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Time to break up Berkshire Hathaway?

Ted O'Glove: Time to break up Berkshire
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Ted O'Glove: Time to break up Berkshire

Should Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway be broken up?

Buffett has built the Omaha, Nebraska-based company into one of the largest and most recognizable conglomerates today, boasting an array of popular brands, including everything from H.J. Heinz to GEICO and Helzberg Diamonds.

Berkshire Hathaway shares nearly doubled over the past five years, too.

But Berkshire's stock would double immediately if only Buffett would allow the company to be broken up, noted investor Ted O'Glove told CNBC on Thursday.

"There's 77 operating companies alone. Most of them could be spun off and within that, you'd have spinoffs of spinoffs," said O'Glove, author of "The Quality of Earnings," on "Closing Bell."

"All these companies have world-class management. That's why they were bought by Warren Buffett," he said. "They were doing very well on their own before. They would do very well on their own now."

However, analyst Tom Russo of Gardner Russo & Gardner disagreed. He noted that if Berkshire were to break up, it would no longer be able to reinvest funds from one company to another tax-free.

Shareholders surround a large scale portrait of Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, during the company's shareholders meeting in Omaha, Nebraska, May 3, 2014.
Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images

As for Buffett himself, he told CNBC earlier this week "there are real advantages to having the company together."

"The one big advantage is the ability to allocate capital from businesses where it can't be used effectively," Buffett said on "Squawk Box." "Maybe the present capital can be used effectively, but incremental capital has very little value and we can move that over to other areas."

Buffett said anyone hoping for the breakup should "dream on."

What do you think? Vote in our poll and comment below.

—By CNBC's Drew Sandholm.

Disclosure: Russo owns BRKA as an analyst. His firm holds less than 1 percent of BRKA, as well.