Warren Buffett admits he made “a huge mistake” on Tesco as share price tumbles again

Warren Buffett has admitted making a “huge mistake” by investing in Tesco, as the supermarket's share price continued to fall today. 

 

The legendary investor, and second richest man in the world, is currently the third largest shareholder in Tesco, through his venture Berkshire Hathaway, which owns a 4.1 per cent stake. 

 

He first invested in Tesco back in 2006, and has increased his holding in that time, even upping it to five per cent earlier this year shortly after the supermarket issued a profit warning. 

 

But since it revealed a £250m black hole in its profits for the first half to August, admitting that it had “overstated”  the amount it had made, Tesco's share price has fallen from a closing price of 229.6p per share on September 19 to yesterday's closing price of 179.7p per share. 

 

That's a drop of nearly 22 per cent in nine trading days. 

 

And today's Tesco's share price had fallen yet again, down 1.1 per cent at pixel time to 178.2p per share. 

 

Buffett told CNBC: “I made a mistake on Tesco. That was a huge mistake by me.” 

 

Tesco is now the subject of an independent investigation into its accounting, which it emerged chief executive Philip Clarke had been handling after the departure of its finance boss some months earlier.

 

It has come under the gaze of several regulators including the Financial Conduct Authority and the Financial Reporting Council.

 

 

Its rating has been put on a watchlist by a number of agencies, prompting it to go cap-in-hand to banks for a series of new (more costly) loans in case it is downgraded. 

 

But all that doesn't seem to have put Sports Direct founder and majority shareholder Mike Ashley, who publicly took a put option on the business early last week praising its "long-term" prospects. 

 

So does he know something none of the rest of us know, and could he be a smarter investor than Buffett?