The Gates Trust spends 10% a year, so it owns almost nothing illiquid
The Gates Foundation Trust held $89.2 billion at the end of 2025, and the foundation it funds committed to pay out $9 billion in 2026. That is about 10% of assets a year, roughly double the legal minimum for a US private foundation, and the foundation is scheduled to close for good at the end of 2045. A pool writing cheques that size cannot lock money up: 31% of its investments sit in debt, 25% in US government securities, and 2.7% in private holdings.
Key numbers, and what they mean
$9B
The 2026 payout, against $89.2 billion of net assets at the end of 2025. That is roughly 10% a year, about double the 5% a US private foundation is required to distribute.
2.7%
Everything the Trust holds in private investments, alongside $845 million of unfunded commitments. When you have promised to spend at this rate, illiquidity stops being a premium you can afford.
25%
The share in US government securities, part of 31% in debt overall. Of $86.9 billion in marked investments, $75.6 billion sits in Level 1, meaning quoted prices in active markets.
End of 2045
When the foundation closes, having committed to spend more than $200 billion. A known end date turns spending from an output of the portfolio into its binding input.
Trust investments, December 2025
Equities58.1%
Debt31.1%
Commodities4.9%
Private investments2.7%
Commingled funds2.3%
Cash equivalents0.8%
Audited figures, rounded. Net derivative positions account for the remaining 0.1%.
The read-through
From the report
Takeaway: how to apply it to a portfolio
A $9 billion payout against $89.2 billion of assets is about 10% a year, and the Trust holds 2.7% in private investments, $296 million in hard-to-value assets and $845 million of unfunded commitments.
Size your illiquid sleeve against the money you have actually promised to spend, not against a target you copied from somebody else. A high draw makes illiquidity unaffordable rather than merely unattractive.
Its quarterly US equity filing showed $34.4 billion across 24 names with the top four at 76%. Its audited statements show $89.3 billion of total investments.
That filing covers barely a third of the pool, so the concentration everyone quotes is roughly double the real thing. Berkshire is 21% of the filing and about 11% of investments. Never size a manager or a peer off a partial disclosure as though it were the whole portfolio.
Warren Buffett's contributions to the foundation reached $47.9 billion by the end of 2025. His July 2026 gift of Berkshire shares went to four other foundations and did not include this one.
Ask which of your inflows depends on one person's discretion, then model the plan without it. A spending commitment underwritten by somebody else's continuing generosity is a different risk from a market risk, and it does not show up in a volatility number.
The Argus lensThe Trust holds 2.7% in private investments and $845 million of unfunded commitments, because a 10% draw leaves no room for a capital call at the wrong moment. Sizing a commitment against your own real liquidity, and knowing what a fund can call and when, is what the documents tell you. That read is ours.
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About the source
The Gates Foundation Trust's audited financial statements for 2025 give the $89.2 billion in net assets, the full investment schedule and the fair-value hierarchy. The $9 billion payout was announced by the foundation in January 2026 and the spend-down to 2045 in May 2025. Holdings come from the Trust's quarterly US equity filing for 30 June 2026. The Trust publishes no target allocation, no benchmark and no return figure.