‘Call me a big fan’: Warren Buffett once beat Bill Gates at dice—now he’s topped him as 2025’s biggest wealth gainer

Even as the global markets are rocked with uncertainty and volatility, Warren Buffett and his investment firm, Berkshire Hathaway has emerged as a beacon of strength and hope for investors, especially retail investors.

In fact, this year alone, Warren Buffett, who had consistently trailed below Bill Gates in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, has finally surpassed Bill Gates.

With an extraordinary $21.5 billion increase in his net worth this year, the largest for anyone in 2025, Buffett has secured the sixth spot on the list with a fortune of $161 billion — edging past Gates, who in comparison, saw his net worth increase by $3.61 billion.

But how did Buffett do it? The investment guru's rise has been, in fact, been fuelled by a 13% surge in Berkshire Hathaway's Class A shares, a stark contrast to the 8% decline in Microsoft stock that has limited Gates’ wealth increase.

Amid growing recession fears and inflationary pressures under the new Trump administration, investors have shown renewed interest in conservatively valued stocks like Berkshire, steering clear of riskier technology stocks.

In fact, one can say that Berkshire’s strategic moves reflect Buffett’s characteristic long-term thinking. The company nearly doubled its cash reserves, Treasury bills, and other liquid assets to $334 billion last year, while selling a net $134 billion in equities. Share buybacks, which have been a hallmark of Buffett’s strategy, were sharply reduced to under $3 billion, with no repurchases in the latter half of the year.

Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway also undertook a series of interesting steps this week. On Monday, reports emerged that the firm has begun to focus more on Japan and Japanese companies. Berkshire has steadily increased its stakes in Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Marubeni, Sumitomo, and Itochu — who are key players in Japan’s economy — raising its combined holdings to $23.5 billion by the end of 2024.

Buffett, in fact, even described these companies as resembling Berkshire itself, with diverse investments and prudent management.

“Our admiration for these companies has consistently grown,” Buffett noted in his latest letter to shareholders, highlighting their sensible dividend hikes and restrained executive compensation.

“I expect that Greg [Abel] and his eventual successors will be holding this Japanese position for many decades,” Buffett wrote in his letter.

Bill Gates and Warren Buffett: A Tale of Friendship and Mutual Admiration

Bill Gates has long been one of Buffett’s closest confidants and greatest admirers. In a widely read article for Harvard Business Review, published way back in 1996 when Gates was in Microsoft and its flagship Windows operating system was still in its infancy, Gates detailed their unlikely yet deep friendship, which began in July 1991 when Gates’ mother persuaded him to meet Buffett.

Initially sceptical, Gates was won over by Buffett’s analytical mind and business acumen.

“When I arrived, Warren and I began talking about how the newspaper business was being changed by the arrival of retailers who did less advertising,” Gates recalled. “Then he started asking me about IBM: ‘If you were building IBM from scratch, how would it look different? What are the growth businesses for IBM? What has changed for them?’”

Gates was struck by Buffett’s clarity of thought. “He asked good questions and told educational stories. There’s nothing I like so much as learning, and I had never met anyone who thought about business in such a clear way.”

The two have since become close friends, vacationing together and sharing insights on business and life. Gates praised Buffett’s hands-off management style at Berkshire.

“Warren installs strong managers in the companies Berkshire owns and tends to leave them pretty much alone,” Gates wrote. “His basic proposition to managers is that to the degree that a company spins off cash, which good businesses do, the managers can trust Warren to invest it wisely.”

Gates also admired Buffett’s ability to identify “moats” — competitive advantages that protect businesses from competition. “Warren likes to say that a good business is like a castle, and you’ve got to think every day, ‘Is the management growing the size of the moat? Or is the moat shrinking?’”

Despite their different approaches — Buffett’s focus on stable, predictable businesses and Gates’ immersion in the fast-changing tech world — their mutual respect is evident. “Warren stays away from technology companies because he likes investments in which he can predict winners a decade in advance,” Gates noted. “Unfortunately for Warren, the world of technology knows no boundaries.”

Their friendship extended beyond business. Gates recounted a playful intellectual duel when Buffett challenged him to a game with four non-transitive dice. Buffett offered Gates the chance to choose first, suggesting they bet on who would roll the highest number most often. Gates was suspicious: “This is a losing proposition. You choose first.” Buffett did — and Gates ultimately figured out the subtle mathematical trap Buffett had set.

At the heart of their friendship is Buffett’s genuine curiosity and love for learning. “When you are with Warren, you can tell how much he loves his work,” Gates wrote. “It comes across in many ways. When he explains stuff, it’s never ‘Hey, I’m smart about this and I’m going to impress you.’ It’s more like ‘This is so interesting and it’s actually very simple.’”

Buffett’s rise on the billionaire index reflects not just his financial acumen but also his ability to remain steady while others falter.

As Gates summed up in the HBR article: “Great businesses are not all that common, and finding them is hard. Warren is superb at recognising these franchises.”