QuestionerThis question comes from Sam Butler, who says he's been a shareholder for many years and asks, what impact does the rise of so many new SPACs have on Berkshire's ability to find and close new acquisitions?
WarrenWell, it's a killer. The SPACs generally have to spend their money in two years, as I understand it, so they have to buy a business in two years. If you put a gun to my head and said, you've got to buy a big business in two years, you know, I'd buy one, but it wouldn't be. much one. It's, you know, we look and look and now there are, I don't know how many, whether it's hundreds, and there's always been the pressure from private equity funds. I mean, if you're running money for somebody else and you're getting paid a fee and you get the upside and you don't have the downside, you're going to buy something. And I could tell you about, I had a very famous, I had a call from a very famous figure many years ago that was involved in it. And I wanted to learn about reinsurance. And I said, well, I don't really think it's a very good business. And he said, yeah, he says, why don't spend this money in six months? I've got to give it back to the investors. So, you know, it's a different equation that you have if you're working with other people's money where you get the upside and you have to give it back to them if you don't do something. And frankly, we're not competitive with that. That won't go on forever. But it's where the money is now, and Wall Street goes where the money is. it does anything, you know, basically that works. And SPACs have been working for a while and you stick your famous name on it. You can you can sell almost anything.