Not many companies in the insurance business largely dodged the current credit crisis. No one should be surprise that Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) is on that list. The company's insurance underwriting operating division saw it business slow a bit, otherwise the company did remarkably well.
Berkshire's net income fell to $2.88 billion, or $1,859 per Class A share, from $3.12 billion, or $2,018, a year earlier. Revenue rose 10% to $30 billion. The numbers beat Wall Street estimates. Investment income actually rose 3% to $884 million, quite an accomplishment in a down market.
Investors sometimes forget how hard it must be to squeeze improving results out of a company like Berkshire. It operates businesses from furniture retail to jet leasing to Fruit of the Loom.
By any set of odds, Buffett should have some bad quarters, even one really bad quarter. That never seems to happen.
Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.
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