire. The stock is up another 8% in pre-market trading today.
In related news, we learned that another renowned investor, Carl Icahn, sold his entire stake in OXY last week.
At its peak several years ago, Icahn’s investment in OXY represented an ownership interest of more than 10%. His two board representatives will also be resigning.
When it comes to insider transactions, we always want to give more weight to the purchases.
Corporate insiders and asset managers will sell shares for any number of reasons. But regardless of who you are, as an investor, you only buy shares for one reason. And that’s to make money.
Three other transactions on today’s List caught our attention.
We show bullish call activity in metals stocks SSR Mining $SSRM and Freeport-McMoRan $FCX as well as another insider purchase by a DraftKings $DKNG officer.
Prices for metals, like those for energy and agriculture commodities, continue to rise.
And this is the second large form-4 purchase we’ve seen from a DKNG director in the past few weeks.
Stay tuned. We'll be back Tuesday with more insider action.
If you want these insider transactions e-mailed to you every morning, click here to sign up for The Hot Corner.
And as always, feel free to reach out with any questions. We love hearing from you!
Allstar Charts Team.