Berkshire B share (NYSE: BRK.B) traded heavily May 30 Friday.
(Full size picture here)
May be Bill Gates is selling on behalf of Gates foundation (USAToday article)? As you may know in 2006 Buffett donated large number of shares to Gates fundation (NYTimes article). I was wondering who is buying BRK.B on Friday? I know I could only afford 0.5 share at this time (hint: President Bush, could you speed up the tax rebate 🙂
After a little Google search, I found the news from Yahoo message board (BRK-A). It says “BRKB’s added to world market index accounts for volume”. Later I also found the offical news through Reuter, quote Reuter “The largest additions to the MSCI World Index < .MIWD00000PUS> are Berkshire Hathaway’s (BRKb.N: Quote, Profile , Research) Class B shares…”
About adding a stock to major index
It’s generally a good sign that a stock being added to a major stock index. Berkshire is not a component of SP 500. I don’t know the specific of MSCI world index, and the criteria of adding a stock.
But I do know MSCI has lots of index for international stocks. With the increasing weight of interntional stock market (relative to US) and the ETF boom, MSCI world index are also getting popular.