3 Stocks Warren Buffett Wishes He Bought Sooner

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The Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting is in the rearview mirror, and investors are now parsing Greg Abel’s early portfolio moves as CEO. The Q1 2026 13F told a clear story: Abel is willing to do the things Warren Buffett openly regretted not doing sooner. That includes finally embracing big tech, leaning harder into AI-exposed names and continuing to compound the consumer franchises Buffett built the empire around.

Here are three U.S.-listed stocks that fit the “ones that got away, until they didn’t” theme this June.

Alphabet (GOOGL)

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) is the freshest example. Per the Q1 2026 13F, Abel aggressively added to GOOGL, with shares up about 204% in the quarter, and a separate GOOG position was initiated the same quarter. Buffett and Charlie Munger both publicly called missing Google a mistake. Abel is correcting it.

The setup is hard to argue with. Q1 2026 EPS came in at $5.11 versus the $2.63 estimate, with revenue of $109.90 billion, up 22% year over year. Google Cloud grew 63% to $20.03 billion with a backlog near $460 billion. Shares trade at $369.35 on a forward P/E of 26x, with a Street target of $432.83 and 14 strong-buy and 43 buy ratings against just 7 holds. The stock is up 18% YTD and 112% over one year.

Retail is along for the ride. A widely circulated r/stocks post titled “For those who keep asking for a ‘one buy and hold for the next 10 years’ the opportunity is here: it’s GOOGL” drew 2,134 upvotes.

Risk: AI CapEx is mammoth. Alphabet guided 2026 capex of $175 billion to $185 billion, and Q1 free cash flow already fell 47% year over year. If AI monetization slips, the depreciation wave will bite margins.

Apple (AAPL)

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) remains Berkshire’s largest holding at roughly 22% of the portfolio. Buffett has said multiple times he wishes he had started buying sooner. He didn’t begin until 2016, and the stock is up 1,266% over the past 10 years. Even after trimming, Berkshire still leans on Apple as its anchor.

Recent results explain why. Q2 FY26 EPS of $2.01 beat the $1.94 estimate on revenue of $111.18 billion, up 17%. iPhone revenue jumped to $56.99 billion from $46.84 billion on iPhone 17 demand. Services hit an all-time record of $30.98 billion. Management authorized a new $100 billion buyback and lifted the dividend 4% to $0.27. CEO Tim Cook called it the “Best March quarter ever…double-digit growth across every geographic segment.”

Shares trade at a premium, with a forward P/E of 31x and an analyst target of $312.72. The installed base sits at 2.5 billion-plus active devices, a moat that compounds Services revenue every quarter.

Risk: Valuation is the friction. At a trailing P/E of 35x, any tariff escalation or China softness gets punished quickly. An r/stocks thread asking “is there underappreciated risk of AAPL re-rating significantly downward?” drew 146 comments, a fair counterpoint to the bull case.

American Express (AXP)

American Express (NYSE:AXP) is a long-time Berkshire core holding. Buffett has said he should have bought more sooner and never sold. The position dates back decades, and Abel has signaled comfort holding through cycles.

The Q1 2026 numbers reinforce why. EPS of $4.28 beat the $3.99 estimate, revenue came in at $18.91 billion, and billed business hit $428.0 billion, up 10% year over year, the highest quarterly growth in three years. The net write-off rate improved to 2% from 2%. Management reaffirmed full-year guidance of 9% to 10% revenue growth and EPS of $17.30 to $17.90. CEO Stephen Squeri summed it up: “We delivered 10 percent FX-adjusted revenue growth and 18 percent EPS growth in the quarter…Card Member spending grew 9 percent FX-adjusted, the highest quarterly growth in three years.”

Shares closed at $340.78, with the stock down 9% YTD but up 7% in the past week and 18% over one year. Forward P/E is 19x, the cheapest multiple of the three, and the Street target is $361.94. The dividend was hiked 16% in Q4 2025 to $0.95 quarterly, with net card fee revenue growing double digits for 30 consecutive quarters.

Risk: Amex is macro-sensitive. A consumer slowdown, tariff escalation, or new interest-rate cap regulation could compress engagement margins, especially after the recent Platinum refresh.

The Takeaway

The common thread across all three is that Berkshire eventually paid up for quality it could have owned cheaper. GOOGL is the freshest example of Abel acting decisively on a stock Buffett admittedly missed. AAPL is the franchise that proved the thesis. AXP is the multi-decade compounder that keeps validating the strategy. Investors studying Abel’s first moves should keep an eye on whether the GOOGL position grows again in the next 13F.

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