Commonfund on the Road: Insights from our Seattle Roundtable
Commonfund OCIO recently hosted a roundtable luncheon in Seattle, WA, for local nonprofit leaders. During our time together, we discussed how institutions can attain intergenerational equity in their...
The Most Overlooked Element of the OCIO Relationship
When properly implemented, outsourcing the investment of nonprofit assets can help institutions establish governance processes, manage a complex portfolio, and navigate operational complexity and...
Top 5 Ways OCIO Fees Mislead
Fees are frequently overemphasized by Investment Committees when evaluating an Outsourced Chief Investment Officer (“OCIO”). Committees often believe that fees are a quantifiable and tangible way to...
Top Ten Tips for Better RFPs
A tightly run RFP process can help ensure your organization will find an ideal investment partner to help you fulfill your organization’s mission. As the second installment of our blog series on the...
Should We Issue an Investment Manager RFP? 7 Key Considerations
Best practice for nonprofits is to issue a Request for Proposal (“RFP”) for an investment management partner every market cycle. Typically, that is at least every 7 to 10 years, or as it is...
5 Key Questions: Comparing Fees of OCIO Providers
The market for Outsourced Chief Investment Officer (“OCIO”) services has boomed over the last decade. Today, OCIO assets under management are by some estimates nearly $1.5 trillion, 2.5 times the...
Five Questions to Ask Your Advisor: Costs of Portfolio Management
Costs matter. With expectations for lower market returns over the coming years, every basis point of net performance is particularly important. Furthermore, the compounding effect of high fees can...
A Gap In Reality
With the release of the annual NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments (NCSE) comes the obligatory comparison of 1-year returns. “How did we do relative to the 12.2 percent average return” is a...
When Leaks Turn into Floods: Challenges Facing Higher Education
2017’s tax legislation is the latest in a growing list of challenges facing higher education. The new excise taxes on endowment earnings of the largest private universities, coupled with the...
A Primer on Outsourced Investment Management
Once seen primarily as a solution for small institutions with limited resources, outsourcing of the investment management function is now widespread, with a broad range of long-term investors –...
Top Ten Risks for Practicing CIOs
A Chief Investment Officer’s primary responsibility is to identify and clearly communicate his/her portfolio’s risks to his/her Board, Investment Committee and/or client(s). About eighteen months...
Deciding on an OCIO Provider: Three Factors to Consider
There are three main factors an institution will need to weigh in deciding if working with an OCIO provider is right for them. Those are: Degree of Discretion: What role do the institution’s board...
What is an OCIO?
Outsourced investment management, once primarily a solution for small institutions with limited resources, is now used by a broad range of long-term investors. When properly implemented, outsourcing...
Six Key Questions To Ask OCIO Providers
“Outsourced CIO” (or OCIO) is a term that might not be familiar to many. In the past it has been defined as a traditional consulting model in which the process of interviewing potential investment...
5 Things to Consider When Choosing an OCIO
Nearly all CFOs and investment committees consider it. And more than ever are acting upon it: investigating the possibility of an Outsourced CIO (OCIO) to manage their institution’s investments. The...