Warren Buffett’s charitable donations exceed $51 billion

June 22 (Reuters) – Warren Buffett has donated another $4.64 billion in Berkshire Hathaway stock to five charities, bringing his total giving since 2006 to more than $51 billion.

The annual donation made on Wednesday is the largest for the 92-year-old Buffett, consisting of about 13.7 million Class B shares of Berkshire.

Buffett is donating 10.45 million shares to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has received more than $39 billion in Berkshire stock overall.

He also donates 1.05 million shares to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, named for his late first wife, and 2.2 million shares divided equally between the charities led by his children Howard, Susan and Peter: the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, the Sherwood Foundation and the NoVo Foundation.

Buffett is gradually giving away all of the wealth he has built up in Omaha, Nebraska, and which he has managed since 1965.

He and Bill Gates pioneered the give a pledgewhere more than 240 people like Michael Bloomberg, Larry Ellison, Carl Icahn, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have donated at least half of their wealth to charity.

Buffett has already donated more than half of his stock to Berkshire. He still owns more than $112.5 billion, or 15.1%, of Berkshire stock after Wednesday’s donations.

The number of shares Buffett donates drops by 5% each year, but this year’s dollar amount is a record because Berkshire’s share price is soaring.

“Nothing extraordinary has happened at Berkshire: a very long runway, simple and generally sound decisions, and American tailwinds and compounding effects have produced my current wealth,” Buffett said in a statement.

“American tailwind” was formulated Written by Buffett in 2019 to describe the United States’ ability to build wealth over the long term, even during times of war and financial crisis.

Buffett has built Berkshire into nearly $740 billion through companies like BNSF railroad and auto insurance Geico, and equity holdings in companies like Apple Inc (AAPL.O).

The Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation works in the field of reproductive health. The Howard G. Buffett Foundation focuses on alleviating hunger, mitigating conflict, and improving public safety. The Sherwood Foundation supports Nebraska nonprofits, and the Novo Foundation has initiatives focused on girls and women.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel) in New York. Editing by Leslie Adler

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