[RationalDino]

Yes, but the float in those insurance companies is invested by Berkshire Hathaway. So when people report on BH, they often quote the float as a pile of cash that Buffett is sitting on.

I tried to verify this by looking at the financial report that it is based on. Which may be found at https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/qtrly/3rdqtr23.pdf. Unfortunately the $157 billion figure quoted in the title does not appear anywhere in the report. But page 37 quotes the float as being approximately $167 billion at September 30, 2023. So I suspect that they are quoting the float, and have a typo. Though they might be doing a calculation off of some other numbers.

My claim about how they think about it can be verified on page 32.

"Our management views our insurance business as possessing two distinct activities – underwriting and investing. Underwriting decisions are the responsibility of the unit managers, while investing decisions are the responsibility of Berkshire’s Chairman and CEO, Warren E. Buffett, and Berkshire’s corporate investment managers. Accordingly, we evaluate the economic performance of underwriting operations without any allocation of investment income or investment gains and losses. We consider investment income as an integral component of our aggregate insurance operating results. However, we consider investment gains and losses, whether realized or unrealized, as non-operating. We believe that such gains and losses are not meaningful in understanding the quarterly or annual operating results of our insurance businesses."