People that are serious about long-term investing find a lot of wisdom from Warren Buffet, the most popular and arguably the most successful investor of all time.
So what does the portfolio of the world’s wealthiest investor look like? Here is multi-billionaire Warren Buffett’s portfolio (through his company Berkshire Hathaway).
Warren Buffett’s (Berkshire) Portfolio
| Company | Symbol | Pays Dividend? |
|---|---|---|
| Coca Cola | KO | Yes |
| Wells Fargo | WFC | Yes |
| Proctor and Gamble | PG | Yes |
| American Express | AXP | Yes |
| Kraft Foods | KFT | Yes |
| Wal-Mart | WMT | Yes |
| Wesco Financial Corp. | WSC | Yes |
| ConoccoPhillips | COP | Yes |
| Johnson and Johnson | JNJ | Yes |
| US Bancorp | USB | Yes |
| Moody’s Corp | MCO | Yes |
| Washington Post Co. | WPO | Yes |
| Nike | NKE | Yes |
| M&T Bancorp | MTB | Yes |
| Costco | COST | Yes |
| USG Corp | USG | No |
| Republic Services Group | RSG | Yes |
| Nalco Holding Corp. | NLC | Yes |
| Ingersoll-Rand | IR | Yes |
| CarMax Inc. | KMX | No |
| Comcast | CMCSK | Yes |
| Nestle S.A. | NSRG.PK | Yes |
| Iron Mountain Inc. | IRM | No |
| Sanofi-Aventis | SNY | Yes |
| Lowes | LOW | Yes |
| NRG Energy Inc. | NRG | No |
| Touchmark Corp | TMK | Yes |
| Becton Dickinson | BDX | Yes |
| General Electric | GE | Yes |
| United Parcel Service | UPS | Yes |
| Home Depot | HD | Yes |
| Wellpoint Inc. | WLP | No |
| Bank of America | BAC | Yes |
| GlaxoSmithKline | GSK | Yes |
| Suntrust Banks Inc. | STI | No* |
| United Health Group Inc. | UNH | No* |
| Gannet Co., Inc. | GCI | Yes |
| Exxon Mobile | XOM | Yes |
| Comdisco Holding Co. Inc. | CDCO.OB | No |
| Traveler’s Insurance | TRV | Yes |
*Denotes a company that pays an insignificant dividend
As shown, Warren Buffett is a dividend stocks investor for the most part. Part of the reason for this is that because his company has so much money, he can only invest in large companies, and large companies are more likely to pay a dividend. Another reason is that Buffett loves cash flow, and companies that pay dividends tend to be rich in cash flow.
This list shows only Berkshire’s stock holdings. The majority of Berkshire Hathaway’s holdings are wholly-owned subsidiaries like Geico, Dairy Queen, and See’s Candy. Most of his wholly-owned companies, in general, pay dividends to Berkshire. So, really, he’s even more of a dividend investor than his portfolio would let on. Buffett generally buys a business for the potential cash flow he can get out of it.
A point of curiosity is that while Buffett obviously loves dividends, his company does not pay a dividend, and this is very unusual for a company so large. Most companies pay dividends because they responsibly conclude that they don’t have good investments for every dollar they make, and so they return some money to shareholders. Buffett, however, is capable of continually investing each and every dollar he makes, so for him paying a dividend wouldn’t make sense.
Full Disclosure: My portfolio shares three stocks with Berkshire: KO, JNJ, BDX.
Further Reading:
Newsletter
8 Reasons to go with Dividends.
