KEYE Austin – (AP) The number of North American colleges with endowments topping $1 billion has jumped to 56, a new study says, with nine schools joining the elite club in what was an average year for university investments overall.
Harvard remained the richest, with $25.5 billion, followed by Yale with $15.2 billion.
The wealthiest per student was Rockefeller University in New York, which has no undergraduates, followed by Olin College, a small engineering school in Massachusetts that opened in 2002 and pays full tuition for all students.
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Over the last decade, billionaire colleges have earned 12 percent per year, compared to 7.9 percent for colleges under $25 million.
The reason is that richer colleges can afford more sophisticated financial advice, and to make riskier bets. The billionaire colleges had 21.7 percent of their endowments invested in hedge funds last year, compared to 2.4 percent for the poorest schools. They also invested higher percentages in private equity, venture capital, real estate and natural resources.
