Warren Buffett believes his best deals during the economy's biggest belly flop since the Crash of 1929 may well turn out to be the ones he didn't do.
Mr. Buffett slammed the door on one opportunity after another during the most harrowing stretch of his storied career. That impulse, he says, left him with the financial firepower he needed last month to strike the biggest deal he has ever done -- Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s $26.3 billion purchase of railroad Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp.
In a series of interviews with The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Buffett gave his most complete account of his epic deal negotiations, including anxious phone calls he fielded from wounded companies such as Freddie Mac, Wachovia Corp. and Morgan Stanley.
"I bought my first stock in 1942, and this roller coaster surpassed anything that I've seen," says the 79-year-old investor. "We didn't do all the smartest things. We didn't do anything really dumb."
