Warren Buffett
Author, Billionaire, Entrepreneur, Executive, Investor
Warren Buffett is the investor and philanthropist who took over Berkshire Hathaway, then a struggling textile maker, in 1965 and built it into a global conglomerate. His annual shareholder letters are famous for plain talk about investing. He became Berkshire's chairman emeritus in 2026.
Warren Buffett's 56 Book Recommendations
- How to Win Friends and Influence People
- Science of Hitting
- The Making of the President 1960
- The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money
- Personal History
- Business Adventures
- Keeping At It
- Shoe Dog
- Limping on Water
- The Little Book of Common Sense Investing
- One Thousand Ways to Make $1000
- Investing Between the Lines: How to Make Smarter Decisions By Decoding CEO Communications
- The Clash of the Cultures
- Where are the Customers' Yachts? Or, A Good Hard Look at Wall Street
- Nuclear Terrorism
- The Smartest Guys in the Room
- First a Dream
- In an Uncertain World
- Poor Charlie's Almanack
- The Farmer from Merna
- Supermoney
- Take on the Street
- Essays in Persuasion
- The Intelligent Investor: “Of all the investments I ever made, buying Ben's book was the best (except for my purchase of two marriage licenses).”
- Security Analysis: Sixth Edition, Foreword by Warren Buffett: “Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, a book that ranks behind only The Intelligent Investor and the 1940 edition of Security Analysis in the all-time-best list for the serious investor.”
- Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits: “Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, a book that ranks behind only The Intelligent Investor and the 1940 edition of Security Analysis in the all-time-best list for the serious investor.”
- Paths to Wealth Through Common Stocks: “On investment books, if you're asking about that, I would recommend the first two books that Phil Fisher wrote back around 1960, "Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits" and the second one ["Paths to Wealth Through Common Stocks"]. They're very good books.”
- Jack: Straight from the Gut: “Last fall, Charlie and I read Jack Welch's terrific book, Jack, Straight from the Gut (get a copy!).”
- Bull!: A History of the Boom, 1982-1999: “A 2003 book that investors can learn much from is Bull! by Maggie Mahar... All three are well-reported and well-written.”
- The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success: “The Outsiders, by William Thorndike, Jr., is an outstanding book about CEOs who excelled at capital allocation.”
- Warren Buffett's Ground Rules: Words of Wisdom from the Partnership Letters of the World's Greatest Investor: “Mr. Miller has done a superb job of researching and dissecting the operation of Buffett Partnership Ltd. and of explaining how Berkshire's culture has evolved from its BPL origin. If you are fascinated by investment theory and practice, you will enjoy this book.”
- Common Stocks as Long Term Investments: “In 1924, Edgar Lawrence Smith, an obscure economist and financial advisor, wrote Common Stocks as Long Term Investments, a slim book that changed the investment world.”
- Co-Piloting: Luck, Leadership, and Learning That It's All About Others: “"Big Jim" Haslam, now 90, has recently authored an inspirational book in which he relates how Jim Clayton's son, Kevin, encouraged the Haslams to sell a large portion of Pilot to Berkshire.”
- Source Code: My Beginnings: “(Read his new book, Source Code.)”
- Benjamin Graham on Value Investing: Lessons from the Dean of Wall Street: “Janet Lowe is here, incidentally, today. She wrote a very good book on Ben Graham. I recommend that any of you that haven't read it, go out and buy a copy.”
- The People v. Clarence Darrow: The Bribery Trial of America's Greatest Lawyer: “One of the books I enjoyed a lot was written also by a shareholder... Geoff Cowan's book, which is on "The People v. Clarence Darrow." It's a fascinating book. Geoff uncovered a lot of information that the previous biographies of Darrow didn't have. I think you'd enjoy that.”
- A Piece of the Action: How the Middle Class Joined the Money Class: “Joe Nocera was the author. I don't remember the title. But it came out about six months to a year ago. It's a terrific history of the credit card business.”
- The Money Masters: Nine Great Investors: Their Winning Strategies and How You Can Apply Them: “Actually, I think John Train's "Money Masters" is an interesting book.”
- Only the Paranoid Survive: “Andy Grove has written a terrific book, incidentally, "Only the Paranoid Survive," which describes strategic inflection points. I recommend that every one of you read that book, because it is a terrific book.”
- The Quotable Einstein: “It's something to the effect of "The Quotable Einstein." I mean it's a lot of his commentary over the years, and it's great reading.”
- Common Sense on Mutual Funds: “A book that came out just in the last few months in the investment world that I would certainly recommend to everybody is "Common Sense on Mutual Funds," by Jack Bogle. Jack is an honest guy, and he knows the business.”
- Damn Right!: Behind the Scenes with Berkshire Hathaway Billionaire Charlie Munger: “I've got to recommend the book on Charlie.”
- When Genius Failed: “It isn't exactly analogous, but it's worth reading Roger Lowenstein's book entitled "When Genius Failed," because it touches on some of the problems we've described that Charlie and I are apprehensive about.”
- The Warren Buffett CEO: Secrets from the Berkshire Hathaway Managers: “Bob Miles has brought out a book and it tells about the people who are handling your capital... Bob has done a good job of interviewing and I would encourage you to read about them.”
- A Short History of Nearly Everything: “I've been reading "A Short History of Nearly Everything." It's very impressive to, you know, to read about people pondering how to figure out the weight of the Earth or something in the 18th century.”
- Speculative Contagion: An Antidote for Speculative Epidemics: “Frank has just brought out a book, incidentally, that's a history of some of his annual letters. It's a good book, and I recommend you get it.”
- The Money Game: “Jerry was a great writer. He wrote "The Money Game," which was a classic.”
- The Great Crash 1929: “We have a book in The Bookworm called "The Great Crash" by Galbraith. It's one of the great books. You really ought to buy it.”
- Stress Test: “I read Tim Geithner's book... and anybody, politician or financial manager, financial supervisor should read that book... And it's a very, very good book.”
- The Most Important Thing: “This is that rarity, a useful book.”
- Railroader: The Unfiltered Genius and Controversy of Four-Time CEO Hunter Harrison: “There's a book that came out about Hunter... And it describes his procedure toward railroading. It's an interesting read if you're interested in railroading.”
- Seeking Wisdom: “We've added a few titles this year. Among them are Seeking Wisdom: From Darwin to Munger by Peter Bevelin, a long-time Swedish shareholder of Berkshire.”
- Margin of Trust: The Berkshire Business Model: “The value of this culture is explored in Margin of Trust, a new book by Larry Cunningham and Stephanie Cuba that will be available at our annual meeting.”
- Trillion Dollar Triage: How Jay Powell and the Fed Battled a President and a Pandemic---and Prevented Economic Disaster: “And in this book which we have for sale out here, Trillion Dollar Triage, in the first early pages, it describes that period. I didn't know some of the stuff that's in the book, even, that was going on.”
- Dream Big: How the Trio Behind 3G Capital Came to Control Four Iconic US Brands and Become a New Positive Force in Business: “The book was written in Portuguese and it was a best seller in Brazil for the last year. But it just got translated very, very, very recently and it is available at the Bookworm.”
- The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy: “We're just about through reading the Joe Kennedy biography... I'm not sure you want to emulate everything he did, but it's still interesting reading.”