Warren Buffett's Company Fined, Factories Confiscated In Land Dispute

Bloomberg News:

BYD Co., the Chinese carmaker part- owned by billionaire Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc., was fined and ordered to surrender seven factories after a dispute over land use in central China.

BYD received a 2.95 million yuan ($442,000) fine and will have the factories in Xi'an, Shaanxi confiscated, according to a statement posted today on the Ministry of Land and Resources website.

Read the whole story: Bloomberg News

Comments

[moonlightesq]

07:25 PM on 10/16/2010

"Warren Buffett's company fined..." another misleading headline from HP. The relationship between Buffet and BYD is rather tenuous. Buffet is a major shareholder and officer of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and Berkshire Hathaway is but a 10% owner of BYD.

The reality is, land confiscation happens all the time in China, for the government owns all land, companies only rents land from the government at 50 to 100 years increments.

[Raccoon1]

10:03 AM on 10/16/2010

So, are they likely to see another Chinese manufacturer do the same thing? I think not.
Until penalties really hurt, corporations just absorb their tiny fines given in the United States as 'part of doing business'.

[Joseph J Schuler]

04:27 PM on 10/15/2010

The company was owned by Berkshire Hathway, not Warren Buffet. The headline is inflammatory. It seems an attempt to paint the man with some guilt for problems caused by a subsidiary in the notoriously loose Chineese market.

[gorgol]

04:37 AM on 10/16/2010

Warren Buffet has been noted to be a good friend of "Goldman Sachs" and supports the idea of derivative trading...no telling how much that old coot made with them. Lets not paint him as a kindly old astute stock trader. He gets in with packs of wolves and runs with them. And if you want to discuss a "loose market", lets start with Wall Street. We've been the teacher to other nations on "wealth creation through corruption". Except China seems to be doing better at "economic initiatives" than we are. We throw our wealth down the toilette of Wall Street, while China builds giant Solar manufacturing plants and builds infrastructure. Then the US complains about their trade practices...pathetic.

[mike72]

06:33 AM on 10/16/2010

The fact that Chinese government senses the "loose market moves" from these super riches indicate they have been watching them very carefully and are taking immediate actions to keep them in line.

That government is doing something. They are still not in the pocket of the super rich like Buffet yet. Let's hope it keeps that way. We don't want all governments around the world becoming the proxies of a few super rich.

By the way, Buffet is just a proxy. The real super rich is still invisible.

[Buffett Fan]

09:42 AM on 10/15/2010

I saw this article saying Warren Buffett has not generated any alpha in 10 years:

http://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/2010/10/13/chart-of-the-day-warren-buffett%E2%80%99s-alpha-1977-2009

Does this make sense to you?

[cavegal]

10:00 AM on 10/16/2010

Very interesting analysis and graph.

[mike72]

07:05 AM on 10/15/2010

Also, the landing grabbing under the disguise of development is very severe in China. Large section of prime location lands are reserved for "economic and industrial" development.

The Chinese government have been actively identifying these activities to avoid wasteful and speculative financial activies that contribute to the housing bubble and stock market bubble in China.

You want to come to China to build electric cars? Fine. You want to come to China to grab land under the disguise of building a electric car, that is not cool.

The fundamental martical art Tai Chi practice is "before making a move on one direction, makes a subtle move on the opposite direction." Chinese knows too well about this kind of moves and Buffet is no match for the cunning Chinese government ... at least for this moment.

Baby, Tai Chi, Baby.

[mike72]

10:23 PM on 10/14/2010

Buffett gets too high profile lately in China, teaming up with Bill Gates and throwing large super rich parties.

AND brought a former Tiananmen Square protest leader into China as a stealth guest. (pushing the political envelope, I guess)

Chinese government took note of these activities of these super rich and decided to take action to send a message for him to cool it. The message is simple: 7 slap Buffett's Chinese business partner.

Buffett should have taken note and will lay low for a while.

[japrz]

02:16 PM on 10/14/2010

I don't feel bad that Buffett got seven companies confiscated. It servers him right for investing in a Communist country. I hope they take everything he has invested in China.
One day the US will have to go to war with this communist country and all these capitalist will be responsible for helping the enemy grow it's military machine.

[Safire]

02:10 AM on 10/14/2010

Just desserts.

[henrypapillon]

01:35 AM on 10/14/2010

Maybe if some more of this happens, then the manufacturing boon for China will shrivel.

[Changeizgood]

12:14 PM on 10/14/2010

I always thought the competition between the countries was good for new ingenuitive ideas and progress, and it wasn't over resources, to control the world on whether they are hot or cold during the seasons.
Those elements can kill humans and should not be under so much global control.
For if this happens, even our very air will be at stake for corporate pollution loopholes.
This planet is being destroyed because of Wall Street Global Greed.

This isn't good for the duration of mans time on this earth.
I don't blame the et's for hiding from such a primative undeveloped species that refuses to care enough about where they live and whether we are rooting in our own filth.

Greed doesn't care about US or any other nation.
WE are stewards of this planet and it is time WE started putting our money where our mouth is for our kids and all children on this planet.
We must teach conservation of resources, to ensure life giving elements are not tampered with for profit.

1984 came about because of this.

NO one is acting responsible enough to make a difference. Greed has overtaken common sense.
Corporate party talks a good game, but WE see what they have done to our planet.
RED CHEMICAL BURINING SLURRY LEAKING ALL OVER THE EUROPEAN LANDSCAPE ALL BECAUSE OF GREED, and paid off public officials.

WAKE UP AMERICAN T-PUPPETS!!!
Fox will never tell the chickens the whole truth ever.

[henrypapillon]

08:36 PM on 10/14/2010

Hmm. I guess I'm missing the relevance of your comment to either my comment or the story.

[bradwestley]

11:40 PM on 10/13/2010

Send them some Panda Express gift cards!

[ConservativeWorld]

10:55 PM on 10/13/2010

Wow. Warren. Your friends, the red Chinese, just took your money. I guess the Marxist here in the USA would like to do the same thing. Even though you are a Democrat, I cannot support the stealing of property, even if it is your property Mr. Buffett.

[henrypapillon]

01:37 AM on 10/14/2010

Maybe if you would get the upper part of your anatomy dislodged from the lower part of your anatomy, you would be able to see the world as it really is.

[Chicagofan1]

08:54 PM on 10/13/2010

Good.

[Kassandra]

07:54 PM on 10/13/2010

Perhaps a few more seizures will discourage American corporations from being so willing to move to totalitarian territory.
they may as well stay in America; we're trying so hard to emulate the Chinese, soon this will be the best business climate for them.

[letprosecutionsbegin]

06:17 PM on 10/13/2010

So let me get this straight -- if nobody owns anything in America and nobody owns anything in China -- can't we just call it a draw and start rebuilding from there?

[letprosecutionsbegin]

06:13 PM on 10/13/2010

oops