Why are US stocks soaring sharply higher, while Warren Buffett and other financial experts are continuously reducing their holdings?

Warren Buffett is right; he's playing the long game.
The first lesson in investing: those who can buy are apprentices; those who can sell are masters.
You think Buffett missed the boat; in reality, Buffett has already sold at the highest point he could. What he wants is for the market to think "Buffett missed out."
Then, amid the laughter, he reduces his positions while the stock price continues to rise.
Pay attention to this sentence: The stock god reduces his holdings while the stock price rises. — This is almost an impossible goal because Buffett's scale is so large, and everyone around the world knows how powerful he is.
Let's compare this with Bitcoin for a more extreme contrast.
Satoshi Nakamoto has not moved a single Bitcoin from his 1.1 million Bitcoin account for years. Why hasn't Satoshi sold even a little, given how high Bitcoin has risen?
The answer is simple: everyone knows he is the father of Bitcoin. He owns 1.1 million Bitcoin, which is worth about $80 billion on paper, but if he sells just one coin, the remaining 1.1 million coins' price would collapse instantly. Because he has sent a signal, and he's too conspicuous; the market would fluctuate wildly in response to his signal.
The same applies to Buffett. The whole world knows he's the stock god. When he buys, countless others follow, pushing the stock price higher — which is obviously good.
But the next question is: how does he sell?
In theory, when he sells, investors worldwide will follow suit.
If he sells 10% of his holdings, it could cause the remaining 90% of his unrealized gains to plummet in price.
So, Buffett is essentially caught here: he owns assets with high book value, but he can't cash out because he's too large and too visible.
But now, what you see is this: Buffett has been reducing his holdings over the past few years, and Berkshire's cash reserves have reached their highest level ever.
Meanwhile, US stocks keep hitting new highs! That’s the brilliance of Buffett.
With such a huge reputation and massive capital, he manages to sell without crashing the entire market! That’s the “god-like” aspect of Buffett.
The first lesson in capital market investing: those who can buy are apprentices; those who can sell are masters. Teacher Buffett will always be your teacher.
How does he do it?
His strategy is: day after day, repeatedly telling everyone, "I'm old, I don’t understand tech stocks anymore, I dare not buy."
Everyone laughs and says, "Yeah, old Buffett can’t keep up with the new era."
Then he secretly accumulates Apple shares worth $30 billion at $39 per share, and cashes out at $220. Later, Apple rose to $290, another 30% above Buffett’s selling range, so many say Buffett missed out and sold too early.
At the annual meeting, Buffett also chuckles and says: "Yes, yes, I still don’t understand Apple. I sold too early. I was really stupid. I regret it."
Trust him? Better to trust me, Qin Shi Huang.
At his peak, Buffett bought nearly 1 billion shares of Apple, accounting for 6% of Apple’s total shares; but now, Berkshire’s Apple holdings only account for 1.5% of Apple’s total stock.
The largest shareholder of Apple, recognized by the market as the most knowledgeable value investor—the stock god—sold 80% of his holdings.
Logically, when Buffett first reduced his position, the market should have sensed something big was coming and started selling en masse.
Such a long-term, large-scale reduction could have crashed Apple’s stock price.
But in reality, it didn’t. That’s the “god-like” aspect of Buffett. Ordinary investors can choose to sell at the peak, but Buffett can never sell at the absolute top. Because of his scale, if he sells too quickly, it could crash the entire market.
So, Buffett needs time. If you understand the US stock market, you’ll know it’s a bull market with a bear market in between — it will steadily rise over five or ten years, but when it peaks, it can plunge rapidly within weeks or months.
That’s a stock market crash. Ordinary people can liquidate all their positions at any point in the market instantly.
But Buffett can’t. If you were Buffett, you wouldn’t want to sell at the very top and see the market decline afterward. For example, if you have 600 billion and sell 100 billion, but the market drops 30%, the remaining 500 billion instantly loses 150 billion.
Selling 100 billion but leaving a position with a paper loss of 150 billion—that’s a terrible way to exit.
You want to create market expectations: that everyone thinks you don’t understand, that you’re shorting the market.
Then, while you sell, the market continues to rise. You sell 100 billion out of 600 billion, and the remaining 500 billion still rises by 20%—so you still have 600 billion!
You’re grinning from ear to ear, but everyone thinks you missed out.
Then, at the annual meeting, you smile and say: “I’m really too old; I don’t understand this market anymore. I missed out. I was really stupid.
I don’t understand the stock market. You do, and you’re making a lot of money.”