The Gates Foundation, set up by Microsoft (MSFT 0.13%) co-founder Bill Gates in 2000, is one of the wealthiest charities in the world. It has spent more than $102 billion on charitable causes since its inception, and as of the latest information, the foundation’s trust manages $86 billion in total assets.
Of the trust’s assets, more than $35 billion is invested in publicly traded companies that are reported to the SEC on a quarterly basis. Although there are nearly two dozen stocks in the portfolio, one stock accounts for 28% of the portfolio — and it isn’t the company Gates co-founded.
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The Gates Foundation’s portfolio
The Gates Foundation’s stock portfolio has a total of 23 positions, but it is rather concentrated, with 96% of its assets invested in its 10 largest holdings. But there is one that is the largest position by a wide margin, and it is massive conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway (BRKB +0.01%).
As of the end of 2025, The Gates Foundation owned about 19.4 million Class B shares of Berkshire Hathaway, which have a total market value of roughly $9.8 billion.
If you’re curious, other top holdings in the portfolio include Waste Management (WM 0.47%) and Canadian National Railway (CNI 4.03%). And yes, Microsoft (MSFT 0.13%) is the number four holding, with a 10.5% allocation.
Why does The Gates Foundation own so much Berkshire Hathaway stock?
Berkshire Hathaway isn’t necessarily The Gates Foundation’s top holding because its portfolio managers believe it’s going to be an excellent long-term investment. To be sure, they might feel that way, but it isn’t the main reason.
The reason why Berkshire Hathaway is the top holding is that Warren Buffett has made annual massive charitable contributions to The Gates Foundation, as well as other charities, for many years. And he does so in the form of Berkshire Hathaway stock.
In fact, from 2006 through 2024, Buffett gave a total of $43.3 billion to the foundation in the form of Berkshire stock. It “only” owns $9.8 billion in Berkshire stock today because it incrementally sells shares to help fund its charitable giving, which is exactly what Warren Buffett intended. In the fourth quarter of 2025 alone, The Gates Foundation sold 2.36 million shares of Berkshire, raising more than $1 billion.
It’s also worth noting that the reason Microsoft is a top holding is that it comes from the charitable contributions of Bill Gates. The tech billionaire owned 45% of Microsoft at the time of its IPO, but now owns less than 1%, with donations to his charitable foundation one of the primary reasons. Berkshire and Microsoft are the only two positions in the portfolio that are regularly sold in order to raise capital, with the rest used for long-term investments.
