Buffett's pay stays at $100,000

NEW YORK: Warren Buffett, the world���s richest man, took a $100,000 salary for the 27th consecutive year in 2007 as profit surged 20% at his Berkshire Hathaway. Buffett received no bonus as he steered Berkshire into bond insurance and arranged for its largest cash purchase, a $4.5-billion deal to buy Marmon Holdings, the Pritzker family���s collection of 125 companies. Buffett gets no stock options or grants for serving as CEO and chairman, the Omaha, Nebraska-based company said.

Since wresting control of Berkshire four decades ago, Buffett, 77, built the once-failing textile manufacturer into a $200 billion investment and holding company with a $75 billion stock portfolio and businesses from candy making to insurance.

���This guy doesn���t care about putting the money into his own pocket, the money is his way of keeping score,��� said Guy Spier, who has about 15% of his Aquamarine hedge fund in Berkshire shares. Spier along with a friend paid $650,100 last year in an annual charity auction to lunch with Buffett. ���Of course, we don���t know what Warren���s private fortune is. He���s always run a separate pool of money, which could well be a billion itself, totally separate from Berkshire.���

Buffett���s wealth increased $10 billion in the 12 months through February 11 to about $62 billion as he beat out Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates as the world���s richest man, Forbes said in its annual list. Berkshire���s shareholder equity, or assets minus liabilities, rose 11% to $120.7 billion in 2007 as the stock climbed 29%, outpacing the 3.5% gain in the S&P���s 500 Index.

���That party is over,��� Buffett said in his annual letter to shareholders, released with the 2007 annual report February 29. ���It is a certainty that insurance industry profit margins, including ours, will fall significantly in 2008. Prices are down.���

With prices falling for property coverage, Berkshire started a new bond insurer in December to compete with companies including MBIA and Ambac Financial Group, charging more than rivals to guarantee payment on municipal debt while avoiding the mortgage-related securities that jeopardised their credit ratings.

Berkshire agreed December 25 to buy 60% of Marmon for $4.5 billion. Companies owned by Chicago-based Marmon have operations in North America, the UK, Europe and Asia, making products ranging from railroad tank cars to wire used in appliances and telecommunications.