Warren Buffett nears a milestone he doesn't want

He added that he shouldn't keep so much money earning next to nothing for long periods

It’s a milestone Warren Buffett probably wishes he weren’t approaching. Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate he’s run for more than five decades, reported Friday that it held just shy of $100 billion in cash at the end of the second quarter.
 
While that figure highlights the staggering money-making ability of the businesses he’s collected over the years, it’s also a burden. Because Berkshire doesn’t pay a dividend and rarely buys back its own stock, Buffett is on the hook to find ways to invest those funds.
 
“To put that money to work would be great,” said David Rolfe, chief investment officer at Wedgewood Partners, a money manager overseeing about $6 billion including Berkshire stock. But the “list of companies that he would like to own is very, very small.”

 
Buffett, 86, addressed the mounting cash pile at Berkshire’s annual meeting in May, saying he hadn’t put his “foot to the floor” on an acquisition for a while and shouldn’t keep so much money earning next to nothing for long periods. The war chest includes some cash-like securities, such as Treasuries.
 
“The question is, ‘Are we going to be able to deploy it?’ he told the thousands of shareholders gathered at the CenturyLink Centre in Omaha, Nebraska. “I would say that history is on our side, but it’d be more fun if the phone would ring.” Buffett has been finding a few places to invest. He built a holding in Apple through the beginning of this year. Then, in June, Berkshire made two smaller equity investments. One was a stake in a real estate investment trust and the other propped up Home Capital Group, an embattled Canadian mortgage lender. Most significantly, Berkshire’s utility arm struck a deal last month to buy Texas’s largest electric utility for about $9 billion.