Berkshire Hathaway, synonymous with its now-retired founder Warren Buffett, is one of the U.S.’s most iconic stocks — but that doesn’t guarantee it’s a good fit for your portfolio.
» Curious about Berkshire Hathaway's investments? Check out the so-called Warren Buffett stocks.
How to buy Berkshire Hathaway stock
You can buy Berkshire Hathaway stock through a brokerage account. You'll need to add money to the account and then search within the brokerage's platform using the symbol "BRK.B." You cannot buy Berkshire Hathaway stock directly from Berkshire Hathaway the company.
Here's the simple way to buy Berkshire Hathaway stock:
1. Open a brokerage account.
2. Add money to the account.
3. Search for Berkshire Hathaway stock within your brokerage account's platform using the ticker "BRK.B."
4. Fill out the order, indicating whether you want to buy the stock in dollars or shares.
5. Submit the order.
» Check out the best brokerage accounts for stock trading
There are a few classes of Berkshire Hathaway stock, but you’ll more than likely be looking into Class B stock. Berkshire Hathaway’s Class B stock (you’ll know it if the stock’s symbol is “BRK.B” versus “BRK.A”) is far cheaper than its Class A stock. In this case, Class A stock does come with more voting power than Class B stock, but few individual investors will ever own enough Berkshire Hathaway stock to make a substantial difference with their voting.
If you’re considering adding Berkshire Hathaway stock to your portfolio, you may want to think about your purchase carefully. There are a lot of factors that go into buying a stock, and it's good to go in having done a little research. Here's the longer version of how to buy Berkshire Hathaway stock.
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1. Open and fund a brokerage account
If you want to invest in Berkshire Hathaway as an individual stock, you’ll need a brokerage account to do so. Brokerage accounts are investment accounts where you can purchase investments, such as stocks. First you’ll need to open the account; then you can add money to it. Keep in mind, there are several types of investment accounts and some have tax advantages, so it’s worth taking a minute to figure out what type of account is best for you before you start buying investments.
2. Research Berkshire Hathaway’s fundamentals
Before you decide if buying Berkshire Hathaway, the single most expensive stock, is right for you, it’s important to look into the company’s fundamentals, such as its revenue, net income and earnings. That information can be found in Berkshire Hathaway’s annual and quarterly reports, which are available on its investor relations’ website. You may also want to consider Berkshire Hathaway’s competition and management. If you need a hand getting started, check out our guide for how to research stocks.
3. Decide how much to invest in Berkshire Hathaway stock
For the last year, the price of one share of Class B Berkshire Hathaway stock has ranged from about $400 to $500. If that’s too pricey, some brokerages allow you to purchase fractional shares, or smaller portions of stock. With fractional shares, you can purchase stock from a specific dollar amount rather than the full cost of a share. For example, if Berkshire Hathaway stock costs $400 per share but you have $100 to invest, you could buy one-fourth of a share.
» Check out the best brokerage accounts for fractional shares
When figuring out how much of a single stock to buy, you may also want to consider how that stock will affect the balance of the rest of your portfolio. If you have a well-diversified investment portfolio, one that encompasses lots of industries, geographies and company sizes, buying a large amount of a single company’s stock can throw off that balance.
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4. Place your order
Now that you’ve done all the legwork you’re ready for the exciting stuff — buying Berkshire Hathaway stock. Like any stock, Berkshire Hathaway’s price fluctuates throughout the day. If you’re looking to hold onto your stock for a long period of time, it’s probably not worth worrying if you’re getting the exact best price that day.
When you’re ready to buy the stock, search for “BRK.B” within your brokerage account’s purchasing platform, and open up the order page. From there you’ll likely need to choose your order type: Market orders and limit orders are the two most common. Market orders go through at the best market price available at the time, so there may be a small difference between the price you see and the price you pay. A limit order allows you to set a price limit, so you can specify that you want to buy the stock but only if it drops to the price you outlined. The risk here is that the stock may never actually reach that price and you may not end up with the stock at all.
Once you set your order type and how much stock you want to purchase, you’ll just need to submit the order — typically through a button that says buy, submit, place trade or similar.
The process for buying Berkshire Hathaway stock is the same as purchasing any other stock. If you’re looking for more information on the process of buying stock, check out our full guide for how to buy stocks.
5. Consider a fund over an individual stock
If you want to invest in Berkshire Hathaway, you can certainly buy some shares of the individual stock, but there is a potentially less risky option: Funds. Funds, such as index funds, exchange-traded funds and mutual funds, are baskets of stocks you can invest in all at once.
And since Berkshire Hathaway is a company included in the S&P 500 — a list of the 500 biggest companies in the U.S. — if you purchase an S&P 500 index fund you’ll be purchasing Berkshire Hathaway stock along with 499 or so other companies. That way, if its stock price falls, your portfolio is protected by the gains other companies may have. A general rule of thumb is to have no more than 5% to 10% of your overall investment portfolio in individual stocks, allocating the rest of your portfolio toward diversified funds.
» Check out how to invest in index funds
Neither the author nor editor held positions in the aforementioned investments at the time of publication.
