Buffett has repeatedly said that Berkshire's size means it will no longer be able to deliver outsized outperformance. He also says that most people should invest in index funds. It is perfectly reasonable to just buy the S&P if that aligns with your financial goals.

> BRK-B's 5 year return is 2% per year more than SP500.

That said, 2% per year is generally considered a lot in diversified mutual fund / ETF land. You might not be able to charge hedge-fund level 2-and-20 fees for delivering that, but you could certainly charge multiples of what the low-cost indexers do (instead, Berkshire charges you approximately nothing). Now, Berkshire is a conglomerate, not a fund, and you could argue 2% is an appropriate risk premium for a single stock, even one as diverse as Berkshire (which is still less diverse than the S&P). But it is pretty impressive for something that is not a tech company. Those are the only things in the S&P that seem to be generating any returns these days (besides Berkshire, JP Morgan is the only other non-tech company with a market cap over $1tn, and arguably banks really are tech companies now, too).

> Apple is still 21% of BRK's publicly listed holdings

The public company investments are a minority of Berkshire's current value. The majority comes from wholly-owned operating companies and insurance businesses.

2% is a massive difference.

Another user posted the difference between sp500 and Berkshire returns in the last 2 decades. Starting with 10k in one case you end up with 160, in the other at 240. And if the 2% delta stays there, it's going to compound even further.

Also, standard deviation on Berkshire is lower than the SP500, so the second is riskier.

BRK-B is also a top-10 (currently #10) component in the S&P 500 with a 1.74% weight. They also own ~40 stocks and I think around half of them are in the S&P 500 (including Apple, Amazon, and Google, which are also top 10 components but a combined ~15% weight), so, yeah.

Kind of a niche use case, but BRK.B is nice if you want a single stock that is relatively diversified, kinda mirrors the greater market, and doesn't pay dividends.

My employer uses a shitty HSA provider (Healthequity) who doesn't provide any sort of tax reporting, and I live in a state that taxes HSAs. Investing in BRK.B instead of a broad fund is a bit riskier, but it saves me from spending an hour tabulating individual transactions when I do my taxes

20-yr CAGR seems to be consistently higher than SP500: https://testfol.io/?s=7boYMdNxqjh

> BRK-B's 5 year return is 2% per year more than SP500.

> If my goal is to not sell for a decade or more, I'm not sure what BRK offers over SP500, except more risk.

I think you have already answered your own question. Historically, BRK-B has very often outperformed the SP500.

Plus, their investment philosophy is pretty clear. It's a solid alternative if you distrust tech which is today very heavy in the SP500.