Articles
Giving Has Been Growing
Charitable Disbursements up 40% in the Past Five Years As the chart below shows, private foundations have increased their annual philanthropic support (green line) by nearly 40%, from $54 billion (FY2013) to $73 billion (Most Recent), an increase of $19 billion per year. Also growing at a rapid pace have been incoming contributions (blue line) with new contributions … [Read more...] about Giving Has Been Growing
The Institutional Approach
Setting A Course In a related article, Who Controls The Money?, we discussed different approaches to managing foundation assets. In this article we discuss the "Institutional Approach". Of the 45,000 foundations we estimate that only about 5% follow the institutional approach described below that is more common in endowments. It bears noting that the 2,000 or so … [Read more...] about The Institutional Approach
Who Controls The Money
Setting A Course The title of this article, Who Controls The Money?, is intentionally provocative. In the foundation world it is an easy answer, the 150,000 trustees that control the $1.2 trillion in assets and $80 billion in annual giving. A more interesting question might be "How do foundations differ in their approaches to managing their assets?" We have categorized … [Read more...] about Who Controls The Money
Benchmark Limbo. How Low Can You Go?
Custom Benchmarks In a previous article, Who Controls The Money?, we explored the case that a large part of investment performance is controlled by creating and implementing an investment policy statement (IPS). One factor we highlighted is the use of custom benchmarks. Custom benchmarks are largely the result of the increase in alternative assets. In effect the argument … [Read more...] about Benchmark Limbo. How Low Can You Go?
US Foundations Assets Hit $1 Trillion for the First Time!
The Trillion Dollar Milestone Over the past several years, US foundation assets have been steadily climbing. The combination of strong financial markets and substantial gifts over the past five years propelled total assets of US foundations to just over $1 trillion in fiscal 2017, breaking the trillion dollar mark for the first time ever. More importantly, grant … [Read more...] about US Foundations Assets Hit $1 Trillion for the First Time!