Great idea with this article. I have an MBA but believe reading the books and letters here really is better than an MBA for anyone looking to make investments or run a business.
Im starting my Masters in Finance this September. I will try to "graduate" from this Berkshire Hathaway MBA at around the same time as my actual degree in a years time. I'm not new to Buffett, but have never actual gone through the shareholder letters myself. This is a great way to finally start. Thanks for this!
Really great idea! I have read all the letters and many of the articles mentioned above, I highly recommend if you plan on going this route, underline the important points and try to relate them to yourself personally in regards to both your business and personal life. Not only is it a MBA in business, but it’s also a MBA in how to treat people in business and how to look at yourself, which I believe is equally important to being an overall successful business person.
Great stuff! Thanks for the info, especially the Charlie Munger shareholder letter at Blue Chip Stamps, never knew that before.
I'm in China, which recently published a big hit book about Munger's shareholder meeting speeches at Wesco Financial and Daily Journal, full of Munger's wisdom as always, and I suspect there are English versions of these on the web as well, which I recommend to anyone interested.
This is incredibly useful and very timely as I was thinking about reading the Mead book ( signed copy acquired at 2022 BRK AGM but gathering dust on my bookshelf) in conjunction with the letters and i intend to follow it to the letter. I will record my progress here .
Super article. Almost exactly my personal Berkshire/Buffett/Munger roadmap. The Making of an American Capitalist in the summer of 1998, after just completing my accountancy exams, utterly and completely changed my life. Still mesmerised by Warren and Charlie. It took a very long time to begin to fully appreciate just how wise they both are. And I know I’m still scratching the surface.
Your article is a fantastic gift to any young person, wired a certain way, to rapidly jump ahead of their peers. Get rich slowly and stay rich. Enjoying the process and realising that the money is not that important in the end anyway.
Have forwarded to my eldest son, who is starting out in finance. He is already a big Buffett and Munger student and this is a great roadmap to accelerate his journey. Thanks for writing it.
I agree that The Complete Financial History of Berkshire Hathaway is an important book and deserves a place on your checklist. For someone serious about Berkshire and Buffett, it’s an incredible walk through what happened. The timeline makes each allocation relatable to the real world pace of accumulation and growing shareholder value. There was tremendous care taken to avoid going back to zero.
The odd thing about accounting, is that you have to learn it and understand it, to appreciate it’s shortcomings. The big skill is jumping straight to the important bits and knowing what nonsense can be ignored. In the same way Buffett does not pay attention to many of the unimportant details that would appear in a typical due diligence report (which he wouldn’t read off course). The complexity in financial statements to non accountants is often hard to grasp, as it is often nonsense. Anyone that reads the Berkshire report can attest to that. I’m drifting off topic a little here. It would certainly seem odd to the average person, that the first thing any right thinking analyst does when reading modern financial statements, is to immediately begin to adjust them to attempt to reveal how the business is actually performing and to eliminate 90% of the noise content.
Great idea with this article. I have an MBA but believe reading the books and letters here really is better than an MBA for anyone looking to make investments or run a business.
Im starting my Masters in Finance this September. I will try to "graduate" from this Berkshire Hathaway MBA at around the same time as my actual degree in a years time. I'm not new to Buffett, but have never actual gone through the shareholder letters myself. This is a great way to finally start. Thanks for this!
Really great idea! I have read all the letters and many of the articles mentioned above, I highly recommend if you plan on going this route, underline the important points and try to relate them to yourself personally in regards to both your business and personal life. Not only is it a MBA in business, but it’s also a MBA in how to treat people in business and how to look at yourself, which I believe is equally important to being an overall successful business person.
Great stuff! Thanks for the info, especially the Charlie Munger shareholder letter at Blue Chip Stamps, never knew that before.
I'm in China, which recently published a big hit book about Munger's shareholder meeting speeches at Wesco Financial and Daily Journal, full of Munger's wisdom as always, and I suspect there are English versions of these on the web as well, which I recommend to anyone interested.
This is incredibly useful and very timely as I was thinking about reading the Mead book ( signed copy acquired at 2022 BRK AGM but gathering dust on my bookshelf) in conjunction with the letters and i intend to follow it to the letter. I will record my progress here .
https://sanj2f3.substack.com/
The general idea I’ve been thinking about for some time… thanks for sharing your wisdom on how to structure and prioritize a learning plan
Really great post. Thanks for this!
Super article. Almost exactly my personal Berkshire/Buffett/Munger roadmap. The Making of an American Capitalist in the summer of 1998, after just completing my accountancy exams, utterly and completely changed my life. Still mesmerised by Warren and Charlie. It took a very long time to begin to fully appreciate just how wise they both are. And I know I’m still scratching the surface.
Your article is a fantastic gift to any young person, wired a certain way, to rapidly jump ahead of their peers. Get rich slowly and stay rich. Enjoying the process and realising that the money is not that important in the end anyway.
Have forwarded to my eldest son, who is starting out in finance. He is already a big Buffett and Munger student and this is a great roadmap to accelerate his journey. Thanks for writing it.
I agree that The Complete Financial History of Berkshire Hathaway is an important book and deserves a place on your checklist. For someone serious about Berkshire and Buffett, it’s an incredible walk through what happened. The timeline makes each allocation relatable to the real world pace of accumulation and growing shareholder value. There was tremendous care taken to avoid going back to zero.
The odd thing about accounting, is that you have to learn it and understand it, to appreciate it’s shortcomings. The big skill is jumping straight to the important bits and knowing what nonsense can be ignored. In the same way Buffett does not pay attention to many of the unimportant details that would appear in a typical due diligence report (which he wouldn’t read off course). The complexity in financial statements to non accountants is often hard to grasp, as it is often nonsense. Anyone that reads the Berkshire report can attest to that. I’m drifting off topic a little here. It would certainly seem odd to the average person, that the first thing any right thinking analyst does when reading modern financial statements, is to immediately begin to adjust them to attempt to reveal how the business is actually performing and to eliminate 90% of the noise content.
This is amazing! Thank you for the time and effort. Legendary
This post is beyond awesome. I will forward it to my son, who plans on attending the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting next year. Thank you!
Genius. Invaluable post.
Thank you.