Why Warren Buffett hasn't delivered a big deal lately

New York

THERE'S certainly no shortage of cash lying around at Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Even so, Warren Buffett's struggle to find the US$407 billion company's next meaningful acquisition shows that his relative buying power has diminished.

If you attended or streamed the shareholder meeting on Saturday, you heard a lot about Berkshire's soaring cash pile, which stood at US$96.5 billion as of the March quarter. And it seems Mr Buffett isn't getting calls from willing sellers the way he'd like, or as he said: "It'd be more fun if the phone would ring." Finding good takeover targets has proved so challenging, the billionaire hinted that should the cash continue to just accumulate he'd have to consider returning some of it to Berkshire's investors via buybacks or a dividend. It was a notable statement from Mr Buffett, who has long been against paying a dividend because his dealmaking could produce superior returns.