Filed under: Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)

You’d be hard-pressed to find someone with more respect for Warren Buffett than me, but I’m disappointed by his handling of a shareholder proposal to split shares of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK.A).

Shareholder Robert Zetlin Sr. submitted a proposal to split shares of the class A stock to bring the value down to between $10 and $30 thousand, hoping to increase the liquidity of the stock.

Berkshire responded by getting permission from the SEC not to include the proposal on the ballot, and shareholders will not have any say in the matter.

Warren Buffett has long opposed splitting the stock and his rationale makes sense in a lot of ways. But Warren Buffett should be a paragon of good corporate governance, and good corporate governance means letting the shareholders decide the fate of their company.

Mr. Buffett owns more than 30% of the stock, and many of his disciples would join him in opposing the split. Zetlin’s proposal would have almost no chance of passing, but Mr. Buffett should give it a chance anyway.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 31st, 2008 at 7:54 am and is filed under Stocks Money News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.