The major stock indexes continued to new highs this year, led by the growth-centric Nasdaq Composite, which is up 22.5% over the last 12 months. While Wall Street continues to worry about the health of the consumer amid rising interest rates, history suggests that now is still a great time to be investing in stocks.
Over the last 92 years, there have been an equal number of bull and bear markets. But the average bull market has lasted almost five years on average, according to Stifel, compared to 1.5 years for the average bear market. This means investors could be looking at another three years of positive returns before the next major hiccup in the stock market.
Who better to look to for relatively safe stocks that can grow your savings than billionaire Warren Buffett? From 1965 through 2023, his investing skills delivered a massive 4,384,748% return for Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) (NYSE: BRK.B) shareholders.
Let’s look at three Buffett-approved stocks that are surefire bets in the current bull market.
1. Berkshire Hathaway
The first stock to buy is none other than Buffett’s largest personal investment — Berkshire Hathaway. At the end of 2023, Buffett held 38% of Berkshire’s class A shares — an investment that would be worth $143 billion at recent share prices, ranking him No. 6 on the Forbes list of billionaires.
Buffett made his first millions managing money for his partners through Buffett Partnership in the 1960s. One of his big bets during those years was a struggling textile mill in Massachusetts that was trading at a bargain price. Buffett acquired a controlling interest in the stock, and over the ensuing decades as CEO, remade it into an investment vehicle to scoop up quality businesses (and stocks) at fair prices.
Today, Berkshire owns dozens of businesses in consumer goods, utilities, energy, and insurance. These businesses generated an operating profit of $37 billion in 2023, up from $31 billion in 2022.
Now is a good time to buy the stock, since Berkshire’s businesses generally do well in a bull market, which usually coincides with a growing…
..
