By Jonathan Stempel
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has bought the 20% stake of the Pilot truck stop business that it did not already own from the Haslam family, after resolving a lawsuit over how much it should pay.
Terms of the transaction were not disclosed by Berkshire or the Haslams in separate statements on Tuesday.
The lawsuit had pitted Buffett against fellow billionaire Jimmy Haslam, who also owns the Cleveland Browns football team.
Berkshire paid $2.76 billion in 2017 for a 38.6% Pilot stake, and $8.2 billion last January for another 41.4%.
The Haslams had an annual 60-day window to sell the remaining 20% of Pilot, with the price based on the Knoxville, Tennessee-based company’s profits.
Each side accused the other in a Delaware Chancery Court lawsuit of manipulating Pilot’s accounting, with the Haslams saying Berkshire was undervaluing its stake, and Berkshire concerned it might overpay.
A Jan. 8 trial had been scheduled before the settlement, which was announced a day earlier. The case was formally dismissed on Tuesday.
Pilot has approximately 800 locations in the United States and Canada, and sold 13 billion gallons of fuel in 2022.
It added $380 million to Berkshire’s profit in the first nine months of 2023.
Buffett said at Berkshire’s annual meeting last May he wished he could have bought all of Pilot in 2017, but the Haslams did not want to sell.
Berkshire may disclose the purchase price in its annual report in late February.
Berkshire did not immediately respond on Wednesday to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for the Haslams declined to comment.
The market value of Buffett’s Omaha, Nebraska-based conglomerate exceeds $780 billion, and Berkshire may not view the Pilot transaction as material.
Jimmy Haslam’s father Jim Haslam founded Pilot in 1958 after paying $6,000 for a Virginia gas station. The family also includes former Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
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