Warren Buffett Excludes Gates Foundation From Midyear Donations

Topline

Warren Buffett excluded the Gates Foundation from his midyear donations for the first time since 2006, opting instead to donate thousands of Berkshire Hathaway shares to four foundations run by his children.

Key Facts

In a statement released on Tuesday, Buffett said he would donate 9 million Class B shares to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, as well as 1 million each to the Sherwood Foundation, founded by Susie Buffett, the Howard G. Buffett Foundation and the Novo Foundation, founded by Peter and Jennifer Buffett.

Buffett had also been making annual donations to the Gates Foundation, the charitable fund founded by billionaire Microsoft founder Bill Gates, since 2006, but snubbed the organization this year after previously donating a record $6 billion last summer.

Buffett’s plans to skip donations to the Gates Foundation were first reported by the Wall Street Journal in June, which said he was delaying a decision about future donations to the fund until possibly Thanksgiving.

The report indicated the Berkshire Hathaway chair was waiting to see the results of a review of the Gates Foundation’s ties to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, and Buffett has also been in contact with the foundation’s leadership about the issue.

“My goal is to dispose of all of my Berkshire shares within about eight years,” Buffett said in a statement on Tuesday, adding that his remaining Berkshire Hathaway shares “will be donated to the four foundations one way or the other by December 31, 2034.”

This article was originally published on Forbes.com