Berkshire wrote two $9.7B checks for chemicals businesses fifteen years apart — one labeled specialty, one labeled commodity. Fourteen years of operating data, the May 2011 fairness opinion, and OxyChem's own segment record under Occidental let us ask which premium the market was actually right about. The data is unkind to the specialty narrative.

Berkshire closed January 2, 2026 by absorbing Occidental's OxyChem chemicals business for $9.7 billion cash — the same headline price Buffett paid for Lubrizol in 2011. The deal carries an unusual lineage: Lubrizol's CEO Rebecca Liebert now also runs OxyChem inside Berkshire.