(Bloomberg) Berkshire Hathaway Inc., run by billionaire investor Warren Buffett, said third-quarter profit more than quadrupled on gains in its insurance units.

Net income climbed to $2.77 billion, or $1,797 a share, from $586 million, or $381, a year earlier, the Omaha, Nebraska-based company said in a statement at the weekend.

Buffett?s insurance units rebounded from Hurricane Katrina, benefiting from milder weather and a retreat by competitors wary of covering properties along the US Gulf Coast. Berkshire set among the industry?s highest rates, charging as much as 30 cents for each dollar of coverage, said John Bullock, an insurance broker at Willis Group Holdings Ltd.

?They were very aggressive,? said Mohnish Pabrai, who manages $330 million at Pabrai Investment Funds in Irvine, California and owns Berkshire shares. ?On the one hand you collect all this money, on the other, you pay no claims. That sounds like a pretty good business to me.?

Berkshire, built by Buffett over four decades, gets about half its profit from insurance and reinsurance units including National Indemnity Co., General Re Corp. and Geico Corp. Almost $2 billion in costs from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita dragged the businesses to an underwriting loss in the third quarter of 2005.

The company can ?take on an amount of risk that other insurers can?t or won?t,? said Keith Trauner, who manages $2.4 billion, including Berkshire shares, as chief investment officer of Fairholme Capital Management LLC in Short Hills, New Jersey.

Berkshire?s stock, which reached $100,000 last month, has advanced 9.6 percent since October 3, when researchers at Colorado State University said the greatest danger from Atlantic Ocean hurricanes this year was over.

The company?s A shares rose $894, or 0.9 percent, to $105,000 on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday. The quarter?s results were released after the close of regular trading.

Buffett, the world?s second-richest man after Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates, owns almost a third of the stock himself. In June, he pledged to give most of his stake, then valued at more than $43 billion, to Gates?s charitable organisation and four family foundations in annual instalments.