Mergers and Acquisitions Boom! Is This a Good Sign for the Economy?
Wall Street dealmakers are off to a busy start to 2013, as some of corporate America’s most recognizable names have become involved in multi-billion-dollar mergers and acquisitions. Just yesterday, American Airlines and US Airways announced they would be merging in an $11 billion deal, while private equity firm 3G and Warren Buffett‘s Berkshire Hathaway announced a $28 billion joint acquisition of food conglomerate H.G. Heinz. And these two deals follow hard upon $24.4 billion leveraged buyout of Dell by private equity firm Silver Lake Partners and the firm’s founder, Michael Dell. Indeed, according to data from Deallogic, U.S. companies have spent $219 billion on mergers and acquisitions so far in 2013, a sharp increase from 2012, when firms spent just $85 billion during the same period. And U.S. firms are on pace to have the biggest year in M&A activity since 2000. While all this activity will be surely benefit shareholders of acquired firms — as well as lots of Wall ...
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Berkshire, CaixaBank in Deal
Berkshire Hathaway will pay CaixaBank €600 million ($778.7 million) for the future cash flow from a portfolio of life insurance policies, a rare dip into a fiscally stressed euro-zone country for Warren Buffett's investment firm.
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Berkshire Hathaway, CaixaBank Agree to Reinsurance Deal
Berkshire Hathaway will pay CaixaBank €600 million ($778.7 million) for the future cash flow from a portfolio of life insurance policies, the Barcelona-based bank said, a rare dip into a fiscally stressed euro-zone country for the investment firm run by Warren Buffett.
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The Other Side of Warren Buffett’s Common Sense Tax Argument
Over the years, Warren Buffett has gotten a lot of miles out of his folksy charm and ability to distill elaborate financial concepts into plain English. And recently, proponents of higher tax rates for the wealthy have gotten a lot of miles out of those qualities too — as the world’s fourth richest man has advocated repeatedly for just that policy. This week, Mr. Buffett was at it again — this time in the New York Times Op-Ed section — calling for, among other things, a higher capital gains tax rate. For years, capital gains have generally been taxed at a lower rate than ordinary income, partly in order to spur investment. The idea is that if taxpayers spend their money by investing in wealth-creating enterprises, then we’ll all be better off than we’d be if they simply spent their money consuming luxury goods or expensive vacations. (MORE: Why the Fiscal Cliff Is the Wrong Thing to Worry About) But Warren Buffett took aim at this logic, writing: “Suppose that an investor ...
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