Warren Buffett’s ties to Bill Gates, whose charitable work has triggered criticism, are putting investors in Berkshire Hathaway Inc. at risk, according to an activist shareholder group attempting a long-shot bid to remove him as board chair at the company’s annual shareholders meeting Saturday.
It’s a rare public rebuke for Buffett and the company with which he’s synonymous. It comes at a time when it already faces questions about corporate structure, just as succession planning for the 92-year-old becomes increasingly pressing. The legendary stock picker would keep just his chief executive officer post under the proposal up for a shareholder vote in Omaha, Nebraska, by the National Legal and Policy Center, a conservative organization based in northern Virginia.
The group cites Buffett’s longstanding financial support for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, one of the world’s biggest charities focused on health, education and gender equity that critics say has too much power and no accountability. It also points to Bill Gates’s association with Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and sex trafficker.
Because Buffett’s so closely identified with Berkshire, his support for polarizing issues can potentially alienate customers, investors or partners with different views, it argues.
“He wants to keep an arm’s length from politics,” said Peter Flaherty, chair of the center, “but he’s engaged in politics, and he’s trying to play both sides of the fence.”
A spokesperson for Berkshire didn’t respond to a request for comment. In a filing, the company noted Buffett’s 31.5% voting interest in opposing the push to split his roles.
“The board believes that as long as Mr. Buffett is Berkshire’s CEO, he should continue as board chair and as Berkshire’s CEO,” it said. “However, as has been stated on numerous occasions by Mr. Buffett in the past, once Mr. Buffett is no longer Berkshire’s CEO, a non-management director should be named board chair.”
Last year, the company faced a similar proxy question from the same organization that got the support of almost 11% of shareholders, including the largest US pension, California Public Employees’ Retirement System. But that proposal didn’t argue that shareholders should remove Buffett as chair because of his ties to Gates and other political activities.
Calpers and other investors have been pushing corporate America to separate chair and CEO positions, saying that governance structures are weakened when the same person holds both roles.
“We believe that Berkshire Hathaway would be best served by Mr. Buffett focusing on his work solely as CEO, and have said so many times in the past,” Calpers, which is abstaining from the group’s proposal, said in a statement. “And because the company’s leaders have made it clear that they, too, expect the roles of CEO and board chairperson to be separate in the future, we are now focused on other issues of importance to shareholders.”
At last year’s shareholders meeting, Buffett said that speaking out on issues can anger more people than it pleases and hurt the company.
“I’ve decidedly backed off,” he told shareholders. “I don’t want to say anything that’ll get attributed, basically to Berkshire, and have somebody else bear the consequences of what I talk about.”
In 2021, Buffett resigned his position as a trustee of the foundation after Bill Gates and Melinda Gates, the only other board members, announced they were divorcing. Buffett said in a statement that he had been an inactive trustee and that he had already given up director posts at corporate boards other than Berkshire.
Having an independent board chair now would better prepare Berkshire when it changes leadership, Flaherty said. Succession questions have long loomed over Berkshire given that the company is helmed by two nonagenarians: Buffett’s longtime business partner Charlie Munger, a Berkshire vice chair, is 99.
Buffett has laid out a plan to have one of his sons, Howard Buffett, 68, serve as non-executive chair of Berkshire when he steps down, while Greg Abel, 60, a longtime deputy who previously ran Berkshire’s sprawling energy business, will take over as CEO.
--With assistance from Sophie Alexander and Eliyahu Kamisher.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.