Gates sells US$940M of CN Rail stock, reduces stake to 9%
Bill Gates sold about US$940 million of Canadian National Railway Co. shares, trimming one of the largest holdings of the investment firm that controls his US$117 billion personal fortune.
Cascade Investment unloaded roughly 12 per cent of its shares in the Montreal-based company from April 27 to May 12, leaving it with a stake of about nine per cent or US$6.8 billion, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission
filing.
Cascade has been reducing its ownership of the Canadian railway since at least May 2021, when it still owned roughly 13 per cent of the company. One of Cascade's investment managers, Justin Howell, has served on Canadian National's board since last year.
Canadian National shares have slid 7.3 per cent this year after rising steadily from pandemic-era lows in March 2020. They closed down 1.5 per cent at $142.92 in Toronto on Friday.
Kirkland, Wash.-based Cascade also owns a Us$14.1-billion stake in Republic Services Inc., a waste-management company, as well as US$9.7 billion of Deere & Co. stock. Cascade's largest holding is thought to be US$26.9 billion worth of shares in Microsoft Corp., the software company Gates founded. Gates stopped reporting his Microsoft shares in 2020 after stepping down from its board.
Gates, 66, the world's fourth-richest person according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index,
recently got into a spat with Elon Musk after he accused Gates of damaging his environmental credibility by shorting Tesla Inc. In an interview with the BBC this month, Gates appeared to acknowledge that he had indeed shorted shares of the electric-vehicle maker, saying that he was merely diversifying his investments.
Gates's former wife, Melinda French Gates, 57, received stock of companies including Canadian National, Deere and Autonation Inc. from Cascade after the couple
announced a divorce last year. She's since sold a large portion of the railway holding, including US$467 million of shares in December.