The 76-Year-Old Reason Why Buffett Has Been Selling Apple

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) has practically been the Apple of Warren Buffett’s eye as he has held it as his top investment year after year, for over a decade. However, Buffett has shed well over half of his AAPL holdings in the past two years.

Over the course of these past two years, Buffett has only had good things to say about Apple. At Berkshire’s (NYSE:BRK-B) 2025 annual meeting, Buffett jokingly commented that Tim Cook made Berkshire more money than he himself did. After all, AAPL stock constituted over 50% of Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio for a long period of time.

So why did Buffett seemingly turn bearish on Apple, even without saying so, or is the rationale bigger than Apple?

Buffett’s age-old rationale for selling Apple stock

Buffett hasn’t just been selling Apple. He has been selling most other big-name holdings in his portfolio that he has been sticking to for decades. The selling spree started in late 2023 as he likely saw the broader market as too expensive and started shifting to bonds.

The rationale behind this is likely Benjamin Graham, specifically his book “The Intelligent Investor”. Warren Buffett first read Benjamin Graham’s The Intelligent Investor in 1949 when he was 19 years old.

So, what does that book say?

In the book, Graham advises that investors maintain a 75/25 balance between stocks and bonds in their portfolio. This ratio is to be adjusted depending on whether or not the investor thinks the market is expensive or cheap.

For instance, if the investor believes the market is starting to get expensive and has 75% of his portfolio invested in stocks, the prescription then is to start reducing that exposure, maybe to a 50/50 split between stocks and bonds. If the market keeps getting expensive to an uncomfortable degree, the investor may sell until stocks constitute only 25% of his/her portfolio and bonds constitute 75%.

Conversely, if stocks start looking cheap, the investor can then start going back to bonds. He/she can then slowly reduce exposure to bonds from the ceiling of 75% down to a minimum of 25% and increase stock market exposure to 75%.

In short, the broader market is the real target. Apple just happens to be his largest holding.

Old habits die hard

It has been 76 years since Warren Buffett read that book, but this isn’t his only connection to Benjamin Graham. Buffett is called his “greatest pupil” for good reason.

Buffett studied under Graham at Columbia Business School and later worked for him at Graham-Newman Corporation, where he absorbed the core principles of value investing. He himself has said that Graham had a pivotal influence on how he learned to evaluate stocks and think about markets. It makes sense why Graham’s investment strategy has been ingrained in Buffett’s way of thinking.

Buffett’s current position

Berkshire Hathaway’s total stock market position is worth $309.65 billion today. The Apple stake is still worth $65.127 billion, or 21% of the portfolio. American Express (NYSE:AXP) is a close second, with 18.7% being allocated to the stock.

If we turn to cash, that’s $381.7 billion. Excluding rail cash and T-Bills payable, that’s $354.3 billion.

Buffett has ~57% of Berkshire’s portfolio in cash. That’s far from extreme pessimism if we use Graham’s prescription as a barometer. Thus, if Buffett has the controls for a few more quarters and the market keeps rallying, he would probably keep on selling… but that will not be the case as Buffett will retire soon.

Will Buffett buy more AAPL stock in the future?

Warren Buffett publicly announced during the 2025 annual meeting that he will be retiring as CEO in 2026. As of writing, that’s just two days until Greg Abel becomes Berkshire Hathaway’s new CEO. Buffett will still remain chairman of the board and controlling shareholder.

Still, his personal oversight over the investments and input is unlikely to be as sharp. Abel will be the one who decides how Berkshire puts the $381.7 billion cash position into use once Buffett retires.

The Q4 13F report will give you a final glimpse into how Warren Buffett sees the market. Beyond that, Abel may choose a different direction where he joins the market rally, or he may continue where Buffett left off and keep selling.

I believe the Q4 2025 report will bring more of the same, as nothing has changed materially in the broader market.