Berkshire’s New Boss Greg Abel Doubles Down on Warren Buffett’s Bitcoin Skepticism

Another Wall Street dinosaur scoffs at crypto—while the rest of finance evolves. Abel inherits Buffett’s aversion to Bitcoin, proving old money moves slow even when the throne changes hands.

Funny how billionaires preaching ’value investing’ keep missing the digital asset revolution. Maybe they’ll wake up after missing the next 1000% rally.

Greg takes control with hundreds of billions at his disposal

Anyway, this past weekend, 40,000 shareholders packed into Omaha to give Warren Buffett a standing ovation. It was his last major moment as the boss of the empire he built over six decades. And right there in the crowd, standing and clapping, was Greg Abel.

When the next annual meeting happens in 2026, all those people are going to be looking at him instead. The torch has been passed.

Now Greg is 62 years old, and he’s actually from Canada. He graduated from the University of Alberta and started climbing through Berkshire’s utility business years ago, and worked his way to the top.

Warren wrote in his 2023 letter that they used to live a few blocks apart in Omaha back in the ’90s, but somehow never ran into each other.

Warren told investors at the meeting on Saturday, “We will be bombarded with offerings that we’ll be glad we have the cash for.” Then he added, “It would be a lot more fun if it were to happen tomorrow, but it’s very, very unlikely it will happen tomorrow.”

This is the situation Greg inherits. He’s got the money. He’s got the power. What he doesn’t have is Warren’s reputation, and he sure doesn’t have his flexibility.

“He’s not known as an investor,” said Bill Stone, chief investment officer at Glenview Trust, which holds Berkshire stock. Stone said his trust in the company came from Buffett’s history of being a solid steward—not Greg’s track record. That sentiment is everywhere. People don’t know yet if Greg has what it takes to move billions of dollars in the right direction.

Greg hasn’t even touched the company’s $264 billion stock portfolio. That’s still off-limits. It’s one of Berkshire’s most important assets, and the new CEO hasn’t been given the keys. All of his big wins so far have been in operations, especially energy.

Larry Cunningham, director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, called Greg an “operations guy.” He said Buffett’s hands-off approach worked because it made managers want to earn his trust. Now Greg has to figure out how to keep that same level of respect without micro-managing everything.

Crypto gets ignored as Wall Street watches Greg closely

Greg’s job gets even harder because people expect him to match Warren’s investment decisions. And let’s be real—nobody’s doing that, it’s impossible. Christopher Bloomstran, president of Semper Augustus and a longtime Berkshire shareholder, said:

“I think the bar for replacing Warren Buffett is an impossible one. Greg will be under a microscope, not so much from the shareholder base but from the public eye.”

And on top of all that pressure, Greg has to keep one eye on takeover threats. Berkshire hasn’t been buying much lately because valuations are too high. Warren said they’ve already picked through everything worth acquiring. That’s why Berkshire has been outbid or just straight-up uninterested in deals lately.

But if the buyouts done after the pandemic start to fail under heavy debt and a weak economy, then sitting on the sidelines might end up looking smart. Time will tell.

So yeah, Wall Street might be ready for Bitcoin, but Berkshire is not.