Warren Buffett Set Berkshire Hathaway Up for Years: Top 5 Stocks Yield $589 Million Each Quarter

Legendary investor Warren Buffett was well-known for his belief in value stocks during his time as CEO for Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK)(NYSE:BRK). While successor Greg Abel has made many changes to the stock portfolio for the conglomerate, the top positions are mostly the same and bringing in large amounts of dividend income.

Buffett’s Dividend Yielders

A look at many of the past top holdings of Berkshire Hathaway will show a preference to companies that pay out dividends, one of the core things that the man dubbed the "Oracle of Omaha" would look for.

Here are the current top five holdings of the Berkshire Hathaway investment portfolio as of the end of the second quarter (June 30, 2026):

• Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL): 227, 917,808 shares, 22% of fund
• American Express (NYSE:AXP): 151,610,700 shares, 17% of fund
• Coca-Cola Inc (NYSE:KO): 400,000,000 shares, 11% of fund
• Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL): 78,791,167 shares, 9.4% of fund
• Bank of America Corporation (NYSE:BAC): 483,394,015 shares, 9.2% of fund

Four of those five are positions that have been held by Berkshire Hathaway for decades. Alphabet is a newer holding for the conglomerate, but one that Buffett takes credit for before he stepped down as CEO at the end of 2025.

These top five holdings make up around 69% of the investment portfolio and each one pays a dividend on the millions of shares Berkshire Hathaway owns.

Here are the current quarterly dividends and annual yields for the five stocks:

• AAPL: $0.27, 0.34%
• AXP: $0.95, 1.15%
• KO: $0.53, 2.39%
• GOOGL: $0.22, 0.26%
• BAC: $0.32, 2.07%

Here are the current quarterly and annual dividends paid out to Berkshire Hathaway for each of the five stocks:

• AAPL: $61,537,808.16 quarter, $246,151,232.64 annual
• AXP: $144,030,165 quarter, $576,120,660 annual
• KO: $212,000,000 quarter, $848,000,000 annual
• GOOGL: $17,334,056.74 quarter, $69,336,226.96 annual
• BAC: $154,686,084.80 quarter, $618,744,339.20 annual

Add it up and Berkshire Hathaway collects $589,588,114.70 per quarter in dividend payments from its top five stock holdings. Annually, the total is $2,358,352,458.80.

Berkshire Hathaway’s Future

Under the leadership of Abel, the top holdings of Berkshire Hathaway could change. Based on recent quarter filings, Abel looks ready to put some of the company’s large cash holdings to work with new holdings and increased bets on recent new stocks added to the portfolio.

While Abel may cut some dividend holdings, he will also likely try to keep a balance of cutting away too much of the dividend income. These top five stock add $2.4 billion to Berkshire Hathaway’s cash holdings each year and that’s just the top positions.

Berkshire Hathaway brings in billions of dollars in dividend payments annually from the stocks it holds in the investment portfolio. Those dividends, on top of higher stock prices, add to the total returns of the stocks in the portfolio.

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