Berkshire Has Revamped Its Portfolio, Here’s How the New Stocks Are Trading
If you’ve been following Berkshire Hathaway for any length of time, you know the drill: Warren Buffett buys something, the market cheers, and the rest of us try to figure out what the Oracle of Omaha sees that we don’t.
Except this time, it wasn’t Warren.
Berkshire Hathaway’s latest quarterly filing, the first under new CEO Greg Abel, landed on Friday, May 15, and it was nothing short of a portfolio earthquake. We’re talking about a $2.65 billion brand-new stake in Delta Air Lines, a tripling of the Alphabet position, a complete exit from Amazon, and a clean sweep of more than 15 other stocks. The total holdings count dropped from 42 to 29, the most dramatic consolidation in decades.
By Monday morning, investors were already voting with their portfolios. Delta popped. Macy’s surged. Alphabet barely flinched, but that might be the most telling reaction of all.
Let’s walk through exactly what happened, how every stock is trading, and, most importantly, what this means for your money.
The Q1 2026 Shake-Up at a Glance
Here’s the TL;DR if you only have 30 seconds:
- New CEO Greg Abel took the reins from Warren Buffett on January 1, 2026.
- In Q1, Berkshire bought $15.94 billion of stocks and sold $24.09 billion, continuing a 14-quarter net-selling streak.
- Biggest buy: Alphabet, position increased 224%, now worth ~$16.6 billion at quarter-end (and roughly $23 billion by mid-May).
- Headline new position: Delta Air Lines, $2.65 billion, 39.8 million shares, the first airline bet since Buffett dumped all four U.S. carriers in 2020.
- Biggest exits: Amazon (fully gone), Visa, Mastercard, UnitedHealth Group, Domino’s Pizza, Aon, and about 10 others.
- Cash pile: Hit a record $397.4 billion — yes, billion with a B.
If you’re thinking “that doesn’t sound like the Berkshire I grew up with,” you’re not wrong. Something fundamental has shifted.
Meet the New Boss: Greg Abel’s First 13F Statement
Let’s address the elephant in the room: Warren Buffett retired as CEO at the end of 2025. He’s still chairman, he’s still in the office every day, and Abel says they talk constantly. But make no mistake, this is Greg Abel’s portfolio now.
And Abel didn’t tiptoe in.
Part of what we’re seeing is practical housecleaning. Todd Combs, one of Buffett’s two longtime investment lieutenants, left for JPMorgan in December 2025. Many of the stocks Berkshire dumped, Visa, Mastercard, Constellation Brands, were widely seen as Combs’s picks, positions that mirrored his old hedge fund. Abel appears to be unwinding those legacy bets and consolidating the portfolio around higher-conviction names.
The other investment manager, Ted Weschler, is still there and likely behind the smaller positions like Macy’s.
But the big, needle-moving decisions? The Delta call? The Alphabet tripling? That’s Abel’s signature, plain and simple.
And here’s the thing, Abel and Buffett share the same value DNA, but Abel seems more willing to revisit industries Buffett swore off and to concentrate tech bets with conviction. This isn’t a rejection of Buffett’s philosophy. It’s an evolution of it.
The Big Buy: Alphabet Stake Tripled, and the Market Noticed
Let’s start with the move that quietly stole the show.
Berkshire increased its Alphabet (GOOGL) holdings by 224% in Q1, from roughly 17.85 million shares to about 58 million shares, pushing the position’s value to nearly $17 billion at quarter-end. By mid-May, with Alphabet shares having rallied 38% since March 31, that stake was worth closer to $23 billion.
Why is this such a big deal? Because it tells us exactly what Abel thinks about the AI race.
Berkshire fully exited Amazon, another Magnificent Seven stock with a massive cloud business, and poured that firepower into Alphabet instead. The message isn’t subtle: Abel sees Alphabet as the better-positioned AI hyperscaler. Over the past six months, Alphabet shares have returned over 40%, nearly triple Amazon’s sub-15% return over the same window.
Alphabet’s Q1 revenue rose 22%, driven by accelerating cloud growth and AI infrastructure demand. The company is firing on all cylinders, and Berkshire just made it the seventh-largest holding in a $263 billion portfolio.
Oh, and Berkshire didn’t stop at Class A shares (GOOGL). It also bought $1.03 billion worth of Class C shares (GOOG), giving it exposure to both voting and non-voting share classes, a liquidity and arbitrage play that suggests institutional sophistication, not passive indexing.
How it’s trading: Alphabet dipped about 0.6% in early Monday trading after the filing dropped, a big yawn considering the stock has been on a tear. Sometimes the most significant moves are the ones the market doesn’t react to, because the smart money was already there.
Welcome Back to the Skies: The $2.65 Billion Delta Air Lines Bet
Now for the headline-grabber.
Berkshire bought 39.8 million shares of Delta Air Lines, valued at $2.65 billion at the end of Q1, instantly making it the 14th-largest holding in the portfolio. Delta shares rose 2.5% in premarket trading Monday and had already popped 3.2% in after-hours trading Friday when the filing was first disclosed.
This is more than just a trade. It’s a philosophical U-turn.
Six years ago, in April 2020, Buffett stunned the market by dumping all of Berkshire’s airline stocks, United, American, Southwest, and Delta, worth more than $4 billion combined. He told shareholders that the pandemic had “permanently reshaped consumer habits and travel demand.” It was one of the most memorable capitulations in modern investing history.
So why is Greg Abel buying Delta now?
Three reasons, and they’re all structural:
1. Delta is a fundamentally different business today. Premium cabin revenue grew 14% year-over-year in the March quarter of 2026. Loyalty and American Express remuneration revenue grew 10%. In Q4 2025, premium products revenue surpassed main cabin revenue for the first time ever. These are stickier, higher-margin revenue streams that didn’t exist at this scale when Buffett walked away.
2. Abel likely bought the dip. Delta shares fell as much as 16% during Q1, hammered by jet fuel prices that more than doubled after the U.S.-Israel military operations against Iran disrupted shipping corridors and sent crude benchmarks soaring. For a value-oriented investor like Abel, that kind of exogenous shock in an otherwise strong business is catnip.
3. The U.S. consumer is still flying. Despite recession whispers, air travel demand has remained resilient. Delta operates over 300 destinations across 50+ countries with a market cap around $46 billion. It’s widely considered the best-run large U.S. airline, and Abel isn’t betting on the industry. He’s betting on this airline.
Is Delta overvalued at ~$70 per share? GuruFocus thinks so, it pegs fair value at $54.07, suggesting the stock is trading at a 30% premium. But Abel clearly sees something the models don’t capture. Maybe he’s right. Maybe he’s early. Time will tell.
The Smaller Bets: Macy’s, New York Times, and the “Sniff Test”
Not every Berkshire move is a multi-billion-dollar conviction play. Some are what we call “sniff tests”, small positions that let a manager follow a company closely without committing serious capital.
Macy’s (M) is the perfect example. Berkshire disclosed a new stake of about 3 million shares worth roughly $55 million — a rounding error in a $263 billion portfolio. It represents about 1.1% of Macy’s outstanding shares.
And yet, Macy’s stock jumped 4% to 7% in after-hours trading on the news, depending on which data feed you’re watching. That’s the “Berkshire halo effect” in action: when a legendary investor’s name is attached to a beaten-down retailer, people pay attention.
Is this a Ted Weschler pick? Almost certainly. He manages about 6% of the equity portfolio, and $55 million fits his typical position size. It’s also consistent with his style, deep-value plays in unloved sectors.
Macy’s is trading at less than 10x expected 2026 EPS, offers a 4% dividend yield, and bought back about 5% of its stock last year. The company launched a new turnaround plan in May 2026 focused on tighter inventory and converting select stores into distribution hubs. It’s not a conviction bet. It’s a “let’s watch this” bet.
The New York Times (NYT) is a different story. Berkshire increased its stake by 199% in Q1, pushing the position from $351 million to $1.27 billion. Unlike Macy’s, this wasn’t pocket change. The Times’ latest earnings report genuinely impressed, shares soared over 8% in response. Abel appears to be betting that premium digital subscription businesses have durable competitive moats. Hard to argue with that.
The Great Purge: 16 Stocks Berkshire Completely Exited
Now for the part that made some investors wince.
Berkshire fully exited 16 positions in Q1, about one-third of the entire portfolio. The most notable casualties:
Tech & E-Commerce
- Amazon (AMZN) — Gone. This follows a 77% reduction in Q4 2025. The message is clear: Abel prefers Alphabet’s AI positioning and Amazon didn’t make the cut.
Payment Networks
- Visa (V) — Fully exited, a position previously worth over $2 billion.
- Mastercard (MA) — Same story, also a multi-billion-dollar exit.
These were classic Todd Combs picks, mirroring positions from his pre-Berkshire hedge fund days. Interestingly, Abel left the American Express position completely untouched. American Express is both a payment network and a bank, and it’s been a Berkshire holding since the 1960s. Not all payment exposure is created equal.
Healthcare
- UnitedHealth Group (UNH) — Berkshire bought this during the stock’s 50% collapse in early 2025, rode a 45% rebound, and sold the entire 5-million-share position. Shortest healthcare bet in recent Berkshire history, but a wildly profitable one.
Consumer & Other
- Domino’s Pizza (DPZ), Pool Corporation (POOL), Charter Communications (CHTR), Aon (AON), Diageo, and Constellation Brands (STZ) (cut 95%) also hit the chopping block.
When you step back, a pattern emerges. Abel is systematically removing lower-conviction bets and concentrating the portfolio. Holdings went from 42 to 29. The top five positions now account for over 67% of the portfolio.
This is what “addition by subtraction” looks like in institutional portfolio management.
What Stayed: Apple, American Express, and the Unshaken Core
Amid all the drama, here’s what didn’t change, and that’s just as important.
Apple (AAPL) remains the undisputed king at 21.99% of the portfolio, with 228 million shares worth approximately $57.9 billion. After several quarters of trimming under Buffett, Abel left the Apple stake untouched. That’s a powerful signal: Apple isn’t going anywhere.
The rest of the top five: American Express (17.43%), Coca-Cola (11.56%), Bank of America (9.52%), and Chevron (6.64%). Together, the top five represent about 67% of all equity holdings.
Chevron did see a 35% trim, worth about $8 billion, but that looked more like profit-taking after the stock hit all-time highs in March than a strategic exit. Berkshire initially bought Chevron around $65 per share in 2020, added more around $124 in 2022, and sold this tranche at an average of $182.59. That’s just good portfolio management.
The core of the Berkshire portfolio, financials, consumer staples, energy, hasn’t changed. What’s changed is everything around the edges.
How the Market Reacted, Trading Snapshot
Here’s a quick-reference look at how the key stocks moved after the 13F filing dropped (all data from May 15–18, 2026):
The broad pattern: Berkshire’s buys popped, its sells barely flinched. That tells you the market had largely anticipated the exits, or simply doesn’t view Abel’s selling as a negative signal on those businesses.
What This Means for Investors, 3 Takeaways
1. Concentration is the new diversification
Berkshire just went from 42 positions to 29. If you’re running a portfolio of 40+ stocks with tiny position sizes, ask yourself: am I spread too thin to make any single bet matter? Abel clearly thinks fewer, bigger bets are the way forward.
2. Don’t be afraid to revisit “no-go zones”
Buffett swore off airlines in 2020 and called them a value trap for years. Abel looked at the same industry six years later, saw a structurally improved business in Delta, and pulled the trigger. Investing rules are useful, until they’re not. The world changes. Your thesis should too.
3. Follow the cash signal
Berkshire is sitting on a record $397 billion cash pile while continuing to sell more than it buys. That’s not bearishness, it’s patience. Abel is telling you, loud and clear, that he’s waiting for the right pitch. If one of the world’s greatest capital allocators thinks it’s wise to hold dry powder right now, maybe you should too.
So here we are, the first real glimpse of Berkshire Hathaway without Warren Buffett at the wheel, and the picture is sharper than most people expected. Greg Abel isn’t trying to be Buffett. He’s not mimicking the folksy quotes or the decades-long tech allergy. What he’s doing, and doing fast, is building a more concentrated, more conviction-driven version of the same value philosophy. The returns on Alphabet alone have already added hundreds of millions to Berkshire’s bottom line. The Delta bet is either going to look brilliant or premature in 12 months, but you can’t accuse Abel of indecision. And that record $397 billion cash pile? It’s sitting there like a coiled spring, waiting for the next big opportunity. The Abel era has officially begun, and it’s going to be fascinating to watch.