Warren Buffett praised the practice of long-term investing in his annual shareholder letter. These are the 10 longest-held stocks in Berkshire Hathaway's portfolio.

Warren Buffett has long praised the practice of long-term investing when it comes to stocks.
"The world is full of foolish gamblers, and they will not do as well as the patient investor," Buffett said in Berkshire Hathaway's 2022 shareholder letter.
These are the 10 longest-held stocks in Berkshire Hathaway's $299 billion stock portfolio.

It's no secret that Warren Buffett is a big believer in taking a long-term view when it comes to investing in stocks, and he hit on that point in Berkshire Hathaway's 2022 shareholder letter over the weekend.

"The world is full of foolish gamblers, and they will not do as well as the patient investor," Buffett wrote. "Patience can be learned. Having a long attention span and the ability to concentrate on one thing for a long time is a huge advantage."

Buffett's long-time business partner, Charlie Munger, has a similar view, writing in the letter: "Warren and I don't focus on the froth of the market. We seek out good long-term investments and stubbornly hold them for a long time."

While the advice might seem easy for the average investor to follow, in practice it's actually really hard, especially when it's so easy to follow the minute-by-minute ticks in stocks prices and instantly sell or buy stocks with the push of a button on your smartphone.

In fact, Buffett recently went against his own advice when he sold roughly 86% of his stake in Taiwan Semiconductor just a few months after buying.

According to an analysis from eToro, the average holding period of a US stock has declined from about five years in the 1970s to just 10 months today.

And that's what makes Buffett and Munger so extraordinary, as simple as it may sound: their uncanny ability to hold onto stocks for decades at a time, even in the face of some really scary economic headlines. Berkshire has owned the top five stocks in its portfolio for an average of 17 years!

These are the 10 longest-held companies in Berkshire Hathaway's $299 billion individual stock portfolio.

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