Tag: omaha travel

There is a saying “all ways lead to Rome”, but what about Omaha, Nebraska, USA? What are the requirements to attend Warren Buffett’s Annual Meeting (Berkshire Hathaway to be more precise), where he gives his thoughts on business, economy and the world in general? What do you have to do to be allowed into the holy halls of Capitalism?

In this article, I would like to point out how everybody – even someone absolutely not associated to Berkshire Hathaway in any way – can attend the meeting in Omaha on May, 6, 2017. Yes, even if you are technically not a shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway there is a legit way to sneak in to Century Link Centre to see Warren Buffett live!

Now I split this into to categories: entitled shareholders and non-shareholders. Then I show the different possibilities for you to travel to what is often called “the Woodstock of Capitalism”.

1. Shareholders:

1.1 living in the US: Easy, if you’re a registered shareholder Berkshire Hathaway will send you the          Annual Report. Along with it you receive the Proxy Statement. Attached to that you find an order form for the meeting credentials. That’s nice, isn’t it?

Click to access 2017Meetinginfo.pdf

 

 

1.2 foreign shareholders: requires some work in advance. Make sure you start doing it early enough:

 

1.2.1 Write an e-mail to Berkshire Hathaway. They have a public e-mail adress, which you can find on their website.

As far as I heard from a fellow investor you have to include a proof of ownership into the mail, stating that you actually own the Berkshire Hathaway Stock A OR B. The problem is, that there actually is a disclaimer saying you shouldn’t contact them – don’t forget these guys are busy. So I can’t tell you the result of that method, although as I said earlier, I know somebody who received an answer saying that the credentials are to be sent to him in April, 2017.

1.2.2 The easier method: Contact your broker and tell them what you have in mind. This is what I did by telephone. After a few days they contacted me again asking for my passport number. Several days later I received a package via UPS, which I will show to you in one of my next posts. Inside there are several documents. One of them is a form to order the tickets for Warren Buffett’s Annual Meeting which I have to send to Berkshire Hathaway in the next few days. Then they are going to send you another mail with the actual credentials. Let me say that your broker/bank may charge you something for this service.

When nothing works

1.3 Nothing works? You don’t get your credentials? You have forgotten to take them to Omaha or your pet has eaten them? There is still a third way for you as a shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway! Just travel to Omaha during Warren Buffett’s Annual Meeting and go to the shareholder kiosk at the CenturyLink Center. I would try to avoid doing that though, because I expect this to be a rather time-consuming option. Again, you have to prove that you are a real shareholder for example by showing them a screenshot of your share portfolio or anything else stating that you own the stock.

 

2. Non-shareholders

Want to attend the Warren Buffett’s Annual Meeting in Omaha, but are not a shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway? Even in this case there is a solution!

2.1 As every shareholder can obtain up to 4 tickets, you can buy some of them at ebay, like you can do here: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Berkshire-Hathaway-tickets-2017-4-Annual-Meeting-Credentials-Guide-Book-/252816929071

Or you can come to me, because if everything works out, I have one ticket left for free :-).

2.2 Students can use a seperate room with a livestram (the corporate movie is included).

2.3 In fact there will be a livestream of the event right here, just like last year: https://finance.yahoo.com/brklivestream

But really, I believe being there live is something much more special. And apart from the Annual General Meeting itself there are many events around it like a shareholder barbecue (whatever that is :D) and you get huge discounts for product coming out of Warren Buffett’s factories. And above all, it’s fun!