--- title: "Gotham Q1 2026: Why Greenblatt's Top Holding Is an ETF" type: research slug: gotham-asset-management-q1-2026-spy-etf-long-short-book canonical_url: https://13finsight.com/research/gotham-asset-management-q1-2026-spy-etf-long-short-book published_at: 2026-05-23T07:14:14.443Z updated_at: 2026-05-23T07:14:18.273Z author: Marcus Chen author_title: Senior Market Analyst author_url: https://13finsight.com/authors/marcus-chen word_count: 788 locale: en source: 13F Insight --- # Gotham Q1 2026: Why Greenblatt's Top Holding Is an ETF > Gotham Asset Management's largest 13F position is an S&P 500 ETF at 21% of the book - a window into how a long-short value manager's filing differs from a long-only fund's. Open the 13F of Gotham Asset Management — the firm co-founded by famed value investor Joel Greenblatt — and the first thing you see is not a value stock. It is the SPDR S&P 500 ETF, at $5.86 billion, a full 21.3% of the $27.5 billion long book. For a manager synonymous with the value-screening "magic formula," a single index fund as the dominant holding can look baffling. It isn't a contradiction; it is a window into how a long-short manager's public filing works, and why you have to read it differently from a long-only fund's. The key fact a 13F does not show is the short side. Gotham runs long-short strategies, and Form 13F discloses only the long positions — individual stocks plus, crucially, the index ETFs the firm uses to manage net market exposure. The large S&P 500 ETF position is best understood as part of that exposure-management toolkit, not as a high-conviction bet that the index will rise. Everything below it tells the more familiar Gotham story. The ETF sleeve versus the stock book Index products cluster at the top of the filing. Beyond the flagship S&P 500 ETF at 21.3%, the book holds a second S&P 500 tracker (about 2.18%) and smaller positions in additional broad-market and value ETFs. Together these index instruments anchor the reported portfolio and explain why Gotham's 13F looks, at the top, more like an asset allocator's than a stock-picker's. The individual equities sit just beneath. Apple was raised 84% in share-count terms to $729.2 million (2.65%), and Nvidia was boosted 40% to $720.8 million (2.62%) — the two largest single-stock positions and the clearest individual conviction moves of the quarter. Amazon, by contrast, was trimmed 20%, with Alphabet and Snowflake rounding out the named holdings. A diversified value tail The structure becomes clearer when you account for the rest of the book. Gotham reports 500 positions — the platform's maximum — and roughly two-thirds of the portfolio sits outside the top ten, spread across a long tail of individual names. That breadth is the systematic value engine at work: Gotham's screens rank a wide universe of stocks on quality and valuation, and the firm holds many of them in modest size rather than concentrating in a few. So the filing is really two portfolios stacked together — an index-ETF overlay that manages market exposure, and a broad, rules-driven book of individual value longs. Reading the single biggest line (the S&P 500 ETF) as the firm's "view" would miss both. A steadily growing book Unlike many filers whose reported value swings with the market, Gotham's has grown almost monotonically. The reported 13F value has climbed from about $7.72 billion in mid-2024 to $27.5 billion in the first quarter of 2026 — a more than threefold increase, up 18.9% in the latest quarter alone. For a long-short manager, rising reported longs can reflect asset growth, higher gross exposure, or a larger index overlay; the steadiness of the climb, with the position count pinned at 500, points to a firm scaling its strategy rather than making episodic bets. It is a reminder that for some filers, the trend in reported value says more about flows and structure than about market calls. What it signals For investors who track institutional positioning, Gotham's first-quarter filing is a useful lesson in reading a filer in context. The headline — a value legend's biggest holding is an S&P 500 ETF — dissolves once you understand the long-short structure: the ETF manages exposure, the 500-name tail is the value book, and the only clean single-stock signals are the deliberate adds to Apple and Nvidia. The actionable takeaway is methodological: before reading any 13F, know what kind of strategy produced it, because a long-short manager's filing hides as much as it shows. FAQ Why is an S&P 500 ETF Gotham's largest 13F holding?Gotham runs long-short strategies and uses broad-market index ETFs to manage net market exposure. The large S&P 500 ETF position reflects that exposure management, not a high-conviction bet that the index will rise. What does Gotham's 13F not show?The short side. Form 13F discloses only long positions, so a long-short manager's filing omits its shorts entirely — meaning the reported book is an incomplete picture of the firm's actual market exposure. What individual stocks did Gotham add in Q1 2026?Apple, raised 84% in share-count terms to $729.2 million, and Nvidia, boosted 40% to $720.8 million, were the largest single-stock positions and the clearest individual conviction moves. Amazon was trimmed 20%. How many positions does Gotham hold?It reports 500 positions, the maximum the platform displays, with roughly two-thirds of the portfolio spread across a long tail of individual value names beneath the index-ETF and megacap top holdings. ## FAQ ### Why is an S&P 500 ETF Gotham's largest 13F holding? Gotham runs long-short strategies and uses broad-market index ETFs to manage net market exposure. The large S&P 500 ETF position reflects that exposure management, not a high-conviction bet that the index will rise. ### What does Gotham's 13F not show? The short side. Form 13F discloses only long positions, so a long-short manager's filing omits its shorts entirely - meaning the reported book is an incomplete picture of the firm's actual market exposure. ### What individual stocks did Gotham add in Q1 2026? Apple, raised 84% in share-count terms to $729.2 million, and Nvidia, boosted 40% to $720.8 million, were the largest single-stock positions and the clearest individual conviction moves. Amazon was trimmed 20%. ### How many positions does Gotham hold? It reports 500 positions, the maximum the platform displays, with roughly two-thirds of the portfolio spread across a long tail of individual value names beneath the index-ETF and megacap top holdings. --- Source: 13F Insight — https://13finsight.com/research/gotham-asset-management-q1-2026-spy-etf-long-short-book Author: Marcus Chen — https://13finsight.com/authors/marcus-chen Last updated: 2026-05-23T07:14:18.273Z