Investing icon Warren Buffett has announced his resignation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates Foundation is one of the recipients of shares of his investment firm Berkshire Hathaway. The 90-year-old investor made this announcement in a letter. However, he did not specify any reason for doing so. But Buffet does state that he has already resigned from all other corporate boards except Berkshire Hathaway. Distancing himself from the charitable organization, Buffett said that he has been not actively involved in the role for an unspecified time. “I am resigning as a trustee of BMG just like I have done from all corporate boards other than Berkshire Hathaway’s. The chief executive officer of the foundation is now Mark Suzman. He is an outstanding selection and I fully support him. My goals are 100 per cent in sync with those of the Bill And Melinda Gates Foundation. I think there is no need for my physical presence to achieve these goals.” Buffett said in the letter. The move catches several eyeballs because Buffett gave USD 30.1 billion to Gates Foundation in 2006. According to reports, he has since donated another USD 4 billion to the foundation. Buffet is a close friend of Bill Gates. His announcement comes close on the heels of Bill and Melinda Gates announced their divorce and subsequent reports about the improper behaviour of former Microsoft CEO’s improper behaviour with employees of the company decades ago.
Bill and Melinda Gates founded the foundation in 2000. The foundation is funded by the personal wealth of Gates couple along with several other Gates family foundation and a gift pledged by the investor. According to the website of the foundation, it has so far invested USD 54 billion. The foundation works for poverty alleviation and global health issues. More recently, it’s involved in the global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines. When the couple announced their decision of getting separated, there was uncertainty over the future of the foundation. However, the couple clarified that there will be “no changes to their roles or the organization are planned.” The couple announced news of their separation after Bill Gates’s reputation suffered several blows in recent years. One of them was reports of his socializing with late billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. The other incident that dented his image was of reports of Gates having an affair with an employee around the year 2000. Gates’s resignation from Microsoft coincides with the investigation launched by the company into his inappropriate relationship with a company subordinate in 2019.
Meanwhile, Buffett in the statement also talked about his future philanthropic goals. In the letter, he noted that he has pledged USD 4.1 billion to five foundations as part of his annual commitment. “Today I have reaches a milestone. I pledged to give all my shares of Berkshire, over 99 per cent of my net worth – to philanthropy. With the distribution of 4.1 billion, I am almost halfway there,” Buffett said. At the time of making this announcement in 2006, Buffet held 478,998 A-shares in Berkshire stock. As of now, this number has increased to 238,624. The value of these shares currently is around USD 100 billion. For those who are unaware, Buffett along with Bill and Melinda Gates established The Giving Pledge. It was an open invitation to super-rich to publicly commit to pledge a major portion of their wealth to philanthropy.
