Harvard Management Company Bets on Big Tech at End of 2024

The Harvard Management Company increased its exposure to Big Tech in its directly held stock portfolio during the final months of 2024, adding new positions in Apple, Amazon, Tesla, and Microsoft while reinforcing its already substantial investment in Meta.

The move marks a decisive bet on the so-called “Magnificent Seven” — a group of tech giants that have driven much of the stock market’s gains in recent years.

The shift comes as Harvard’s public equities portfolio reached $1.69 billion at the end of 2024, slightly down from $1.73 billion in the previous quarter, but still up 42 percent from $1.19 billion a year ago.

HMC sold off large percentages of its shares in Alphabet, Booking Holdings, and Advanced Micro Devices. The $68 million decline in Alphabet made an exchange-traded fund tracking the Nasdaq-100, Invesco QQQ, HMC’s second-biggest holding.

Harvard also deepened its investment in Meta, increasing its holdings by 10 percent to $762.8 million, which now makes up 45 percent of its public equities portfolio. The University added $27.2 million in Apple, $14.8 million in Amazon, $22.4 million in Microsoft, and $8.1 million in Tesla, all of which were absent from its previous filings.

John Longo, a finance professor at Rutgers Business School, said that the Trump administration’s stance on business and technology may have influenced Harvard’s increased exposure to major tech firms.

“The Trump Administration is embracing pro-business policies and technology infrastructure investments, with a particular emphasis on artificial intelligence,” Longo wrote in a statement to The Crimson.

“Perhaps HMC’s managers noticed the underlying technology spending trends and believe these specific firms are well positioned in the year ahead,” he added.

HMC spokesperson Patrick S. McKiernan did not respond to a request for comment.

One of the most significant reductions came from Booking Holdings, where HMC cut its shares by 46 percent. Booking, which operates Booking.com and Kayak, was previously Harvard’s third-largest holding but has now dropped to its sixth largest position.

The company has historically drawn criticism for its business activities in Israeli settlements in the West Bank, leading to student activism calling for divestment.

HMC’s directly held public equities portfolio remains roughly the same size, with 16 companies, up from 15 last quarter.

HMC also fully sold positions in Snowflake, Samsara, and Q32 Bio, companies specializing in cloud computing, internet infrastructure, and biotechnology, respectively. These removals continue a shift away from high-growth, high-volatility firms in favor of more established companies.

“Snowflake is an expensive stock according to most valuation metrics, so perhaps HMC’s managers believed the proceeds from selling may be better deployed elsewhere,” Longo wrote.

The exit from Q32 Bio makes HMC’s $2.4 million holding in 10x Genomics Inc. its only directly held healthcare stock after two years of slashing healthcare investments.

New York University finance professor David L. Yermack ’85 cautioned that the disclosures only offer a partial view of the endowment’s holdings because they exclude private equity, hedge funds, and other alternative investments.

Yermack, a former Crimson managing editor, wrote in a statement that attempting to pick individual stocks rather than diversifying across the entire market runs counter to widely accepted financial principles.

“Trying to pick individual stocks that may outperform the market violates one of the central tenets of finance, the Efficient Market Hypothesis, which recommends simply diversifying a portfolio across the entire market in the belief that no one investor knows enough to out-think the wisdom of the crowd,” Yermack wrote.

—Staff writer Saketh Sundar can be reached at saketh.sundar@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @saketh_sundar.