Thomas Gayner's Trades and Holdings in Q2 2025

Breaking down the stocks Thomas Gayner (Markel Group) bought, sold, and held in Q2 2025, including their holdings at the end of the quarter. All data sourced from Markel Group's 13F filed on August 01, 2025.

Who is Markel Group?

Markel Group is a holding company focused on specialty insurance underwriting, long-term equity investing, and ownership of diversified operating businesses (commonly referred to as Markel). The company is known for its diversified equity portfolio, typically consisting of 130-140 stocks, with the top 10 holdings comprising approximately 40% of equity assets, and cash and short-term investments averaging around 15% of total invested assets when balancing liquidity needs against opportunities. Their investment strategy is a long-term value investing approach inspired by Warren Buffett, emphasizing buy-and-hold ownership of high-quality businesses evaluated through four key pillars: profitable operations with good returns on capital and minimal debt, management teams with equal measures of talent and integrity, businesses with favorable reinvestment opportunities, and purchase prices that provide a margin of safety. Markel focuses on undervalued or underappreciated companies that can compound intrinsic value over decades, with strong qualitative factors like durable competitive advantages, reliable cash flows, resilient balance sheets, industry leadership, and alignment with the company's "Markel Style" values of excellence, fairness, and frugality.

Markel.com
Markel Group on X
Q2 '25 13F filed with SEC

Holdings in Q2 2025

Current Investment Strategy

Markel Group maintained its Buffett-inspired long-term value investing approach in Q2 2025, anchoring its equity portfolio around quality blue-chip holdings including Berkshire Hathaway, Brookfield, Alphabet, and Amazon, while adding new positions in technology and industrial names Adobe, Applied Materials, and CSX that fit its criteria of profitable businesses with strong returns on capital. The specialty insurer continued to emphasize its patient buy-and-hold philosophy focused on companies with durable competitive advantages and reliable cash flows, allocating capital across its diversified equity portfolio of approximately 137 holdings while navigating strategic restructuring of its insurance operations by placing its reinsurance division into run-off.

New Investments

Adobe ADBE

Thomas Gayner bought $5.42M of Adobe in Q2 2025. Adobe delivered strong Q3 FY2025 results, beating both revenue ($5.99 billion, +10% YoY) and EPS ($5.31, +14% YoY) expectations, driven primarily by AI-feature adoption across its Creative Cloud and Document Cloud portfolios. The company achieved AI-influenced ARR of over $5 billion and record Q3 operating cash flow of $2.20 billion, demonstrating robust monetization of its AI-first product strategy despite intensifying competitive pressures from generative AI tools. Currently trading at a P/E of 22.41 and approximately 43% below estimated fair value, the stock presents potential upside opportunities given strong margin expansion (30% net profit margin) and consistent execution.

• Non-GAAP EPS of $5.31 exceeded consensus by 2.5%, with 14% year-over-year growth.
• Q3 revenue increased 10% year-over-year to $5.99 billion, while AI-influenced ARR surpassed $5 billion.
• Trading at P/E ratio of 22.41 with 30% net profit margin, representing 43% discount to fair value estimate.

Applied Materials AMAT

Thomas Gayner bought $3.02M of Applied Materials in Q2 2025. Applied Materials delivered record Q3 2025 results with $7.30 billion in revenue (up 8% YoY) and non-GAAP EPS of $2.48 (up 17% YoY), demonstrating strong execution across all three business segments despite near-term macroeconomic headwinds. Profitability metrics expanded significantly with gross margin improving 150 basis points to 48.9% and operating margin expanding 190 basis points to 30.7%, reflecting both revenue strength and operational efficiency. However, the market focused on cautious Q4 guidance citing China digestion and non-linear leading-edge customer demand, creating near-term uncertainty despite management's confidence in longer-term semiconductor industry growth driven by AI.

• Non-GAAP EPS beat consensus estimate by 5.1% ($2.48 actual vs. $2.36 estimate), with 17% YoY growth.
• Gross margin expanded 150 basis points to 48.9% YoY, while operating margin improved 190 basis points to 30.7%.
• Semiconductor Systems segment generated $5.427B in revenue with robust 36% operating margin; Applied Global Services achieved 24th consecutive quarter of YoY growth.

CSX CSX

Thomas Gayner bought $2.12M of CSX in Q2 2025. CSX reported mixed Q3 2025 results with revenue declining 1% year-over-year to $3.59 billion and adjusted EPS down 4.3% to $0.44, though earnings beat consensus estimates of $0.42. Coal revenues plummeted 11% while merchandise volumes fell 1%, but intermodal revenues grew 4% on stronger volume demand offsetting some weakness. Operating margins compressed to 34.9% from 37.4% year-over-year, impacted by a $164 million goodwill impairment related to Quality Carriers, though operational metrics showed sequential improvement and management maintained guidance for full-year volume growth.

• Adjusted EPS of $0.44 beat consensus estimates of $0.42, but declined 4.3% year-over-year.
• Coal revenues declined 11% YoY while intermodal volumes surged 5%, demonstrating divergent segment performance in mixed market conditions.
• Operating margin compression of 340 basis points to 34.9% reflects ongoing pressure, though Jefferies set a price target of $42 suggesting 13.45% upside potential.

Added, Trimmed, and Exited

Added

Markel Group significantly increased positions across several key themes, with the most notable additions to financial market infrastructure including CBOE (+13,000 shares, +226% return) and CME Group (+13,000 shares, +146% return), as well as substantial increases to food and distribution businesses including Sysco (+15,000 shares, +169% return), Archer Daniels Midland (+22,500 shares), Tyson Foods (+17,500 shares), and Marriott International (+8,250 shares). The firm also added to transportation holdings Old Dominion Freight Line (+29,250 shares) and Union Pacific (+11,500 shares), technology positions Alphabet (+15,000 shares) and Airbnb (+28,183 shares), healthcare leader Novo Nordisk (+108,588 shares), and select industrials including Ferguson Enterprises (+11,500 shares), Lamar Advertising (+21,000 shares), Franco-Nevada (+44,250 shares), and Lowe's (+9,000 shares).
What it means: Markel is strategically concentrating capital in businesses with durable competitive moats and pricing power during uncertain economic conditions. The aggressive buying of financial exchange operators—which generate highly predictable, fee-based revenues with natural monopoly characteristics—reflects conviction in essential market infrastructure. Similarly, the food and distribution adds target companies with inelastic demand and supply chain advantages. The transportation and industrial additions suggest Markel sees long-term value despite near-term cyclical pressures, while continued accumulation of Novo Nordisk positions the portfolio to benefit from the multi-decade GLP-1 obesity treatment opportunity.

Trimmed

Markel Group executed significant reductions in packaging and materials companies, slashing Graphic Packaging by 287,225 shares (-62% of position, -69% return), O-I Glass by 400,400 shares (-46% of position, -30% return), and 3M by 175,500 shares (-60% of position, -58% return). The firm also made smaller trims to Watsco (-25,331 shares, -17% return) and IQVIA (-9,084 shares, -24% return).
What it means: These aggressive reductions signal a clear strategic retreat from cyclical materials and packaging businesses facing deteriorating fundamentals and weak end-market demand. The heavy losses on these positions—particularly the 69% drawdown on Graphic Packaging and 58% on 3M—suggest Markel is willing to recognize mistakes and redeploy capital rather than wait for turnarounds in challenged business models. The trimming of 3M, a legacy industrial conglomerate still working through litigation and restructuring, reinforces the firm's preference for cleaner, more focused business models. This capital reallocation from commodity-exposed, margin-compressed businesses to the higher-quality infrastructure and essential services names detailed above demonstrates disciplined portfolio management.

Exited

Markel Group completely liquidated its position in Cable One, selling 11,900 shares valued at $3.16 million.
What it means: This full exit from a regional cable operator reflects recognition of the secular challenges facing legacy broadband infrastructure businesses, including intensifying competition from fiber providers, fixed wireless access from telecom carriers, and pricing pressure in maturing markets. Cable One's high leverage and capital intensity combined with slowing subscriber growth likely made this an unattractive long-term hold for Markel's value-oriented, quality-focused strategy. The proceeds were redeployed into higher-conviction opportunities with better growth trajectories and competitive positioning.

Disclaimer: All posts are for informational purposes only. They are NOT a recommendation to buy or sell the securities discussed. Please do your own research and due diligence before investing your money.