The Rise and Fall of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett’s Long Friendship

Gates and Buffett’s friendship can be traced back to a single day: July 5, 1991.

Gates’ mother, Mary, invited the late Meg Greenfield, a Washington Post editor, to her home. Greenfield planned to bring her friend Buffett, Business Insider previously reported.

Mary Gates pressed her son to join them, but he didn’t want to take the day off work, Business Insider reported.

“What were he and I supposed to talk about, P/E ratios?” Gates later wrote in a column for Fortune. But he chose to show up because Greenfield was also planning to bring legendary Post publisher Katharine Graham, with whom Gates wanted to speak.

To the surprise of both men, they hit it off, Fortune reported.

Gates recalled being impressed by Buffett’s questions, such as, “If you were building IBM from scratch, how would it look different?”

Gates told Buffett to buy stock in Intel and Microsoft. It was the beginning of a deep friendship and a mutual mentorship.

Buffett has attended multiple Microsoft events, but he’s never served on the company’s board or invested in the tech company, Business Insider previously reported.

In 2018, he said it would be a conflict of interest due to their close friendship.

Gates didn’t seem to worry as much about a conflict of interest.

He joined Berkshire Hathaway’s board in 2004 after the passing of Buffett’s first wife, who was a board member, Market Watch reported.

Both credit their tremendous success to a laser focus, Alice Schroeder wrote in a biography of Buffett. Gates has written that he’s learned from Buffett how to manage his time by prioritizing certain people and tasks.

Shortly after they first met, Gates said he asked Buffett for his favorite business book recommendation, and Buffett lent Gates his copy of “Business Adventures” by John Brooks.

It’s now Gates’ favorite business book, too, and he still has Buffett’s copy.

They’ve often joined forces for political and philanthropic causes.

In 2010, Gates and Buffett, along with Gates’ then-wife, Melinda French Gates, started The Giving Pledge, which encourages billionaires to donate most of their wealth to charitable causes in their lifetimes or in their wills. To date, about $600 billion has been pledged.

Gates also credits Buffett with inspiring him to found the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000.

Buffett has given part of his fortune, including Berkshire stocks, to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In 2006, he committed to giving 99% of his wealth to philanthropy and said the Gates Foundation would be the biggest recipient of his donations in his lifetime.

Buffett’s contributions to Gates’ foundation from 2006 through 2023 total at least $39 billion, accounting for the appreciation of Berkshire stock over time, The New York Times reported.

In 2014, Gates, Buffett, and Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson published a New York Times op-ed pushing for immigration reform.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Buffett called Gates his “science advisor.” In February 2020, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pledged $100 million to fight the pandemic.

Pre-pandemic, they’d been seen trying out mattresses in Buffett’s hometown, enjoying Dairy Queen, and playing ping pong.

In July 2020, Yahoo’s Andy Serwer wrote that during the pandemic Warren and Gates were “talking on a more regular basis.” Buffett told Serwer that the two men scheduled a weekly hourlong call, but they usually exceeded the allotted time.

That same year, Gates resigned from his roles at Berkshire Hathaway and Microsoft. The billionaire said he wanted “to dedicate more time to philanthropic priorities.”

Over the years, Buffett’s feelings about Gates appeared to have cooled. The New York Times reported in August that Buffet began to believe the Gates Foundation had become bureaucratically bloated, hindering philanthropic productivity. He was disheartened to hear some people found Gates rude.

Following the death of disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2019, news emerged that Gates met with Epstein repeatedly. Gates later said the meetings were for philanthropic purposes and were a “huge mistake.”

In 2021, Gates and his wife announced their divorce after 27 years of marriage. Shortly after, Buffett resigned from the three-person board at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

“My goals are 100% in sync with those of the foundation, and my physical participation is in no way needed to achieve these goals,” Buffett said at the time.

In a 2022 blog post, Gates said half of the Gates Foundation’s resources had come from Buffett’s gifts.

However, Buffett, who is 93 years old, said recently that his 2006 commitment to the foundation would remain only while he lived.

In 2023, he detailed plans for his wealth distribution after his death, leaving it to his three children to disseminate. Buffett made no mention of the Gates Foundation, and The New York Times reported his children have unanimously agreed that none of the remaining Berkshire shares will go to the foundation.

On his blog, Gates once wrote regularly about Buffett.

In 2018, he wrote about how the two friends visited a “fantastic” candy store in Ohama, where Buffett lives and works. In 2019, Gates wrote a post titled “Grilling and chilling with Warren.” In 2020, Gates wished Buffet a happy 90th birthday. It included a photo of him holding a cake with Buffett’s face on it.

But the few posts from 2021 and 2022 that mention Buffett are strictly business. Instead of writing about goofy guys’ trips, Gates thanked Buffett for his generous contributions to the Gates Foundation. In 2023, Gates didn’t mention Buffett in a single post. And in his 20-plus posts so far in 2024, Gates has only mentioned Buffett once, again focusing solely on philanthropy.

Buffett, who announced in May that he would step down from Berkshire Hathaway at the end of the year, announced on June 27 that he would donate about 12.4 million Class B shares — common stock of a corporation — to five foundations. That’s about $6 billion in total.

Despite the cooled friendship, the biggest beneficiary of Buffett’s donation will be the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust, which will receive 9.4 million shares worth about $4.6 billion.