Ajit Jain, Buffett’s insurance leader for nearly 40 years, dumps more than half of Berkshire stake

Ajit Jain, Warren’s Buffett’s insurance chief and top executive, sold more than half of his stake in Berkshire Hathaway, a new regulatory filing showed.

The 73-year-old vice chairman of insurance operations dumped 200 shares of Berkshire Class A shares on Monday at an average price of $695,418 per share for roughly $139 million. That left him holding just 61 shares, while family trusts established by himself and his spouse for the benefit of his descendants hold 55 shares and his non-profit corporation Jain Foundation owns 50 shares. Monday’s sale represented 55% of his total stake in Berkshire.

The move marked the biggest decline in Jain’s holdings since he joined Berkshire in 1986. It’s unclear what motivated Jain’s sales, but he did take advantage of Berkshire’s recent high price. The conglomerate traded above $700,000 to hit a $1 trillion market capitalization at the end of August.

“This appears to be a signal that Ajit views Berkshire as being fully valued,” said David Kass, a finance professor at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. 

It’s also consistent with a significant slowdown in Berkshire’s share buyback activity as of late. Omaha-based Berkshire repurchased just $345 million worth of its own stock in the second quarter, significantly lower than the $2 billion repurchased in each of the prior two quarters.

“I think at best it is a sign that the stock is not cheap,” said Bill Stone, CIO at Glenview Trust Company and a Berkshire shareholder. “At over 1.6 times book value, it is probably around Buffett’s conservative estimate of intrinsic value. I don’t expect many, if any, stock repurchases from Berkshire around these levels.”

The India-born Jain has played a crucial role in Berkshire’s unmatched success. He facilitated a push into the reinsurance industry and more recently led a turnaround in Geico, Berkshire’s crown jewel auto insurance business. In 2018, Jain was named vice chairman of insurance operations and appointed to Berkshire’s board of directors.

“Ajit has created tens of billions of value for Berkshire shareholders,” Buffett wrote in his annual letter in 2017. “If there were ever to be another Ajit and you could swap me for him, don’t hesitate. Make the trade!”

Before it was officially announced that Greg Abel, Berkshire’s vice chairman of non-insurance operations, will evenetually succeed the 94-year-old Buffett, there were rumors about Jain one day leading the conglomerate. Buffett recently clarified that Jain “never wanted to run Berkshire” and there wasn’t any competition between the two.