SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Warren Buffett’s plan to buy back Berkshire Hathaway Inc. shares isn’t only the safest route for deploying the conglomerate’s cash pile, it also helps pave the way for the Oracle of Omaha’s eventual exit, according to fund managers.

“This is a piece of the unfolding introduction of life after Buffett,” said Thomas Russo, partner at Lancaster, Pa.-based Gardner Russo & Gardner. “Under him, cash has had such a high value and going forward those maestro opportunities will be reduced.”

Earlier in the month, Berkshire Hathaway (XNYS:BRK-B - News) (XNYS:BRK-A - News) tapped Ted Weschler to help manage the firm’s equity portfolio. That pick followed the hire of Todd Combs last year to manage the portfolio.

Buffett turned 81 about a month ago.

This time around, Russo said, Buffett will go ahead with a significant buyback of shares unlike 2000, when the mere mention of a possible share repurchase boosted Berkshire shares to a level above book value. The buyback would mark the first time the firm has bought back shares.

Berkshire B-shares rose 6.9% to $70.93 in recent activity; A-shares advanced 6.2% to $106,540. Last Thursday, the price of A-shares dipped below $100,000 for the first time since January 2010.

Berkshire shares hit a multiyear high in early March, but they’ve been under pressure since as the

Martin Foil's company sells yarn that winds up in clothes from the Gap, Ralph Lauren and American Apparel, and business is growing. He's buying new machines and hopes to hire as many as 200 workers this year.

When he decided to expand into a shuttered yarn factory in North Carolina, he borrowed $11 million recently from Wells Fargo to buy it.

"It was a Hanes factory that was closed for a couple of years and had some good equipment -- we knew we could crank up that place," said Foil, who also used the loan to buy equipment and another factory in South Carolina. "We have the advantage of being stronger at a time when others aren't."

Now that demand is up and business is finally improving for many companies, they're doing what they always do at the beginning of an expansion -- calling the bank and asking for a loan.

And in a stark contrast to the depths of the financial crisis, the banks are saying yes.

In the last three months of 2010, U.S. Bancorp wrote $8 billion in new business loans, the most in two years. JPMorgan Chase added 400 midsize companies as clients. And bank loans overall grew for the first time in two years, according to the Federal Reserve.

"Companies are talking about growth in ways they haven't for three years," says Perry Pelos, head of

LONDON (AP) -- Cadbury PLC revealed Monday it has received approaches from The Hershey Co. and Italy's Ferrero International SA as it launched a robust defense against a hostile 9.8 billion pound ($16.3 billion) from Kraft Foods Inc.

Cadbury Chairman Roger Carr said the statements of intent from Hershey and Ferrero were too preliminary to start proper talks as he warned shareholders not to let Kraft "steal your company with its derisory offer."

The British chocolate and gum maker also raised its long-term performance targets to play up its position as a strong independent company.

The prospect of the 195-year-old company falling into foreign ownership has caused some consternation in Britain were it is a much-loved brand -- a member of Cadbury's founding family has been publicly critical and the country's leading labor union fears large-scale job losses.

But Carr left open the door for some kind of tie-up, saying that Cadbury was open to discussion with any potential suitor -- Kraft included -- that made a compelling offer that fully valued the company.

"As yet, we've only had one offer, which is far from compelling, it is ... derisory on a good day because it's falling, and we've had a statement of intent from two people that are yet to come forward with an offer," Carr told reporters.

"We have told them very clearly what the rules of the game are, but until they come forward ... that

NEW YORK (AP) -- Warren Buffett has made bets on railroads before, but now he's all in. The billionaire investor's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. on Tuesday agreed to buy Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., making a $34 billion bet on the future of the U.S. economy.

Burlington Northern, the nation's second-largest railroad, is the biggest hauler of food products like corn, and coal for electricity, making it an indicator of the country's economic health. The railroad also ships a large amount of consumer goods -- including items imported from Asia -- from big Western ports like Los Angeles and Seattle.

Analysts say Buffett is planting both feet in an industry that is poised to grow as the economy gets back on solid ground. It would be the biggest acquisition ever for Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

Berkshire Hathaway already owns about 22 percent of Burlington Northern, and will pay $100 a share in cash and stock for the rest of the company. That was 31.5 percent premium on Burlington Northern's Monday closing price. The stock shot up over 28 percent Tuesday, to $97.66 in afternoon trading.

Shareholders have the option to convert their stock for a cash payment of $100 per share or receive Berkshire Class A or Class B common stock. Up to 60 percent of the deal is cash and 40 percent is in stock.

"Berkshire's $34 billion investment in BNSF is a huge bet on that company, CEO Matt Rose and his team, and the railroad industry," Buffett said in a statement.

"Most important of all, however, it's an all-in wager on the economic future of the United States. I love

DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) -- Ford, the only Detroit automaker to dodge direct government aid and bankruptcy court, surprised investors with net income of nearly $1 billion in the third quarter and forecast a "solidly profitable" 2011.

The automaker said Monday earnings were fueled by U.S. market share gains, cost cuts and the Cash for Clunkers program, which drew flocks of buyers to showrooms this summer. Ford's shares rose 53 cents, or 7.6 percent, to $7.53 in afternoon trading.

The latest results signal that Ford's turnaround is on more solid ground. The company lost more than $14.6 billion last year and hasn't posted a full-year profit since 2005. While it made a profit in the second quarter, that was mainly due to debt reductions that cut its interest payments.

Ford, based in Dearborn, Mich., reported third-quarter net income of $997 million, or 29 cents per share. Its profit forecast for 2011 was a step above previous guidance of break-even or better for the year.

Ford's key North American car and truck division posted a pretax profit of $357 million, the division's first quarter in the black since early 2005. Ford cited higher pricing, lower material costs and increased market share for the improvement.

Excluding one-time items, Ford earned 26 cents per share, blowing away analysts' expectations of a loss

MILWAUKEE (AP) -- Bearing in mind that consumers will remain focused on low prices even when the recession ends, soft drink and snack maker PepsiCo Inc. said Thursday that it's creating new products at lower prices and plans to continue offering discounts in its Frito-Lay and beverage businesses.

The effort seems to be working for PepsiCo's Frito-Lay business, which posted revenue and volume gains in the third quarter. But the beverage business, with brands like Pepsi cola, continued to slump as consumers cut their spending and continued switching to healthier juices and teas.

Overall, the Purchase, N.Y.-based company said its fiscal third-quarter profit rose 9 percent, thanks in part to cost-cutting, even as revenue slipped 1 percent.

Chief Financial Officer Richard Goodman said PepsiCo has been offering more promotions at the end of each month, when consumers' budgets become more constrained. For instance, bags of chips may be promoted at two for $5 early in the month but fall to $2 each by the end of the month.

"We want to be able to make sure that at the beginning of the month or at the end of the month, they're buying our products," Goodman told reporters in a conference call after the company released its earnings report Thursday.

Consumers are so focused on cost they are willing to forgo getting more for a given price. PepsiCo's promotion to boost volume -- with no price increase -- on certain chips failed to gain traction and will be

AMSTERDAM (AP) -- Consumer products giant Unilever NV said Friday it has agreed to buy soaps and personal care businesses including the Sanex and Duschdas brands from Sara Lee Corp. for euro1.28 billion ($1.88 billion).

The businesses to be acquired, subject to regulatory approval, include Sara Lee's worldwide body care products business and its European detergents arms. In addition to Sanex -- a cheaper parallel of Unilever's Dove brand -- and Duschdas, a German shower gel maker, Unilever is buying several strong regional brands such as Radox bubble bath and Switzal, a maker of baby shampoo.

Unilever said the businesses it will acquire had sales of euro750 million and operating earnings of euro128 million in the 12 months ending in June.

Unilever, the world's third-largest consumer products company after Procter & Gamble Co. and Nestle SA, says its Dove, Axe and Rexona lines will complement the Sara Lee brands.

"The acquisition will strengthen Unilever's leadership positions overall in Western Europe," the company said in a statement. "In addition, there is significant potential to build these brands in developing and emerging markets, which already generate approximately 15 percent of their annual sales."

Analysts said the deal made sense.

"The positioning of Sara Lee is more mid-market and below the other Unilever brands," said Fernand de Boer of Petercam Bank in a note on the deal. The deal fits into a strategy "to play the entire price

WASHINGTON (AP) -- With the economy on the mend, the Federal Reserve on Wednesday said it is slowing the pace of a program to lower mortgage rates and prop up the housing market.

The Fed decided to stretch out its goal of buying $1.45 trillion in mortgage-backed securities and debt issued by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae until the end of the first quarter of 2010. Originally, the central bank intended to complete buying those securities by the end of this year.

It marked the second time since August that the Fed has opted to slow some of its extraordinary support to revive the economy and spur Americans to boost spending. It shows that the Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues are confident the recovery will take hold.

In a more upbeat assessment, the Fed said: "Economic activity has picked up following its severe downturn." When the Fed last met in August, policymakers declared that economic activity was "leveling out."

The central bank also "expects that inflation will remain subdued for some time."

Even though the Fed will stretch out its purchases of mortgage securities, rates for home loans should remain low "in the 5 percent range" as long as the purchases continue, said Guy Cecala, publisher of Inside Mortgage Finance.

On Wall Street, stocks rose on the Fed's more optimistic outlook. The Dow Jones industrial average, which

Warren Buffett tells CNBC that while the economy "hasn't gotten worse" but also hasn't "gotten much better" over the past three months, he doesn't expect a 'double-dip' recession and sees significant improvement in residential real estate.

In a taped interview with Becky Quick airing this morning on Squawk Box, Buffett says he looks at a number of indicators, including data from Berkshire Hathaway companies, and "we have not bounced -- but we've quit going down."

Unless there's some "horrible event," Buffett thinks the odds are "very much against" another significant downturn for the overall economy in the near future.

He also sees "important" signs of life for housing: "I think we're certainly-we're through the worst of it in residential real estate in all probability. And-- and-- and the reason is we're building a lot fewer houses and we're-- and we're forming households, so that solves itself over time. Doesn't do it in a day or a

GENEVA (AP) -- Airline companies lost more than $6 billion during the first half of the year due to the economic crisis, even as fresh figures showed some signs of recovery in the passenger and freight business, an industry group said Tuesday.

A sample of more than 50 airlines found their losses declined to $2 billion in the second quarter from $4 billion in the first quarter, the International Air Transport Association said, noting that the April-June period is usually a strong one for the industry.

"Since the sample of airlines is incomplete, total industry losses in the first half of 2009 are likely to have been in excess of the reported $6 billion," IATA said.

The Geneva-based group, which represents 230 airlines worldwide, said seat occupancy in international markets stabilized in July -- the first time in over a year -- but added that airlines need to further cut capacity to meet demand.

Freight capacity also still exceeds demand despite an 8.1 percent capacity cut in July, IATA said.

"With excess capacity continuing through Q2 it was not surprising that freight rates were down more than 20 percent over the year," it said.

Overall, the industry outlook remains volatile, IATA said.

Airlines are still adding to their fleet because of long-term orders committed to before the downturn.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - EBay Inc plans to sell a 65 percent stake in its online phone unit Skype for $1.9 billion to private investors including Silver Lake and a venture firm run by the Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen.

The deal values Skype at $2.75 billion, down from the $3.1 billion the Internet auction house paid for the popular service in 2005.

The group buying Skype includes London-based Index Ventures and the Canada Pension Plan, in addition to Silver Lake and Andreessen's firm Andreessen Horowitz.

The deal leaves to eBay focus on its PayPal electronic payments service as well as its flagship auction service, the company said. It also avoids the risks of a initial public offering eBay had slated for Skype next year.

Susquehanna Financial Group analyst Marianne Wolk said the valuation was at the high end of her expectations.

"It eliminates the risk of the planned IPO and is a better price than many of us expected," Wolk said, adding that the valuation is about 24 times her estimate for Skype's 2009 after-tax earnings contribution to eBay or 4 times her revenue estimate.

John Donahoe, eBay's chief executive, had said in May that a $2 billion valuation would be low for the growing Internet telephone business amid speculation about a potential sale of the company to private

NEW YORK (AP) -- Oil fell below $70 a barrel Monday as a steep drop in China's stock market raised doubts about the strength of the U.S. and global economic recovery.

Benchmark crude for October delivery lost $3.18 at $69.56 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract on Friday added 25 cents to settle at $72.74, after falling from near $75 earlier in the week.

China raised some red flags last week as government officials seemed to suggest they would cut back on bank lending in coming months, essentially removing one of the stimuli they have added to the Chinese economy, said PFGBest analyst Phil Flynn.

The Shanghai Composite Index plunged 6.7 percent on Monday, adding to a nearly 3 percent drop on Friday, on concerns of a tightening in bank lending.

"The market is concerned whether or not the Chinese government can engineer a soft landing," Flynn wrote in his morning report. "How will the futures markets react as they start to remove this historic stimulus?"

Major refiner China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. fell by the daily maximum 10 percent after the company said it does not expect to significantly boost production, while PetroChina, the Shanghai index's heaviest weighted share, fell 6.7 percent.

Oil has traded near $70 a barrel for most of the last few months as investors struggle to gauge how

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- The Walt Disney Co. is buying Marvel Entertainment Inc. for $4 billion in cash and stock, bringing such characters as Iron Man and Spider-Man into the family of Mickey Mouse and WALL-E.

Under the deal, which was announced Monday and is expected to close by the end of the year, Disney will acquire the rights to 5,000 Marvel characters. Many of them, including the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, were co-created by the comic book legend Stan Lee.

Disney CEO Robert Iger said Marvel's comic books, TV shows, movies and video games amounted to "a treasure trove of content." Iger said the deal would bring benefits like the ones Disney got from buying "Toy Story" creator Pixar Animation Studios Inc. for $7.4 billion in stock in 2006.

"The acquisition of Marvel offers us a similar opportunity to advance our strategy," Iger said, and "to build a business that is stronger than the sum of its parts."

For Marvel, Iger said being in the Disney camp would mean better global distribution and better relationships with retailers to sell its products. Another storied comic book maker, DC Comics, has been under the wings of a major studio since 1969, when Warner Bros. bought the home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman.

Marvel Chairman Mort Handel called Disney "a perfect home for our great collection of characters."

One point of the deal is to help Disney appeal to young men who have flocked to theaters to see Marvel

NEW YORK (AP) -- Intel Corp. raised its third-quarter revenue forecast above Wall Street's expectations Friday, citing strong demand for its chips and giving another signal that business is improving for one of the world's biggest technology companies. Intel shares rose 4 percent.

The leading maker of computer microprocessors now expects sales of $8.8 billion to $9.2 billion. Its last guidance, which came July 14, was for revenue in the range of $8.1 billion to $8.9 billion.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting $8.55 billion in revenue before Friday.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel also said it expects the quarter's gross profit margin to be in the upper half of the range it previously forecast.

Because it gets most of its revenue from selling chips that are the "brains" of personal computers, Intel is indicating that PC makers are loading up on new chips faster than even it expected. While that suggests PC makers believe demand for the computers they're building will be strong, it doesn't necessarily mean they're selling briskly yet.

Intel is benefiting from the fact that PC makers had burned through a lot of their inventory, instead of buying new chips, as the financial crisis worsened. Now they have to restock ahead of what they're hoping will be a healthy back-to-school and holiday season.

Consumer demand for PCs is stabilizing or improving slightly from deeply depressed levels, as shown in the latest quarterly results from the world's top two PC makers, Hewlett-Packard Co. and Dell Inc. But the PC

SAN JOSE DE LAS LAJAS, Cuba (AP) -- Cuban rum maestro Jose Navarro's taste buds sing when he sips Havana Club, the sweet spirit distilled in this farming town south of the capital.

"It has to be Cuban," said Navarro, the oldest of the island's nine certified rum experts. "Havana Club can't exist anywhere else."

But another Havana Club does exist, one made by Bermuda-based rum giant Bacardi Ltd. A variety of Cohiba cigars, once rolled exclusively for Fidel Castro, is produced by Swedish Match North America of Virginia, and a Miami firm offers its own version of Cubita, a top Cuban coffee.

Washington's 47-year-old trade embargo has kept Cuban products out of the U.S. -- but hasn't prevented companies from using the communist island's brand names.

As the U.S. and Cuba consider better ties, such trademark issues would have be settled before any easing of the embargo. The fight between Bacardi and the Cuban government for the Havana Club name already has played out in the U.S. courts and Congress for more than a decade -- and is now before Spain's high court.

But the battles are about so much more than brand names. They are charged with 50 years of emotion over Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution and expropriation of private companies as he implemented socialism. They are also rooted in the future as U.S. corporations face the specter of new competition from Cuban