Warren Buffett’s Estate Planning Sends Charities Scrambling

Warren Buffett has long held his cards close to the vest when it comes to his investing plans. Now, charities including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are racing to adjust to possible changes in his plans for charitable giving. The results could dramatically reshape the world of philanthropy.

In 2006, the Omaha billionaire made a pledge worth tens of billions of dollars: He would earmark 85% of his stock in his company, Berkshire Hathaway Inc., for charity, with the bulk going to the Gates Foundation, a global philanthropy run by his longtime friends. He wrote to the couple that he was “irrevocably committing to make annual gifts of Berkshire Hathaway ‘B’ shares throughout my lifetime.”