Excerpted from his 2007 letter to Berkshire Hathaway Inc. shareholders (which didn't come with the picture...):...We made one large sale last year. In 2002 and 2003 Berkshire bought 1.3% of PetroChina for $488 million, a price that valued the entire business at about $37 billion. Charlie and I then felt that the company was worth about $100 billion. By 2007, two factors had materially increased its value: the price of oil had climbed significantly, and PetroChina’s management had done a great job in building oil and gas reserves. In the second half of last year, the market value of the company rose to $275 billion, about what we thought it was worth compared to other giant oil companies. So we sold our holdings for $4 billion.
They purchased PetroChina when we were ignorant of global crude oil supply issues "years before". They disposed PetroChina when we were just "starting" to notice bullish China market. They made 700% ROC (grossly, not factored in dividends, exchange rate gain, taxes, and etc.) in just about 5 years time. If that is not called smart money, what else is? Do you still think Buffett is a slow moving boring old fat investor? Think again. He is a probably greatest and fastest moving trader on earth.
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