Guru Investment Watch: Buffett, Icahn, Gates, Peltz, Heebner

This week was a huge week as far as getting to see what the large funds and key money managers or investment gurus were putting into their portfolios.  We compiled lists and lists of investment holdings from the great investors.  Out of these came investment holdings from Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A; BRK-B), Carl Icahn and Icahn Enterprises, L.P. (NYSE: IEP), Bill Gates and his Cascade investment vehicle, Nelson Peltz and Trian, and finally Ken Heebner’s CGM FOCUS FUND (CGMFX).  All of these billionaires or gurus have been broken down individually below.

Every quarter there is a push to see Warren Buffett’s investmentholdings for Berkshire Hathaway.  He broke these down into three groupsalphabetically and consolidated these for simplicity.
Buffett’s holdings "A to G"
Buffett’s holdings "H to S"
Buffett’s holdings "T to Z"

Carl Icahn’s Icahn Enterprises is always an interesting watch becausehe can cause waves in so many companies.  This quarter we focused onhis biotech and BioHealth sector investments because some seemed odd orleft over and his efforts in Yahoo!, Motorola, and Time Warner arealready known.

Bill Gates and his Cascade Investment LLC vehicle have always beeninteresting to watch because of his investment foresight  into trendsthat frequently do not make sense for several quarters and then seemvery obvious.  His latest stock investment list has him looking like a garbage man andlooking south towards trends in Mexico, among many others.

Nelson Peltz and his TRIAN FUND MANAGEMENT made some interesting stockchoices, some of which made an impact on share prices.  He’s known forfood and restaurant activist changes and this list was very differentthan before.

Ken Heebner’s CGM FOCUS FUND really appears to still have stuck with commodities despite the downturn.  His last quarter performance was huge, although this quarter his fund is off to a rock start.

Jon C. Ogg
August 16, 2008