Endowments plunge at Ivy League unis - September 11, 2009
Harvard, Yale and other elite US universities announced this week just how many billions of dollars they lost from their endowments last year.
Harvard's endowment tumbled 27.3%, shedding nearly $11 billion — an amount that exceeds the total endowment of every other university except for Yale, Stanford, Princeton, and the University of Texas System. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based school's decline was the first loss in seven years and the biggest in four decades. Harvard's portfolio now sits at around $26 billion. (NYTimes)
Yale saw its endowment plummet 30% — worse than the 25% forecast — to $16 billion in the fiscal year that ended on June 30. The drop means that the New Haven, Connecticut, university will face annual deficits of $150 million for the next four years. On top of 7.5% reductions in staff and non-salary expenses already announced for the current academic year, Yale plans to push for another 5% in non-salary cuts. (Wall Street Journal)
"With the exception of financial aid, no area of expenditure will be immune from close scrutiny," Yale President Richard Levin and Provost Peter Salovey wrote in a statement. The administrators singled out faculty recruitment and building construction as two areas that are expected to slow down.
Rounding out most of the rest of the Ivy League schools: Columbia University in New York’s endowment declined in value by 21%, to $5.7 billion (Wall Street Journal); Providence, Rhode Island-based Brown's endowment investments dropped 23%, while the total fund dipped 27%, leaving the school with $2 billion (Bloomberg); and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia announced last month that its endowment lopped off 15.7%, falling to $5.3 billion (Bloomberg).
Image: Wall Street Journal
