Bill Gates' Trust Offloads Apple Stake And Buys This Stock Instead

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust sold its entire stake held in Apple Inc. AAPL and Twitter Inc. TWTR in the first quarter of this year but acquired a new stake in South Korea-based e-commerce company Coupang Inc. CPNG.

What Happened: The investment changes, made before Microsoft Corporation MSFT co-founder Bill Gates and Melinda Gates announced their divorce earlier this month, were disclosed by the foundation trust in a regulatory filing.

The Gates’ trust sold its entire holding of more than 1 million shares in Apple that it owned at the end of 2020. The trust also sold 272,420 Twitter shares, exiting its position in the social media company giant.

The trust’s holding in Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B) was trimmed to 37.10 million Class B shares from 42.10 million shares held at the end of December last year.

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In addition, the trust cut its stake in FedEx Corp. FDX by almost half to 1.49 million shares from 3.02 million shares held at the end of last year. It also reduced its stake in Walmart Inc. WMT to 7.60 million shares from 11.63 million shares held earlier.

The trust acquired 5.71 million shares in Coupang and initiated a stake in the e-commerce company, which went public in March.

See Also: Divorce Asset Split Starts: Melinda Gates Now Owns Stakes In These 4 Stocks

Why It Matters: Gates began his philanthropic work with the William H. Gates Foundation, which he launched in 1984. In 2000, Gates and Melinda began the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Gates left Microsoft in 2008 to concentrate on his philanthropic endeavors, with a focus on socioeconomic, educational, and environmental issues.

The Gates Foundation is the world's largest private charitable foundation, with a trust endowment of $49.8 billion.

The Gates’ divorce could lead to the splitting up of a fortune worth more than $130 billion, including stakes in several publicly traded companies.

Price Action: Microsoft shares closed 0.5% lower on Friday at $245.17.

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