Always finding that "bright spot" when it comes to the shit economy, 'eh, Globe?
Yeah, it's not so bad -- especially if you are a rich Jew building a mansion!!!
"In dim year, 2 Mass. funds shine bright" by Kimberly Blanton, Globe Staff | August 8, 2008
Massachusetts again has some of the best money managers in the world. But unless you're a public employee or the parent of a Harvard student, you won't benefit much from this tremendous talent.
Harvard University's endowment, already the nation's largest university endowment, earned 7 to 8 percent over the past year, a period when stock markets tanked and many investment professionals lost substantial sums. Harvard's performance, first reported yesterday by The Wall Street Journal and confirmed by a financial industry source briefed on the school's returns, puts it at the top of an elite group of institutional investors.
Strong results from such alternative investments allowed Harvard to offset losses in traditional stocks and bonds and post an overall profit for the year. A spokesman for Harvard Management Co., which manages the university's $34.9 billion endowment, declined to comment.
Another elite achiever clocked in with a strong record this week, though not nearly as strong as Harvard's: The Massachusetts state pension fund reported that despite all the market turmoil in the past 12 months, the $51 billion fund lost just 1.8 percent for the fiscal year ended June 30. That's better than 80 percent of comparable funds.
Unimpressed? Massachusetts' peer group of public pension funds posted a median 4.36 percent decline. And as individual investors know well from their recent retirement account statements, the general investment world suffered even larger losses. The Standard & Poor's 500 index for the period was down around 13 percent.
And for that, the whole office GAVE OUT BONUSES -- even though the fund LOST MONEY!
That's TAXPAYER $$$, folks!!!!
See: The Massachusetts Piggy-Bank
Massachusetts and Harvard were able to post better results because they have access to investments average investors generally do not: hedge funds, commodities, complicated derivatives, large real estate portfolios, and other unusual assets such as timberland.
Translation: It's a shell game.
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