But the Berkshire Hathaway CEO would be sitting on a fortune nearly three times that amount had he not pledged in 2006 to give away all of his money.
Over the past 18 years, Buffett has donated more than $81.6 billion of his Berkshire Hathaway stock to charities.
In fact, the $7.8 billion donation in late June pushed Buffett down two spots on the Forbes billionaires list, giving him his lowest ranking in decades.
At the time of Buffett’s announcement, he owned 474,998 Class A shares, which were then worth about $63.8 billion.
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Had he kept his shares, his net worth would have been about $293 billion, surpassing the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, with $60.8 billion, the second-richest man, Jeff Bezos, with $114.2 billion, and the third-richest man, Bernard Arnault, with $151.3 billion.
Instead, Buffett has given away nearly 99% of his wealth by making billions of dollars in donations to charities each year.
A large portion of his wealth has been earmarked for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation—a nonprofit organization focused on tackling poverty and promoting health care in developing countries.
Buffett has also given billions of dollars to his three children — Susan, Howard and Peter — who run their own charitable foundations, as well as the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, named after his late wife.
Since then, he has burned through his Berkshire stake to 207,963 Class A shares with the goal of continuing to donate shares to the five foundations every year until his death.
“They have already received large sums of money for their personal use and will receive more in the future.
“They live comfortable, productive lives. I will continue to live in a way that gives me everything I could possibly want in life.”
