Warren Buffett's Humorous Threat

By BILL BARKER
The Motley Fool, September 2, 2008

Along with being the world's greatest living investor, Warren Buffett is an outstanding writer, a generous educator, and a reliable wit. His annual letters to shareholders, replete with investing insights both timely and timeless, nearly always include a number of well-delivered jokes.

In one letter, he wrote:

"We show below our common stock investments. With two exceptions, those that had a market value of more than $700 million at the end of 2006 are itemized. We don't itemize the two securities referred to, which have a market value of $1.9 billion, because we continue to buy them. I could, of course, tell you their names. But then I would have to kill you."

Now, when I first read that, I laughed. The notion that Buffett might need to off one or more of his readers is just good comedy. Then I thought, "Was it Freud or an embittered ex-girlfriend of mine who said that there really is no such thing as an innocent joke?" (I know that one smoked a lot of cigars, and one needs to get over my remark about her haircut.) Read Full Story...