Berkshire Hathaway, the company led by Warren Buffett, reported $25.7 billion in profit for the second quarter of 2026, according to the company's August 8 earnings release (Stocktitan). That's a 119% jump from the same period a year earlier. But a big chunk of that profit, $12.7 billion, came from investment gains, which are profits on stocks Berkshire owns, not from its actual businesses. Forbes, citing the results, separately reported an 18% increase in operating earnings, which measures profit from those actual businesses (Forbes).

During the quarter, Berkshire put its money to work in two ways. It bought $3.8 billion more in stocks than it sold, and it spent $1.0 billion buying back its own shares (Morningstar). The buyback amount is small compared to what Berkshire has done in the past, which may mean the company felt its own stock price was too high to justify buying more.

The second-quarter results build on a strong first quarter. Berkshire's first-quarter 2026 report, filed on the company's website, showed total assets of $727.2 billion, up $9.8 billion from the end of 2025. Profit for the first quarter was $10.1 billion (Berkshire Hathaway Q1 2026 Report). Adding both quarters together, Berkshire earned about $35.8 billion in the first half of 2026.

The investment-gains part of that profit is worth a closer look. In Berkshire's February 2026 news release covering all of 2025, the company reported $12.9 billion in investment gains for the entire year (Berkshire Hathaway). The $12.7 billion recorded in the second quarter of 2026 alone nearly matched that full-year total.

Here's why this matters. Since 2018, accounting rules require companies to count changes in the value of stocks they own as profit or loss every quarter, even if they haven't sold those stocks. Think of it like your house: if home prices in your neighborhood go up, your net worth rises on paper, even though you haven't sold the house. Berkshire's $12.7 billion in investment gains works the same way. It means the stocks Berkshire held went up in value during the quarter.

Berkshire also completed its purchase of Taylor Morrison, a homebuilder, according to a July 24, 2026 announcement on the company's news page (Berkshire Hathaway). That adds a new type of business to Berkshire's already wide-ranging collection of companies, and its results will show up in Berkshire's numbers going forward.

Berkshire's 2026 news page also lists an August 5, 2026 notice titled "Information Regarding Second Quarter Earnings Release," which is the company's usual practice of telling the market ahead of time when it will report. The second-quarter report was published August 8, 2026. Berkshire's reports page keeps both first-quarter and second-quarter reports for each year, and the first-quarter 2026 report is available alongside the new second-quarter data.

On the balance sheet, the $9.8 billion increase in total assets during the first quarter, from $717.4 billion at the end of 2025 to $727.2 billion at March 31, 2026, gives a starting point for measuring second-quarter activity. The $3.8 billion in stock purchases, $1.0 billion in buybacks, and the Taylor Morrison deal all point to continued growth in Berkshire's assets, though the exact second-quarter total will be in the company's upcoming detailed filing.

The 119% jump in profit is the number that will grab headlines, but where that profit came from tells you more than how big it is. If most of the gain comes from rising stock prices, then Berkshire's profit is really just reflecting what the stock market did during the quarter, not whether its actual businesses improved. The 18% growth in operating earnings is the number that shows whether Berkshire's real businesses, like insurance, railroads, and manufacturing, are getting stronger. Both numbers went up this quarter, but they can move in opposite directions, as they have before when falling stock prices dragged down reported profit even while the businesses did well.

For anyone following Berkshire, the detailed filing to watch for will break down operating earnings by business segment, show how much cash the company holds, and reveal any changes in its stock portfolio. The $1.0 billion buyback pace, if it continues all year, would total about $4 billion, which is below what the company spent on buybacks in 2023 and 2024. That could mean management thinks the stock isn't cheap enough at current prices to justify buying more. The $3.8 billion in stock purchases, on the other hand, suggests Berkshire is still finding opportunities in the stock market even as it spends on big acquisitions like Taylor Morrison.