Adam Spatacco, The Motley Fool

Tue, May 13, 2025, 1:33 AM5 min read

• Warren Buffett recently tapped Greg Abel to take over the CEO role at Berkshire Hathaway.

• Abel played a huge role in transforming Berkshire's portfolio for nearly two decades, particularly in the energy sector.

• Despite market-beating returns over several decades, Berkshire stock looks incredibly undervalued, and Abel could be about to take over as the company holds a record level of cash.

• 10 stocks we like better than Berkshire Hathaway ›

It's quite rare to come across major storylines related to the business world during the weekend. If a corporation, especially a public company, has something important to announce, it generally does so during the workweek. In many ways, these updates and the speculative narratives around them are what cause share prices to move.

But on Saturday, May 3, investors all around the world were hit with perhaps the biggest financial storyline of 2025 so far. And guess what? It had nothing to do with artificial intelligence (AI) or tariffs.

Of course, I'm talking about a major announcement made by Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) (NYSE: BRK.B) CEO Warren Buffett. Over the weekend, Berkshire held its annual investor conference. Per usual, investors worldwide gathered around and eagerly hung on Buffett's last word. Some lucky attendees even got the chance to speak to the Oracle of Omaha and ask him questions.

While this is all par for the course for Berkshire's annual shareholder meeting, Buffett surprised everyone by announcing his intention to step away from the CEO role by year's end. During this announcement, Buffett made it clear that his choice as successor would be Greg Abel, who currently leads Berkshire's noninsurance side of the portfolio.

With such a major change in the works, investors are likely wondering what may be in store for Berkshire's future. Let's explore Abel's experience prior to and during his tenure at Berkshire and assess whether investors should buy the stock in the post-Buffett era.

While Abel got his start in the financial services industry as an accountant at PwC, he isn't particularly known as a stock picker like Buffett's other top lieutenants, Todd Combs and Ted Weschler. Rather, Abel is more of an operator, understanding how to put together complex deals, integrate management teams, and build more efficient processes to drive profitability.

In the early 1990s, Abel left the financial services world for a job at electricity company CalEnergy. By 1999, CalEnergy had transformed into a global operation and bolstered its size through the acquisition of MidAmerican Energy. Later that year, Berkshire Hathaway acquired MidAmerican Energy. In the mid-2000s, Abel became CEO of MidAmerican Energy, which eventually rebranded to Berkshire Hathaway Energy (BHE) in 2014.