After more than six decades at the helm of one of the world's most consequential financial institutions, Warren Buffett has formally relinquished the chairman title at Berkshire Hathaway — a moment long anticipated, yet still weighted with the gravity of an era closing. The move is not a rupture but a culmination, the latest deliberate step in a succession architecture Berkshire has been quietly constructing for years. In stepping back, Buffett does not so much leave as test whether the institution he shaped can carry his philosophy forward without his name at the top.