China man coughs up $2.1 mn to dine with Buffett

A lunch date with billionaire investor Warren Buffett was sold to a Chinese hedge fund manager yesterday for more than $2.1 million during an online auction, more than tripling last year's record of $650,100.

Zhao Danyang, who manages the Pureheart China Growth Investment Fund in Shenzhen, won the auction by bidding $2,110,100, said Denise Lamott, a spokeswoman for Glide Foundation. Glide, a San Francisco charity, will receive all proceeds from the auction.

It was Buffett's ninth annual auction to benefit Glide, and the fourth consecutive time the winning bid set a record. A total of nine bidders placed 78 offers over five days this week, according to EBay auction site.

Lamott said a crowd of Glide employees, board members, donors and others gathered to watch the results at a San Francisco hotel last night, and were jubilant. "There were screams, shouts "" it was amazing in here,'' Lamott said in a phone interview.

Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, will entertain Zhao and seven companions at a New York steakhouse and answer virtually any question except what he is buying and selling.

He praised Glide, which provides services,including job training, medical care and 750,000 meals a year to the poor.

"It takes people who've hit bottom and brings them back,'' Buffett, 77, said in an interview before sitting down earlier this week with last year's winners. "'That's why we're here.''

No one answered the phone at the Pureheart offices in Shenzhen after the auction closed on Saturday morning local time.