Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

Berkshire Hathway roots in a textile manufacturing company. Oliver Chace established it in 1839 as Valley Falls, Rhode Island. Chace had worked under Samual Slater (founder of the first successful textile mill in America). Then in 1806, Chase founded his first textile mill. In 1929, the Valley Falls Company joined with the Berkshire Cotton Manufacturing Company in Adams, Massachusetts. The new combined company was known as Berkshire Fine Spinning Associates.

Seabury Stanton made investment efforts and renewed profitability after the great depression. Further, in 1955, Berkshire Fine Spinning Associates merged with the Hathway Manufacturing Company (founded in 1888) in New Bedford, Massachusetts, by Horatia Hathway. It profits from whaling and China Trade. After the merger, Berkshire Hathway had 15 plants employing over 12000 workers with over $120 million in revenue, headquartered in New Bedford. However, by the end of the decade, seven of these locations were closed, accompanied by large layoffs. It was 1962 when Warren Buffet began buying stock in Berkshire Hathway after noticing a pattern in the price direction of its stock.

Eventually, Buffett accepted that the textile business was declining and the financial situation would not improve. But later, Buffet decided to buy more of the stock to acquire a significant part of the company instead of selling at a slightly lower price, which made him the majority owner of the falling textile business. Initially, Buffet maintained Berkshire's core textiles business, but later, he expanded into insurance and other investments by 1967. Berkshire first entered into the insurance business by purchasing a National indemnity company. Later in the 1970s, it acquired an equity stake in the Government Employees Insurance Company. It forms the core of its insurance operations today. It shut down the last textile operations in 1985. In 2010, Buffet claimed that purchasing Berkshire Hathway was his biggest mistake and claimed it had denied him compounded investment returns of about $200 billion over the subsequent 45 years.