Warren Buffett buys another $127 mn worth of Occidental Petroleum stock

Investor Warren Buffett's company bought another $127 million worth of Occidental Petroleum stock over the past week to give Berkshire Hathaway 213.9 million shares of the oil producer.

Berkshire's latest filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission late Monday showed that it had bought another 2.2 million Occidental shares.

Buffett's Omaha, Nebraska-based conglomerate controls 23.8% of Occidental's stock and holds warrants to buy another 83.9 million shares for $59.62 apiece, but the billionaire recently told shareholders that he has no plans to buy the entire company.

Many people like to copy Buffett's moves because of his remarkable track record. Buffett doesn't routinely comment on Berkshire's stock purchases.

Buffett has been regularly buying Houston-based Occidental shares since early last year whenever the stock drops below $60. Berkshire's latest purchases were made at prices between $56.34 and $58.52.

Occidental's shares were down slightly Tuesday morning at $58.23. So Berkshire's warrants remain out of the money.

Berkshire also holds 93,532 preferred shares of Occidental that are worth about $10.3 billion and carry a hefty dividend, but Occidental recently redeemed 6,468 of them for $110,000 apiece. Berkshire picked up those preferred shares and the warrants when it helped finance Occidental's purchase of Anadarko in 2019.

In addition to investments, Berkshire owns dozens of companies outright including BNSF railroad, Geico insurance, several major utilities and an eclectic assortment of other companies such as See's Candy, Helzberg Diamonds and Precision Castparts.