Cresset Asset Management Q4 2025: $23.7B Multi-Family Office

Cresset Asset Management, LLC is a Chicago-based multi-family office and registered investment advisor that filed a Q4 2025 Form 13F-HR reporting $23.73 billion in US-listed equity holdings. The book reads unlike any conventional active equity manager's 13F. The top position is Arista Networks at $2.71 billion and 11.81% of portfolio — an extreme single-stock concentration typically associated with founder-family trusts. The second and third positions are S&P 500 ETFs (SPY at 10.84% and IVV at 6.87% — combined 17.71% beta-sleeve exposure). Behind these sit a tail of individual-stock positions reflecting Cresset's multi-family-office structure, where individual client portfolios produce diverse holdings aggregated into a single 13F reporting vehicle.

Cresset serves approximately 1,500 ultra-high-net-worth families across the US. The firm runs concentrated equity portfolios tailored to individual client risk profiles, which produces the unusual 13F shape: a small number of large single-name positions (often reflecting individual founder-client concentrations) plus broad ETF allocation (beta-sleeve management for client portfolios that mandate market-tracking exposure) plus a long tail of incremental single-stock positions.

The book at a glance

$23.73 billion total AUM. 500 long positions. WhaleScore 65.25 — placing Cresset below the elite smart-money tier because the 13F structure reflects accommodation of individual client mandates rather than discretionary stock-picking conviction. The score is structurally lower for multi-family-office filers because the WhaleScore methodology rewards concentrated active discretion rather than client-driven aggregation.

The Arista 11.81% concentration

The largest single-name position is Arista Networks (ANET) at $2.71 billion. The 11.81% portfolio weight is the kind of single-name concentration typical of family-trust or single-client mandates. Cresset is a multi-family-office structure, so the position most likely reflects a single major client's founder-equity or executive-compensation-driven concentrated stake.

Multi-family-office structures often manage individual founder-clients who have substantial personal exposure to a specific company. The client directs the firm to manage that concentrated position outside their primary holding (often as part of an estate-planning, charitable-giving, or generational wealth-transfer framework). The position appears on the firm's 13F because the firm has discretionary management authority over the position, even though the underlying economic interest belongs to a single client.

The 11.81% Arista concentration suggests a single Arista-related client (founder, executive, or family member) directs Cresset to manage a position of approximately $2.71 billion. The position is meaningful in absolute terms but does not represent Cresset's house view on Arista — it represents one client's strategic concentration.

The SPY + IVV beta sleeve

The second and third positions are the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV) and the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY). Combined: $4.07 billion or 17.71% of portfolio. This is unusual for a 13F that lists active equity positions, but it reflects Cresset's institutional accommodation of client mandates that require S&P 500 tracking exposure. The ETF positions serve as:

• Beta sleeve for risk-managed accounts that need broad-market exposure.
• Parking position for new client capital ahead of active portfolio deployment.
• Tax-aware overlay reducing tracking error from sector concentration without forcing individual-name dilution.

The 17.71% ETF weight is much higher than any active manager would deploy. Cresset is filling client-mandate requirements rather than expressing stock-picking discretion.

The other top 10

• Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (RSP) at $821M / 3.58% — Another ETF position, providing equal-weighted S&P exposure as a beta-sleeve diversifier.
• Apple (AAPL) at $503M / 2.19% — Standard mega-cap tech position, slight underweight versus S&P 500 weight of ~6.1%.
• Erie Indemnity (ERIE) at $501M / 2.18% — Specialty insurance holding company. Smaller position but unusual at 2%+ portfolio weight; likely another single-client concentrated holding.
• iShares MSCI EAFE ETF (IEFA) at $485M / 2.11% — International developed-market beta sleeve.
• Meta Platforms (META) at $405M / 1.76% — Mega-cap tech.
• Reddit (RDDT) at $390M / 1.70% — Recent IPO, possibly reflecting concentrated client exposure.

The mix of single-stock concentrations (ANET, ERIE, possibly RDDT) plus ETF beta sleeves (SPY, IVV, RSP, IEFA) plus standard mega-cap tech positions is unmistakably a multi-family-office 13F shape.

The top 10 vs the rest

The top 10 absorbs approximately 53% of AUM. The remaining 47% distributes across the 490 tail positions reflecting individual client holdings, model portfolio allocations, and incremental positions. The structure differs from concentrated-active managers (where top 10 absorbs 25-50% and the tail is structural diversification) and from index-aware managers (where positions hew close to benchmark weights).

AUM trajectory

Cresset reported 13F AUM has grown steadily through 2024-2025 as the firm has added family-office clients. The structure is stable: concentrated client positions at the top, ETF beta sleeves in the middle tier, and broad diversification in the tail.

What this 13F tells institutional readers

1. Don't read multi-family-office 13Fs as discretionary stock-picker output. Cresset's 11.81% ANET position reflects a single client's concentration, not the firm's house view on Arista. Following this position as a trade signal misreads the structural source.
2. The ETF allocation is client-mandate accommodation. SPY + IVV + RSP combined 21.29% of portfolio in S&P 500 ETFs is institutional accommodation of client risk-management requirements, not active investment discretion.
3. The mid-tier positions (ERIE, RDDT) are also likely client-driven concentrations. Watch which names persist quarter-over-quarter at the 2%+ weight level — those are likely structural client positions rather than rotating discretionary picks.

How to identify a multi-family-office 13F

Five fingerprints help spot this category:

1. Filer name contains 'Family Office', 'Asset Management LLC' (without specific stock-picking mandate), or geographic markers like 'Chicago', 'New York', 'Greenwich' that signal RIA structure.
2. Top position is an unusual single-name concentration (10%+ weight) in a non-mega-cap stock.
3. S&P 500 ETFs (SPY, IVV, VOO) appear in top 5-10 at meaningful weights (5%+).
4. Position list mixes concentrated single-name bets, ETFs, and standard mega-caps without a unifying philosophy.
5. WhaleScore typically falls in the 60-70 range (below pure active-manager elite tier) because client-mandate accommodation dilutes the discretionary-conviction signal.

What to track

1. Cresset Q1 2026 13F. Watch whether the 11.81% ANET position holds (suggesting structural client mandate) or compresses (suggesting client-driven liquidation or reallocation). Track via the institutional signals feed.
2. The SPY + IVV weights. A shift in beta-sleeve weight signals either new institutional inflows or rebalancing toward more active discretionary positioning.
3. The mid-tier concentrations. ERIE at 2.18% and RDDT at 1.70% are unusual weights for diversified-active mandates; both likely reflect specific client positions worth tracking.

Cresset Asset Management's Q4 2025 13F is one of the clearest examples of multi-family-office 13F shape at scale in the US institutional universe. For more on reading multi-family-office and RIA 13F filings versus discretionary-active fund filings, see our explainer hub.

Source: SEC Form 13F-HR filed by Cresset Asset Management, LLC (CIK 0001761013) for the period ending 2025-12-31; available via EDGAR — Cresset filer index.