By Timothy J. Keating
For many years, the Ivy League has been known for its traditions, its gothic buildings, and, until recently, the mystique of its mammoth-sized endowments that consistently generated incredibly high returns in bull and bear markets alike. Ivy League and other large endowments, weighing in at billions of dollars, were able to achieve these extraordinary results by following what is often called the “Yale Model” for endowments developed by Yale University’s Chief Investment Officer, David Swensen, under which they invested heavily in alternatives such as private equity and hedge funds. Until very recently, it seemed to some that the Yale Model was invincible.
