Warren Buffett buys cheese, Krafty cheese

The Wall Street Journal has indicated that Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A) has taken a 5% stake in Kraft Foods Inc. (NYSE: KFT). The stake is under 5% and looks like it was made before activist investor Norman Peltz piled into the food giant, which is under pressure from Carl Icahn as well.

What is odd is that the newspaper noted that it was unclear if Buffett sided with activist investors Peltz and Icahn. This is somewhat amusing when you consider that Buffett invests his monies on a somewhat passive basis and does more voting type initiatives. He rarely steps in and demands that companies leverage their balance sheets or pursue rapid share buybacks for a short term boost. Those initiatives are usually risks to companies because the leverage can hurt on a long term basis. Buffett always looks at these matters in the long term, even if he only holds some of these passive investments for a few quarters.

If you can figure out an average price he paid, probably in the mid-$30s, you can bet that at that price the Oracle of Omaha was thinking there was long term value in Kraft. Based on a $1.80 estimate from First Call for 2007, Kraft trades at 18.8 times 2007 estimates after the 2% drop seen this morning.

Jon Ogg can be reached at jonogg@247wallst.com; he does not own securities in the companies he covers.