Investor Relations (IR) is a strategic management responsibility that integrates finance, communication, marketing and securities law compliance to enable the most effective two-way communication between a company, the financial community, and other constituencies, which ultimately contributes to a company's securities achieving fair valuation. (Adopted by the NIRI Board of Directors, March 2003.) The term describes the department of a company devoted to handling inquiries from shareholders and investors, as well as others who might be interested in a company's stock or financial stability.

Typically investor relations is a department or person reporting to the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) or Treasurer. In some companies, investor relations is managed by the public relations or corporate communications departments, and can also be referred to as "financial public relations" or "financial communications". Investor relations is considered a specialty of public relations by the U.S. Department of Labor.

Warren Edward Buffett (/ˈbʌfɨt/; born August 30, 1930) is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is widely considered the most successful investor of the 20th century. He is the primary shareholder, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. He is consistently ranked among the world's wealthiest people. He was ranked as the world's wealthiest person in 2008 and is the third wealthiest person in the world as of 2011. In 2012, American magazine Time named Buffett one of the most influential people in the world.

Buffett is called the "Wizard of Omaha", "Oracle of Omaha", or the "Sage of Omaha" and is noted for his adherence to the value investing philosophy and for his personal frugality despite his immense wealth. Buffett is also a notable philanthropist, having pledged to give away 99 percent of his fortune to philanthropic causes, primarily via the Gates Foundation. On April 11, 2012, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Buffett was born in 1930 in Omaha, Nebraska, the second of three children and only son of U.S. Representative Howard Buffett, a fierce critic of the interventionist New Deal domestic and foreign policy, and his wife Leila (née Stahl). Buffett began his education at Rose Hill Elementary School in Omaha. In 1942, his father was elected to the first of four terms in the United States Congress, and after moving with his family to Washington, D.C., Warren finished elementary school, attended Alice Deal Junior High School, and graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in 1947, where his senior yearbook picture reads: "likes math; a future stock broker."