“Superinvestor” is an informal name for a money manager with a long, public record of beating the market. The word comes from Warren Buffett’s 1984 essay “The Superinvestors of Graham-and-Doddsville.” Today people use it for managers such as Buffett, Bill Ackman and Michael Burry, whose holdings are followed closely every quarter.
The main way to see what these managers own is a public SEC filing called Form 13F. This guide explains how to use it, what it misses and why copying it is harder than it looks.
What a 13F is
Form 13F is a quarterly report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Any institutional investment manager with investment discretion over at least $100 million in “Section 13(f) securities” must file one (SEC Form 13F FAQ). Section 13(f) securities are mostly U.S.-listed stocks, plus some exchange-traded funds, convertible bonds and listed options. The SEC publishes the official list.
Each filing lists the manager’s long positions at the end of the quarter: the issuer, the number of shares and the market value. For a fuller walkthrough of the form, see what a 13F filing is and how to read a 13F.
The 45-day lag
A 13F is due within 45 days after the end of each calendar quarter, and the SEC does not grant extensions (SEC FAQ). In practice that puts filings around these dates:
| Quarter ends | Filing due around |
|---|---|
| March 31 | May 15 |
| June 30 | August 14 |
| September 30 | November 14 |
| December 31 | February 14 |
So when you read a 13F on its due date, the snapshot is already six weeks old. A position bought early in the quarter could be four and a half months old. A stock sold the day after the quarter ended still appears as a holding.
What a 13F misses
The form is narrow by design. It does not show:
- Short positions. The SEC tells filers not to include short positions, and not to net them against longs (SEC FAQ). A manager could be heavily short and look fully long.
- Options the manager wrote (sold). Only puts and calls the manager holds may be reported.
- Most non-U.S. stocks, private companies, bonds that are not on the list, cash, real estate and commodities.
- Prices paid. You see the quarter-end value, not the cost.
- Holdings under confidential treatment. A manager can ask the SEC to keep a position private for a time, usually while it is still buying.
Options deserve special care. On a 13F, a put or call is reported in terms of the shares underlying it, not the option itself (Form 13F instructions). A line showing $500 million of puts may reflect options that cost a small fraction of that. Our guide to what a 13F can’t tell you goes into more detail.
How to read quarter-to-quarter changes
A single 13F is a snapshot. The useful information is often in the change from the previous quarter. Look for:
- New positions. A stock that was not there last quarter. These get the most attention.
- Exits. A stock that was there last quarter and is now gone.
- Adds and trims. Changes in share count. Compare shares, not dollar value, because the value moves with the stock price even if the manager did nothing.
- Weight. A position’s share of the reported portfolio. A new stake at 0.2% of the portfolio is a very different signal from one at 15%.
Our 13F changes page lists the biggest new buys, adds, trims and exits each quarter across the funds we track, and each fund page on funds shows its own history.
Choosing whom to follow
Not every 13F filer is worth tracking. Thousands of managers file, from index fund giants to small advisers. A few traits make a filing more informative to read:
- Concentration. A manager who holds ten stocks tells you more with each line than one who holds two thousand.
- Low turnover. A manager who holds positions for years gives you time to study an idea before the filing goes stale.
- A stated approach. Managers who publish letters or explain their reasoning let you check whether a holding fits their usual style.
- Long-only stock funds. If most of a manager’s strategy runs through U.S. stocks they own outright, the 13F captures more of it. A fund that relies on shorts, credit or derivatives shows much less.
Index funds and very large asset managers are less useful for this purpose. Their 13Fs mostly reflect the market itself, not individual picks.
Why cloning is risky
“Cloning” means copying a famous investor’s holdings into your own portfolio. Some people do it on purpose. The risks are specific:
- You buy late. By the time the filing is public, the manager’s buying may have pushed the price up, and the manager may already be selling.
- You see part of the picture. A long stock may be half of a pair trade whose short side is invisible. A put may be a hedge for longs that a 13F does not show.
- Size and timing differ. A manager may build a position over many months at prices you cannot get.
- Different goals. A fund with locked-up capital, tax considerations or an activist plan can hold through drops that an individual might not.
- Survivorship. The managers who become famous are the ones whose bets worked. Their next bet is not guaranteed to.
None of this makes 13Fs useless. They are a good research starting point, a source of ideas to study and a record of how skilled managers allocate capital over time.
Examples
2022: a stock sold before the 13F came out. Pershing Square, Bill Ackman’s fund, bought about 3.1 million Netflix shares in January 2022 and sold the entire position on April 20, 2022, after a loss of roughly $400 million, CNN reported. Pershing’s 13F for the first quarter, filed in mid-May 2022, still listed about 3.1 million Netflix shares as of March 31. Anyone who copied that filing would have bought a stock the fund had already sold almost four weeks earlier.
2024: a holding kept confidential. Berkshire Hathaway’s 13F filed on May 15, 2024 revealed a stake of about 25.9 million Chubb shares, worth roughly $6.7 billion as of March 31, 2024, Kiplinger reported. Berkshire had started buying in the third quarter of 2023 and received permission to keep the position out of its public filings while it built the stake. For about two quarters, Berkshire’s public 13Fs did not show one of its large new holdings. See our guide to following the Berkshire portfolio.
2023: notional value versus money at risk. Michael Burry’s Scion Asset Management reported puts on the SPDR S&P 500 ETF and the Invesco QQQ Trust in its second-quarter 2023 13F with a combined notional value of about $1.6 billion, according to The Motley Fool. Notional value is the value of the shares underlying the options. The premium Scion actually paid was not disclosed and would have been much smaller. More in our Burry guide.
A practical routine
- Pick a short list of managers whose style you understand. Browse famous investors and funds.
- When a new 13F lands, read the changes before the full list.
- Check the date of any news the manager has made since quarter end. A letter, a TV interview or a Schedule 13D can update the picture.
- Follow the fund on WallStPal so new filings show up on your desk.
- Treat each idea as the start of your own research, not the end of it.
Where the data comes from
- 13F filings: SEC EDGAR full-text and company search
- Filing rules, deadlines and exclusions: SEC Form 13F FAQ
- Option reporting rules: Form 13F and instructions (PDF)
WallStPal reads 13F filings from EDGAR for the funds listed on funds and the quarterly 13F report.
Explain it like I’m 13
Imagine the best player on your basketball team had to post a photo of their sneaker collection four times a year. But they get to wait about six weeks before posting it.
By the time you see the photo, they might have sold some of those sneakers and bought new ones. The photo also doesn’t show the sneakers they borrowed, the ones they promised to sell to someone else, or how much they paid.
So if you run out and buy the same sneakers, you’re copying an old photo. It can give you good ideas about what a smart player likes, but it isn’t a live view of what they’re doing now.
Questions about this guide? Pal reads it with you and answers in plain English.
WallStPal explains public filings. Nothing here is investment advice. Editorial policy · Corrections