Warren Buffett Says Investors Are in a "Gambling Mood" as S&P 500 Shiller CAPE Stays Above 40

Warren Buffett compared the current market to a church with a casino attached. In a CNBC interview at Berkshire Hathaway's annual meeting, he said, "We've never had people in a more gambling mood than now." He added that this does not mean "investing is terrible," but that "prices for an awful lot of things will look very silly."
The S&P 500 is up roughly 19% over the past six months and the Nasdaq has gained about 26%. Both indexes hit record highs this week.
The S&P 500 Shiller CAPE ratio has been above 40 since May 2026. The long-term average is approximately 17, and the ratio hit a record 44 in late 1999, shortly before the dot-com bubble burst in March 2000.
Buffett's concern is not that stocks are bad investments, Fortune reported, but that a speculative mood tends to inflate prices across the board. Berkshire Hathaway has also been sitting on cash rather than putting it to work.