Harvard's Endowment Cut Nvidia by 34% and Opened a $198.5M AMD Stake

Harvard Management Company trimmed its Nvidia position by 34.3% and built a new $198.5 million stake in Advanced Micro Devices during the third quarter, according to the 13F filing submitted Friday.

The filing shows 324,400 AMD shares worth $198.5 million as of September 30. Harvard reported zero AMD shares at the end of June, so this is a fresh position, not an add-on. The Nvidia cut left 517,551 shares, and the portfolio mix flipped: AMD now sits at 5.0% of reported holdings versus 3.0% for Nvidia.

A 13F won't tell you when the trades happened or at what prices. It's a September 30 snapshot, and Harvard hasn't explained the reasoning.

Has the swap paid off so far?

On paper, yes. Nvidia closed Friday at $162.85, down 28.7% from its September 30 close — a slide that followed a week in which the board reportedly weighed removing longtime CEO Jensen Huang. AMD closed at $534.06, off 12.7% from its own quarter-end mark.

That means the new mix has held up better than the old one would have. By calculation, Harvard's AMD shares would be worth about $173.2 million at Friday's prices, and the remaining Nvidia stake about $84.3 million — assuming nothing changed since the filing.

What else moved in the portfolio?

The clearest signal: Harvard stayed in AI chips, it just repositioned within them.

• Taiwan Semiconductor ADRs rose 85% to a stake worth $616.5 million. TSM manufactures for both Nvidia and AMD.
• Microsoft got cut 41% to $118.7 million — a deeper trim than Nvidia's, and it leaves AMD as the larger holding.
• Alphabet Class A shares were cut by 62%.

Why does the AMD-versus-Nvidia math matter?

Scale drives the argument. Last quarter, AMD's data center sales rose 97% to $8.546 billion, with Anthropic, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI and Oracle bringing their first Helios racks online. Management expects 2027 revenue to grow more than 80%.

Nvidia posted $89.023 billion of data center revenue in its latest quarter at a 75.0% non-GAAP gross margin, and it expects roughly 70% growth in fiscal 2028. But AMD is valued at $875.90 billion against Nvidia's $3.93 trillion — roughly one-quarter the size — so each new customer moves AMD's growth rate more.

Lisa Su put it plainly: "demand is higher than supply." AMD's CEO said that as data center is expected to account for more than 80% of 2027 revenue.

What are the risks on each side?

AMD's problem is price. It trades at a trailing P/E of 202x, versus 33 for Nvidia. Free cash flow came in at just $554 million last quarter while inventory climbed to $11.463 billion.

Nvidia's test arrives sooner. The company is expected to report after the close on Tuesday, November 17 — the date is unconfirmed. Guidance calls for $108.0 billion in revenue with gross margins near 74.0%. If Nvidia hits that number and keeps Vera Rubin on schedule, the selloff likely overshot. Demand looks like the smaller concern: in August the CFO called guidance "a supply-constrained outlook."

How much weight should the filing carry?

Less than AMD's own results. The 13F covers less than 6% of Harvard's $68 billion endowment, so this is a window into a slice, not the whole book.

For investors who like the demand story but not the chip multiple, Taiwan Semiconductor offers exposure to both designers regardless of which one gains share. The power, cooling and networking suppliers behind AI data center buildouts are another route to the same demand.