Berkshire Hathaway Sells Its Stake In M&T Bank

Feb. 17—Billionaire investor Warren Buffett and his Berkshire Hathaway business sold its entire $800 million stake in M&T Bank Corp. in recent months, eliminating an investment it had held since 1991.

The Omaha, Neb.-based investment powerhouse had more than 5.4 million shares of the Buffalo-based bank a year ago, representing more than 4% of the bank's stock, but revealed in a regulatory filing Tuesday that it had sold the last of its shares during the fourth quarter.

It had already unloaded 2.5 million shares in the second and third quarters, and dumped the remaining 2.9 million shares in the fourth quarter.

The surprise move by Buffett ended a relationship with M&T that had endured for more than 20 years, through three prior recessions. It came about a year after Berkshire sold its other Buffalo-based holding, The Buffalo News, along with other newspapers to Lee Enterprises.

Berkshire still owns Geico, an insurance firm that employs more than 3,000 workers in Amherst.

"We can't offer any insight into decisions made by individual shareholders, but as a long-term investor in M&T, Berkshire Hathaway helped position us to achieve a track record of growth and success that has benefited our shareholders, customers, colleagues and the communities we serve," said M&T CEO Rene Jones. "Mr. Buffett's friendship and counsel has always been valued by our leadership team, and it will always be welcome."

Buffett had been a fan of longtime former M&T Bank Chairman and CEO Robert G. Wilmers, who built the bank into a national powerhouse, and also fit the same mold of mild-mannered business and community leader as Buffett himself. Wilmers died in December 2017.

Buffett — the legendary investor known as the Oracle of Omaha — bought into M&T during the early 1990s, when the bank went on an expansion spree that began with the Goldome and Empire of America transactions that it divided with KeyCorp. Since then, the stock had appreciated strongly, and peaked as high as nearly $200 per share in March 2018. It's also been a steady payer of dividends, even through economic downturns.

But its stock price had settled back down to the high $160s and low $170s by early 2020. And since the Covid-19 pandemic began, it plunged to less than $100 at times, and has only recently begun to recover to its current level, apparently prompting Berkshire's decision last year to get out.

The disposal of the stake by one of the world's richest and best-known investors didn't seem to harm M&T shares, which still rallied more than 4.5% on Tuesday to $148.67, before falling below $148 by midday Wednesday.

It was one of three banks that Berkshire exited, along with JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Pittsburgh-based PNC Financial Services Corp., while it reduced its stakes in Wells Fargo & Co. and U.S. Bancorp.

Berkshire also got out of Barrick Gold and Pfizer — despite the latter's role in developing one of two Covid-19 vaccines now on the market — and cut its holdings in Suncor Energy, General Motors Co., Apple and Liberty Communications.

On the other hand, it raised its investment in drugmakers Merck, AbbVie and Bristol-Myers Squibb, as well as Restoration Hardware parent RH, T-Mobile and Kroger Corp. And it took new positions in Verizon Communications, Chevron Corp., E.W. Scripps and Marsh & McLennan Cos.

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