Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A)(NYSE: BRK.B) is hosting its much-anticipated annual meeting this weekend, and as usual, this coincides with the company's first-quarter earnings release. With that in mind, here's a rundown of some of the key takeaways for investors and what to watch going forward.

As Chairman and CEO Warren Buffett has pointed out many times, Berkshire's bottom-line earnings aren't a great indicator of how well the business is performing. Because Berkshire has so much invested in publicly traded stocks, and accounting rules require unrealized gains and losses to be included in earnings, the bottom-line earnings per share (EPS) number doesn't accurately convey how much money the company truly earned.

If we back out the company's investment gains and losses, we see that Berkshire's businesses are performing quite well, with earnings from its operating businesses growing by 12.6% year over year. The bulk of the gain can be attributed to Berkshire's insurance business, with underwriting income rising sharply year over year, and the rising-rate environment causing the insurance business's investment income to rise by 68% compared with the first quarter of 2022.

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Source Fool.com