Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway cash pile soars to $382 billion

Warren Buffett offloaded $6.1 billion of shares during the period.

Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s cash pile soared to $381.7 billion in the third quarter, a fresh record, and operating earnings at Chief Executive Officer Warren Buffett’s conglomerate surged 34%.

That figure hit $13.5 billion, driven by an increase in insurance underwriting profit, in a period that was marked by an unusually low disaster activity, according to filings published Saturday.

Buffett offloaded $6.1 billion of shares during the period. In spite of that growing cash hoard, the firm’s net investment income declined 13% to $3.2 billion amid lower short-term interest rates.

The firm’s collection of primary insurance and reinsurance businesses both turned a pretax underwriting profit this quarter, after posting losses in the year-ago period.

But Berkshire auto insurer Geico’s pretax underwriting profit fell 13% amid higher claims, even as the unit continued to add new clients.

For the fifth straight quarter, the firm declined to buy back its own shares, even after they fell nearly 12% after Buffett announced in May that he would step down as CEO at the end of the year.

Berkshire’s earnings are closely watched because the conglomerate’s stable of businesses — ranging from insurance to rail, energy and manufacturing — provides a snapshot of the health of the US economy.