Warren Buffett Worried Over Nuclear War, Pandemics — Not Stocks

Warren Buffett, America's greatest billionaire stock investor, says the threat of a nuclear war and future pandemics — and not his company or the economy — keeps him up at night.

Talking recently on CNBCs "Squawk Box" about his conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett says his firm is fine but other threats are concerning.

"Well, at 92 I've got other things to worry about. I don't worry about [Berkshire Hathaway's] ability," Buffett said.

"There's things I worry about. Sure. I worry about the nuclear threat. I worry about a pandemic in the future ... But I don't worry about them because I can't do anything about them. ... I never go to bed worried about Berkshire and how we'll handle a thing."

Buffett bought the failing Berkshire Hathaway textile company in 1965 and turned it into the world's most successful holding company, worth an estimated $700 billion in market capitalization. His personal net worth is estimated over $113 billion.

Buffett's comments come at a time the U.S. faces a growing risk of a nuclear confrontation with Russia, China, North Korea, or Iran.

Recently, the U.N.'s disarmaments chief warned that the world faces the higher risk of a nuclear incident or worse since the end of the Cold War.

As Russia's war against Ukraine continues, President Vladmir Putin and his government have not ruled out the use of nuclear weapons.

Numerous pro-government commentators in Moscow have called for using nuclear weapons against Ukraine, NATO countries like Poland and Britain, and the United States.

Recently, Putin has ordered nuclear weapons to be moved into Belarus, closer to NATO, while conducting war games using nuclear submarines and hypersonic missiles in simulated attacks against Western nations.

As for the recent spate of bank failures that began with Silicon Valley Bank, Buffett said he doesn't believe the country is finished with the crisis, though he doesn't think the individual depositors will suffer.

"We're not through with bank failures. But we're through [with] the depositor — depositors haven't had a crisis," he said.

"The owners of banks may have lost a hell of a lot of money. The people who bought the debt of the ... holding company ... they may lose a lot of money. People can ... lose a lot of money.

"But the depositors aren't going to, so you don't need to turn a dumb decision by managers into a panicking the whole citizenry of the United States about something they don't need to be panicked about."

During his CNBC interview, Buffett said his family members are invested in his company, and he is confident about running it properly to live up to that responsibility.

"I've got all my relatives in. I've got everybody in," he said. "If I thought that I wasn't going to be able to do a decent job of managing the risk — a better than decent job — I'd be crazy to take on that responsibility."

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