‘Be fearful when others are greedy’: Warren Buffett’s sharpest lessons in investing

Warren Buffett, the billionaire investor who is retiring at the end of 2025, has entertained and educated shareholders in his Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate for many years with his pithy annual letters outlining the firm’s performance.Every year since 1965 he has updated his investors on the journey as Berkshire morphed from a “struggling northern textile business” with $25m of shareholder equity when he took over, to an empire worth more than $1tn.Here we pick out some of the choicest turns of phrase from the departing Sage of Omaha.Last year, Buffett described his purchase of Berkshire Hathaway as a mistake, writing:Though the price I paid for Berkshire looked cheap, its business – a large northern textile operation – was headed for extinction.Cue Buffett’s capital allocation strategy, though it took him a while to recognise that he and his team faced no institutional restraints when deploying capital; the only hurdle was their ability to understand the likely future of a possible acquisition

UK consumers still reluctant to spend going into 2026, KPMG survey finds

UK consumers are reluctant to spend going into 2026 despite feeling almost as secure about their personal finances as they did at the beginning of the year, according to research.A study by the accountancy multinational KPMG found that concerns about the health of the UK economy were holding consumers back from spending, especially on eating out and big ticket items such as cars and furniture.The firm said its latest consumer pulse survey, which asked 3,000 people about their spending in the fourth quarter of 2025 and their intentions for the first three months of 2026, showed “a combination of concern about the economy and household cost pressures” would continue to limit overall spending.Consumers said they were still coping with the high cost of food and energy after several years of soaring inflation. The survey found they had little appetite for spending on discretionary items

Australian cruise ship stuck off PNG ‘detained’ amid investigation into why it ran aground

A cruise ship that ran aground off Papua New Guinea has been “detained” out of concern it’s unseaworthy “due to potential damage”, amid an investigation into how it became stuck on Saturday morning.The Coral Adventurer remained stuck on a reef off the north coast of Papua New Guinea, about 30km from PNG’s second-largest city, Lae, on Tuesday, as efforts to refloat it continue.No injuries have been reported to the ship’s 80 passengers and 43 crew. The passengers were due to travel back to Australia on a chartered flight to Cairns on Tuesday.Agencies in PNG and Australia have launched investigations into the grounding, with the ship “detained”

Trump says he’d ‘love to fire’ Jerome Powell in latest attack on Fed chair

Donald Trump launched another attack against Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell on Monday, calling the central banker a “fool” and once again suggesting he would like to fire him.Trump launched his latest attack on Powell during a press conference with Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, repeating false claims about the cost of a renovation of the central bank headquarters, and told reporters that he might file a lawsuit against Powell for “gross incompetence”.Trump boasted about what he said was the great state of the US economy, before adding that it was so, “despite the fact that we have a fool at the Federal Reserve.”“I mean, Biden reappointed him. It’s too bad

Sainsbury’s CEO among business leaders recognised in new year honours

The boss of Sainsbury’s who helped turn around the grocer’s fortunes is among leading figures from the business world to be recognised in the new year honours list.Simon Roberts, who has been chief executive of the UK’s second largest supermarket since 2020, has been made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to the retail industry.His tenure has included leading Sainsbury’s through the Covid pandemic as well as the cost of living crisis while improving its market share, helping its stock price rise by about three-quarters.Roberts courted controversy during 2025 as he was accused of “Orwellian” tactics for trialling facial recognition technology to combat shoplifting and embarked on a programme to axe 3,000 jobs as part of a £1bn cost-cutting drive while being paid more than £5m in the supermarket’s financial year to 1 March.The businessman was a member of the then prime minister Rishi Sunak’s 2023 business council and took over as president of the Institute of Grocery Distribution in 2024

Silver and other precious metals hit new peaks before falling back; oil price rises after Trump-Zelenskyy meeting – as it happened

Global stocks are on course to end the year at all-time highs, while the dollar is trading close to a three-month low, as markets are expecting further interest rate cuts from the US Federal Reserve next year.The MSCI’s world equity index is flat, leaving the global stock benchmark with a near-21% gain so far this year, after Wall Street hit record highs at the end of last week – dubbed a Santa rally.European shares on the Stoxx 600 index briefly touched an all-time intra-day peak this morning. The FTSE 100 index in London is broadly flat (up 3 points at 9,873), with the world’s leading silver miner Fresnillo leading gains, up 2.6%, while defence shares are down on Ukraine peace hopes