Ultimate 2009 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting Guide
In anticipation of this year’s Berkshire Hathaway (BRKa) annual meeting, I’m starting my 2009 annual meeting guide early this year. I’ve been getting quite a few questions already about this year’s meeting, so hopefully this guide will help answer some of those questions.
Official Releases
Premeeting Preparation
- Background Reading
- 2009 Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting Weekend Facebook Event page
- Value Investing News Calendar – May 2009
Meeting Schedule
- Borsheims cocktail receiption for shareholders on May 1, 2009 from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM.
- Door open at the Qwest Center on May 2, 2009 at 7:00 AM.
- The Berkshire movie will be shown at 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM.
- The question-and-answer session will start 9:30 AM and run until 3:00 PM.
- The annual meeting will start at 3:15 PM.
- Receiption for shareholders from outside of North America at 4:00 PM.
- Main Borsheims gala on May 3, 2009 from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
- Gorat’s will be reserved for shareholders from 1:00 PM to 10:00 PM on May 3, 2009 (Requires reservation, call 402-551-3733 on April 1st).
Meeting Questions
There are several changes to how this year’s meeting questions will be handled. First, several journalists have been selected to participate in the question-and-answer period with questions that shareholders have submitted by email. These journalists include the following: Fortune’s Carol Loomis, CNBC’s Becky Quick, and New York Time’s Andrew Ross Sorkin. Just click on the previous links to send your questions to those journalists. In your email, let the journalist know if you would like your name mentioned if your question is selected.
Second, there is no need to rush the doors this year when they open at 7:00 AM in order to get in line for the mics. There will be a drawing at 8:15 at each microphone for those shareholders hoping to ask questions themselves. Questions will alternate between those asked by the journalists and those from the winning shareholders. Hopefully, this will improve the quality of questions this year and result in more questions directly related to Berkshire Hathaway.
If you are looking for question ideas, Marcelo P. Lima is organizing questions for this year’s Berkshire Hathaway meeting at his website. His goal is to create a list of great, unanswered questions.
Jeff Matthews is also asking his readers to provide him with great questions regarding Berkshire Hathaway. Readers who submit the Top Ten vote-getters as of the New York Stock Exchange close on April 15, 2009, will receive an autographed copy of Pilgrimage to Warren Buffett’s Omaha. Updated: Here are the Top 10 Questions for Warren Buffett.
Live Blogging from Annual Meeting in Omaha
Twitter Streams:
- Source: Mark Wancier
- Liz Claman, Fox Business anchor
“up now, it’s 4am CT, not as freezing as last year. Buffett has a staged cowboy shootout at Qwest to kick off day” - Alex Crippen, CNBC.com
“Buffett: Not every CEO wants a “rational” compensation system because irrational systems often pay better” - Joe Ponzio – FWallStreet
“Buffett: Wells Fargo under $9 again, I’d put my entire net worth in it.” - Andrewr Sorkin – DealBook
“Buffett says “I was dead wrong” about Gen Re when he bought it. Commends management for fixing it.” - Jason McGowan
“Warren suugests reading the book “the Great Crash” - Matthew Dettinger
“You can bet on inflation & I guarentee the dollar will buy less in 5 yrs -Buffett” - David Spitz
“sue decker and billg are sitting within whisper distance” - David Burn
“Over time people will live better and better in this country. Our system works.” – Warren Buffet” - 3dcheckers
“At goreshims cocktail party. Trying to find the bar.” - #Berkshire – Follow all the #Berkshire tweets!
Live Blogging
- Live from the Berkshire Shareholders meeting – Omaha.com
- Warren Buffett Watch – CNBC.com
Videos
Articles
- Berkshire’s Munger Favors ‘100% Ban’ on Credit Swaps – Bloomberg
- Buffett dispenses gloom at Berkshire fest – Reuters
Blog Posts
- Top 5 Quotes From Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting – The Manual of Ideas
Berkshire Hathaway 2009 Annual Meeting Notes
- From the AGM – The Motley Fool Berkshire Hathaway Board
- NEW meeting notes – The Motley Fool Berkshire Hathaway Board
- Berkshire Hathaway 2009 Meeting Notes – ValueHuntr
- NEW 2009’s Woodstock for Capitalists: Recap – buffettologist.com
Please let me know of any other resources to add to this list. I suggest you bookmark this page and check back often. I will be updating this page as new information becomes available.
Hey, are you organizing any type of group outing, dinner or meeting during shareholder weekend? By the way, this is a great summary.
Sadly, I will not be attending this year’s shareholder weekend, so no I won’t be organizing any type of group event during the shareholder’s weekend.
This is our first annual meting and we need suggestions as to where to stay and how to get around.
Are children allowed at any of the events? This is our 1st time attending the meeting and we have a 3 month old baby. Any suggestions will be appreciated.
Do you know of anyone (or their url) that will be “tweeting” the meeting via twitter?
It is the Qwest Center as is Qwest Communications; spelling and grammar are a great asset to a company’s integrity and credibility.
Thanks for catching that typo, Darin. I’ve updated the Qwest Center name.
Always look forward to this article. thanks George
-Alexg
I missed some of the Q @ A part of the meeting. Is there anywhere I can read or hear the questions and answers directed to Warren and Charlie? Thanks.
Great summary. One could always learn a ton from BRK.a annual meeting.
The ValueHuntr notes are by far the best. Thanks for posting !
Can anyone attend the meeting? How do you sale products at the meeting?