Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE:BRK-A) (NYSE:BRK-B) has had a pretty good start to the year. Net earnings per Class A share rose to $3,143 in the quarter, from $2,862 a year ago. Adjusted for one-time items, the company earned $2,583 per class A share, from $2,149 a year ago.

The conglomerate reported net earnings of $5.16 billion in the first quarter, compared with $4.70 billion a year ago.

Berkshire Hathaway – Growth drivers

Berkshire Hathaway reported that earnings from its insurance underwriting business grew 4% to $480 million during the quarter while earnings from railroad, utilities and energy jumped 24.6% to $1.466 billion.

However, net earnings at Berkshire Hathaway Energy, fell 7% in the first quarter, to $421 million. Lower revenue from mild weather in some markets weighed on results at the energy unit.

Berkshire Hathaway’s investment income from its security portfolio rose to $875 million in the first quarter, up about 22% from a year ago.

Berkshire’s insurance float amounted to $83.5 billion at the end of the first quarter, down by around $500 million from the end of 2014. Berkshire’s railroad, BNSF contributed more than $1 billion in first-quarter net profit, or roughly one-fifth of Berkshire’s overall net profit of $5.2 billion.

Since the end of 2014, Berkshire’s book value, Warren Buffett’s preferred yardstick for measuring growth, has increased by 0.5%, standing at $146,963 per Class A share as of March 31.

Berkshire’s cash pile had risen to $64 billion at the end of the last quarter.

Weapons of mass destruction

During the first quarter Berkshire Hathaway also reported significant gain from its long-term derivative bets on the global stock markets.

Once labeled by Buffett “financial weapons of mass destruction” it’s interesting to see him making such a large gain from financial products he’s discouraged others from using in the past.

The derivatives used by Berkshire in this case are a number of put options on four major stock indices. More on the contracts here.

During the first quarter the paper gains on these contracts reached $1.3 billion.

Significant business acquisitions

During the first quarter, Berkshire Hathaway made two major acquisitions. The first was The Van Tuyl Group (now named Berkshire Hathaway Automotive). Berkshire Hathaway Automotive has 81 automotive dealerships located in 10 states as well as two related insurance businesses, two auto auctions and a manufacturer of automotive fluid maintenance products. The total paid for this acquisition was $4.1 billion.

Additionally, Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company acquired AltaLink, L.P.  for approximately $2.7 billion. AltaLink is a regulated electric transmission-only business, headquartered in Calgary, Alberta.

Heinz income

Berkshire Hathaway linked up with 3G Capital to buy H.J. Heinz Company (NYSE:HNZ) during 2013 for approximately $23.25 billion in aggregate. Berkshire’s investments in H.J. Heinz Company consist of 425 million shares of common stock, warrants to acquire approximately 46 million additional shares of common stock, and cumulative compounding preferred stock with a liquidation preference of $8 billion. In the first quarter, Heniz’s earnings attributable to Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders totaled $231 million, up 22% year on year.