The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust, founded by billionaire Bill Gates, has continued to sell Microsoft shares.
Bill Gates is one of the world’s best-known businessmen. He co-founded Microsoft with Paul Allen in 1975.
He served as the company’s CEO until 2000 and its chairman until 2014. Under his leadership, Microsoft revolutionized the personal computing industry.
Microsoft is best known for its Windows operating system and Office suite, but it also has a strong position in the global cloud and gaming industries.
The company’s success made him the world’s youngest self-made billionaire in 1987 and held the title of the world’s richest person for nearly two decades.
In 2000, he and his then-wife, Melinda French Gates, founded the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The foundation has committed to spending its entire $200 billion endowment and to closing its doors by 2045.
Current efforts focus heavily on reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, and eradicating infectious diseases like malaria and polio.
Outside of the foundation, Gates focuses on climate change through Breakthrough Energy, a network of investment funds and programs he founded in 2015.
He is also a major proponent of nuclear energy, particularly through his company TerraPower, which is developing next-generation traveling-wave reactors.
His net worth is estimated at approximately $105 billion, ranking him among the world’s richest people.
His ranking has declined over the years primarily due to his massive transfers of wealth to his foundation.
Following his 2021 divorce from Melinda, he continues to work as a founder and technology advisor for Microsoft.
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust sells Microsoft shares
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has a two-part structure to separate its charitable work from its investment management.
Under this arrangement, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation focuses on awarding grants to achieve its charitable aims.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust manages the endowment and provides the funding needed for the foundation’s initiatives.
It holds the gifts donated by Bill Gates, Melinda French Gates, and, most significantly, the annual instalments from Warren Buffett.
The Trust invests these assets to preserve and grow the value of the endowment, and it then transfers the proceeds to the Foundation.
The Foundation and its staff have no influence on the investment decisions, strategies, or activities of the Trust.
The Trust is one of the world’s largest investment pools, and its portfolio holdings are publicly disclosed through required SEC filings (13F filings).
The investment strategy is focused on achieving long-term growth and stability to ensure ongoing funding for the Foundation’s charitable objectives.
The latest 13F filing from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust for the quarter ended 31 December 2025, revealed that it significantly reduced its stake in Microsoft.
The trust, with a portfolio value of $35.4 billion, cut its Microsoft holding by 16% over the previous quarter. However, this only tells part of the story.
Between 2022 and 2025, Microsoft was the biggest holding in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust portfolio.
In Q3 2022, when a large number of Microsoft shares were added to the trust, it was the portfolio’s largest holding, with a 27% share.
However, trust has consistently reduced its stake in Microsoft over the last few quarters, which saw it drop to number four in size in the portfolio.
Microsoft now only accounts for 11% of the portfolio, lower than Berkshire Hathaway, Waste Management, and Canadian National Railway Company.
It also has significant investments in Caterpillar, Deere, Ecolab, Walmart, FedEx, and one of Buffett’s favourite companies, Coca-Cola.