Under Warren Buffett’s savvy leadership, Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A, BRK.B) garnered a reputation for continuously outperforming the overall U.S. stock market by a wide margin.

Looking at the XXI century, the benchmark S&P 500 index is up 341.93% as it rose from about 1,320 at the start of 2001 to approximately 5,900 at the start of 2025 – the year ‘The Oracle of Omaha’ announced he would retire.

Within the same timeframe, BRK.B stock rallied 884.13% from roughly $85 to just above $442.

Simultaneously, Berkshire Hathaway’s departure since Buffett revealed he intends to step down and since he actually stepped down, raised questions regarding how much of the firm’s recent success is due to savvy leadership and how much is due to the reputation of its leaders.

How Berkshire Hathaway stock performed since Warren Buffett announced his retirement

To begin with, extending the comparison between BRK.B and the S&P 500 to press time on March 31, 2026, shows that the advantage for the former has effectively stopped growing. Specifically, the benchmark index is 381.11% in the green, and Berkshire stock 955.27% at its press time value of $474.66.

Furthermore, examining the equity’s performance since May 3, 2025 – the day Warren Buffett announced he would step down – shows BRK.B has fallen 12.07% from PRICE to $474.66.

Since ‘The Oracle of Omaha’ actually retired at the start of 2026, Berkshire is down 4.47%.

Elsewhere, the S&P 500 is up 11.55% since May 3, 2025, but is down year-to-date (YTD) more than BRK.B stock at 7.51%.

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