Buffett cashes in on Goldman shares

NEW YORK: Warren Buffett���s option to buy shares of Goldman Sachs Group, part of an agreement reached at the depths of the credit crisis, has earned a profit on paper of about $2 billion, a return of more than 40%.

Goldman Sachs on Thursday passed $162 in New York trading for the first time since rival Lehman Brothers Holdings collapsed in September.

Buffett���s Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire Hathaway has warrants to buy $5 billion of Goldman common stock for $115 a share any time in the next four years.

���It must feel good to be Warren Buffett,��� said Gerald Martin, a finance professor at American University���s Kogod School of Business in Washington.

It is common for investors to buy and sell shares in mimicry of the 78-year-old Buffett, the world's second-richest person and perhaps its most revered investor.



Berkshire paid $499 million for its Moody's stake, and on paper its investment has more than doubled in value.

The 48 million share stake was worth $3.65 billion when Moody's shares peaked at $76.09 in February 2007.

Berkshire has revealed a stake larger than 20 percent in at least one other publicly-traded company, the railroad operator Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp.