Data sourced from Dakota Marketplace, the global LP and GP intelligence platform trusted by thousands of investment professionals. Learn More | Book a Demo
What Is a 13F Filing?
A 13F is a quarterly SEC filing that shows exactly what a large institutional investor owns: which stocks, how many shares, and how much they're worth (SEC.gov, Frequently Asked Questions About Form 13F). It's one of the few public windows into what hedge funds, pensions, RIAs, and endowments are actually buying and selling.
It's also more limited than most people assume. Here's what it covers, and what it doesn't.
Who Has to File
Any manager exercising investment discretion over $100 million or more in "Section 13(f) securities" must file. The threshold is based on fair market value at any month-end during the year, not total AUM (SEC.gov).
That covers:
- Hedge funds
- RIAs and equity managers
- Pension funds and endowments
- Family offices
- Banks, insurers, and broker-dealers
- Foreign managers using U.S. means of commerce (Finrep, "13F Filing Deadlines 2026," July 2026)
Once a manager crosses the threshold, the obligation sticks around: that year's Q4, plus the following year's first three quarters, even if holdings later dip back below $100 million (SEC.gov).
What's Covered
A 13F only includes securities on the SEC's official 13(f) list, over 17,500 of them, updated quarterly (netacn.com, "What Is Form 13F and Who Must File It?", January 2026):
Included: U.S.-listed equities, ETFs, ADRs, REITs, closed-end funds, BDCs, and certain options, warrants, and convertible debt.
Excluded: Private equity, private credit, direct real estate, short positions, and most fixed income. Mutual funds aren't required, though some managers report them voluntarily.
When Filings Are Due
45 days after each quarter ends. For 2026:
- Q4: February 17
- Q1: May 15
- Q2: August 14
- Q3: November 16
(SEC.gov; Finrep, July 2026). No extensions.
The Catch
By the time a 13F is public, it's already up to 45 days old. And it's just a list: no contact name, no fund mandate, no sense of why the position matters. Turning that list into a lead takes more work than most teams have time for.
How Dakota Marketplace Fills the Gap
Dakota ingests every 13F daily and enriches it before it reaches a client:
- Tagged by asset class, sub-asset class, strategy, and vehicle type, across a taxonomy of 19 asset classes and 236 sub-asset classes
- Matched to a known allocator profile
- Linked to confirmed, active contacts
- Connected to other data Dakota already tracks, including Form ADV, Form D, and public pension data
- Delivered into Salesforce, HubSpot, Backstop, or DealCloud
The sub-asset class depth is what makes it usable for prospecting, not just reference. Private credit gets split into direct lending versus structured credit; U.S. equities into large-cap core, blend, and growth. An institution already holding a position in your asset class is a warmer conversation than a cold call based on AUM alone.
Fund managers can filter Dakota's holdings data by firm, AUM, asset class, sub-asset class, product structure, and filing period to find that overlap. The same data works as competitive intelligence too, showing which vehicles allocators are rotating into or out of quarter over quarter.
Put the Data to Work
A 13F is a useful, legally required snapshot: 45 days stale, and stripped of contacts or context. Dakota Marketplace turns the same public filings into a name, a fit assessment, and a reason to call.
Book a demo to see your target segment's holdings data in Dakota Marketplace.
