Harvard's high-paid star investor leaving

[kuozzman]

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2005/01/12/harvards_high_paid_star_investor_leaving/

Jack Meyer, who produced stellar investment results for Harvard's endowment but faced criticism for the multimillion-dollar paychecks he and his money managers earned, said yesterday he and some of his employees were leaving to start a private investment firm.

In the nearly 15 years Meyer was president of Harvard Management, the university's money management arm, the endowment grew from $4.7 billion to $22.6 billion. Over the past decade only two major universities -- Yale and Duke -- earned higher returns.

"Jack was one of the greatest assets Harvard had," said Tim Peterson, president of Regiment Capital, a Boston investment firm that manages some of Harvard's money.

But Meyer made as much news for his disputed compensation policies as for his investment prowess. Because Harvard manages a significant portion of its money internally -- a rarity among universities -- Meyer insisted he had to pay his investment managers the kind of salaries they could earn in the private sector. Two years ago, Harvard's top two managers made $35 million each. Meyer himself earned $7.2 million last year.

[Rabrrrrrr]

1. Well, if you want the good people, you gotta pay for it

Asking for less than 1% of the yearly earnings as salary is hardly awful, in my book.

Too bad they kept bitching at him for earning what he's worth.

[barackmyworld]

2. hah

The endowment appears to serve little purpose. There are so many ways that they could better student life (like 24 hour shuttles because a lot of students have been assaulted, etc) and the money just sits there. We have 23 billion dollars and our dining hall cut tomatoes from the menu when they were a couple cents more expensive.