Warren Buffett on Business and Charity Giving
Born as Warren Edward Buffett on August 30, 1930, Warren Buffett is an American corporate investor and philanthropist. Buffett is among the most accomplished investors throughout history, the biggest shareholder and is best known for being the chief executive officer of Berkshire Hathaway. Just last year, he was listed as one of the wealthiest persons in the world by Forbes magazine, with an approximate net worth of $62 billion.
Warren Buffett has been labeled as the “Sage of Omaha” or the “Oracle of Omaha” and is renowned for his commitment to the value investing principle and for his penny-pinching character in spite of all his earned fortune.
Outside business matters, Warren Buffett is also a famous philanthropist who has vowed to offer 85% of his wealth to the Gates Foundation. The Grinnell College Board Trustee was honored as the leading money manager of the 20th century, according to a survey by the Carson Group, way ahead of figures like John Templeton and Peter Lynch. He was also considered among the 100 Most Influential People in the world by Time magazine.
In 2006, Warren Buffett raised money for Girls, Inc. by auctioning his 2001 Lincoln Town Car on the online marketing site eBay.com. That same year, he pronounced his proposal to give away his large fortune to charity, with 83% of his riches going to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, where he would soon be one of the organization’s Board of directors. In June of that same year, he donated about 10 million worth of Berkshire Hathaway Class B shares to the organizations, which was worth an estimated 30.7 billion US dollars as of the 23rd of that month. That was by far the largest charitable contribution in history. It also made Warren Buffett one of the prominent leaders in the philanthrocapitalism reform.