Bad Bet
Last year was a disaster. While the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index returned almost 12 percent, Mindich’s flagship fund lost 9.4 percent, in part from a wrong-way bet on Japanese equities, according to people familiar with the matter. As the market surged this year, the fund remained flat. Assets under management slipped to around $7 billion. A spokesman for Mindich declined to comment.
In January, the Harvard endowment sent its redemption notice, according to people familiar with the matter. They didn’t say how much money Harvard pulled but said the school retained a stake. Harvard had been considering the move even before the arrival of Narvekar, according to one of these people. On March 23, Mindich announced he was shutting down and returning capital to the remaining investors.
Laurence Siegel, former head of research at the Ford Foundation, said the rise and fall of Mindich’s fund shows that Harvard needs to establish more distance from those connected to the university.
Over the long term, Siegel said, “These special relationships haven’t really paid off.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.