Billionaire Buffett gives stock to charity

updated 12:47 p.m. ET July 8, 2008

OMAHA, Neb. - Billionaire Warren Buffett has given away 512,169 Class B shares of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. stock to three charitable foundations in keeping with his plan to give away the bulk of his fortune.

The gifts were revealed in paperwork filed Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Those shares were worth $3,999 each, more than $2.05 billion total, at the close of trading July 1, the day Buffett transferred their ownership. Most of the shares — 451,250 — went to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Buffett said in 2006 that he planned to give 10 million B shares to the Gates Foundation over time, 1 million B shares for the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation named in honor of his first wife, and 350,000 shares for each of the three foundations run by his three children.

Omaha, Neb.-based Berkshire Hathaway owns a variety of companies, including insurance, clothing, furniture, jewelry and candy companies, restaurants, natural gas and corporate jet firms and has major investments in such companies as Coca-Cola Co. and Wells Fargo & Co.

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