Warren Buffett's longest-held equity position, Coca-Cola, has reached an all-time high under new Berkshire Hathaway leadership. The stock is up 26% year to date, outpacing the S&P 500's 14% gain. Buffett first purchased Coca-Cola shares in 1988, calling it one of the "inevitables" that would dominate its market. Berkshire bought $1.3 billion worth of stock between 1988 and 1994 and has never sold a share. The position is now worth nearly $35 billion, with Berkshire set to receive $848 million in dividends in 2026 alone. Coca-Cola has raised its dividend annually for 64 consecutive years, earning it Dividend King status. The company reported 6% year-over-year organic revenue growth in the second quarter despite inflation challenges.

Greg Abel, Warren Buffett's successor at Berkshire Hathaway, may eventually invest in Microsoft, a stock Buffett admired but avoided for decades. Buffett previously called his failure to buy Microsoft "stupidity" but refrained due to ethical concerns over his friendship with Bill Gates, who served on Berkshire's board. With Gates no longer on the board and Abel already expanding Berkshire's technology holdings, including Alphabet, the constraints preventing a Microsoft investment have weakened. Microsoft's fundamentals align with Berkshire's investment criteria: fiscal 2026 revenue grew 18% to over $331 billion, operating income rose 21%, and net income jumped 31%. The company's cloud and AI business reached a $37 billion annual run rate, growing 123% year over year, whilst Microsoft Cloud revenue hit $59.3 billion, up 27%.

GEICO second-quarter underwriting earnings fall 45.4% as claim frequency increases accelerate. Property damage and collision claim frequencies rose in the 3% to 5% range through the first six months of 2026, widening the reversal that began in the first quarter. GEICO's pre-tax underwriting earnings fell to $994 million in the second quarter of 2026, down $827 million, or 45.4%, from $1.821 billion in the second quarter of 2025, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. disclosed in the quarterly report it filed Aug. 8. The decline was steeper than the one GEICO recorded three months earlier, and it pushed the insurer's combined ratio to 91.2% from 83.5% a year earlier, an increase of 7.7 percentage