This report suggests preconditions to the selection of appropriate benchmarks and the flaws inherent even in careful selection. Discrete sections for public market investments, marketable alternatives, private equity, and real estate are included.
This short paper reviews asset class valuations and offers summary asset allocation recommendations.
The reasons most commonly cited for the seemingly inexorable slide toward the financial abyss are the relentless competition for high position in college rankings such as those invented by U.S. News & World Report; competition from taxpayer-subsidized public universities; and the inclination of even relatively affluent parents to bargain for more financial aid. Most at…
Our data suggest that colleges with proportionally more endowment enjoy stronger pricing power and greater capacity to bridge the widening gap between operating revenues and expenditures. At the same time, the abrupt end to the sustained 1990s bull market increases the prospect that volatility in investment returns may put endowment support of operations at greater…
A discussion of how to think about and measure risk at two key stages in the investment management process: when constructing a coherent long-term asset allocation policy, and when implementing and evaluating that policy once developed.
This short paper addresses a range of investment planning topics including deflation hedging, valuation models, and consolidation in the investment management industry.
An evaluation of common mistakes made by investment committees including overrating the importance of recent information, oversimplification of complex issues, extrapolation of past results into the future, and diffusion of responsibility.
This paper advises investors to carefully examine the risk, return, and correlation characteristics of their portfolios against those on which policy allocations are based; and rebalance from equities to bonds, from growth to value, and from financial to real assets.
A working paper that proposes an economic—as distinct from accounting—definition of endowment, along with discussion of the strategic importance of endowment.
An in-depth look at endowment risk, return, and spending.