虽然像哈佛和耶鲁这样的大学所拥有的捐赠基金规模甚至超过了某些小国的经济总量，但当前的牛市环境却让那些资源有限、缺乏庞大捐赠网络的小型院校也能取得不逊于它们的市场投资业绩。
While universities like Harvard and Yale carry around endowments that are larger than some small countries' economies, this bull market has provided an environment in which their market performance can be rivaled by nimble collegiate counterparts lacking their vast resources and donor networks.
耶鲁大学拥有440亿美元的捐赠基金，这一数额与尼泊尔的GDP水平相当。截至2025年6月，该基金在过去十年中的年化收益率达到了9.4%——这一成绩虽不错，却仍不及德克萨斯州阿比林市的私立基督教大学——阿比林基督教大学。后者同期年化收益率高达11.4%，最近其资产规模也成功突破10亿美元大关。
Yale University's $44 billion endowment, a close comp to Nepal's GDP, has returned 9.4% over the past decade through June 2025 — good, but not good enough to beat Abilene Christian University, a private Christian university in Abilene, Texas, and its 11.4% over the same period, which recently led it to surpass the $1 billion in assets milestone.
据该校提供的数据显示，截至2026年6月，阿比林基督教大学十年期投资的年化收益率已升至13.6%，而由全球70%股票与30%债券构成的基准指数同期收益率仅为9.1%。这并非只是某一年的出色表现：截至2026年6月，该校20年期投资的年均收益率也达到了10.9%，远高于6.8%的基准水平。
Through June 2026, ACU's 10-year return climbed to 13.6%, against 9.1% for a benchmark of 70% global stocks and 30% bonds, according to data provided by the school. But it's more than just a good year: ACU's 20-year 10.9% average through June 2026 is well above its 6.8% benchmark.
对众多院校而言，每年9月至11月正是公布财政年度投资业绩的时期，不过相关信息并不会同时全部发布。例如，耶鲁大学至今尚未公布2026年度的投资数据。由美国大学财务管理协会与Commonfund联合开展的年度捐赠基金调研报告，也将在2027年2月才会公布2026财年的相关业绩数据。
For many schools, this is the period (September to November) when fiscal year investment performance is released, but not all information is released at the same time. Yale, for instance, has yet to publish its 2026 numbers. The most-cited annual study of hundreds of endowments, the NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments, will be published in February 2027 for FY 2026 performance data.
负责管理阿比林基督教大学投资组合的校内投资机构——阿比林基督教投资管理公司的总裁兼首席投资官乔·李指出，多年前该校做出的一系列规模虽小却明智稳妥的决策，经过时间的积累最终产生了显著成效。
Joe Lee, president and chief investment officer of ACIMCO (Abilene Christian Investment Management Company), a university-controlled investment company that manages the school's portfolio, said that many small, but good, sound decisions early on, years ago, have compounded over time.
“我们采取的都是其他捐赠基金也会采用的常规做法，”李说道。他提到的投资策略以股票投资为核心，注重超长期投资规划，同时注重挑选优秀的管理人员并实行多元化投资手段。
"We do the standard stuff that other endowments do," Lee said, pointing to a philosophy that is equity-oriented, incorporates super long time horizons, and employs good managers and diversification techniques.
不过李还指出，规模较小其实也能成为优势，“只要能充分利用小规模基金所带来的种种便利条件。”规模较大的基金则往往设有资金门槛，低于该门槛的项目便不值得它们投入精力去运作。
But he also said being small can be an advantage, "if you lean into the advantages of a smaller endowment," Lee said. Larger endowments have fund-sized thresholds below which they are not worth their time.
“对于规模达1亿美元的基金项目，我们也会充满热情并切实取得成果，”李说道。
"We can look at a $100 million fund and get excited about it and get something material," Lee said.
截至2026年6月30日这一最新财政年度末，ACU的基金规模略超10亿美元；而根据耶鲁大学最新披露的数据（2025财年），其基金规模则高达441亿美元。耶鲁大学方面未对相关询问作出回应。
ACU's endowment of a little over $1 billion, as of the end of its most recent fiscal year on June 30, 2026, compares to a Yale endowment valued at $44.1 billion in Yale's most recent disclosure (FY 2025).
虽然在高等教育领域并非独此一例，但ACIMCO模式对基金组合管理而言确实是一大助力。
Yale did not respond to requests for comment.
“我们的架构十分出色，”李说道。他补充道，由大学自身设立的管理公司而非外部机构来负责基金运作，使得学校能够制定更为长远的投资规划。
ACIMCO, while not unique in higher education, is an asset to portfolio management.
这一模式还能提升学校的决策效率。李认为，这要归功于专门设立的投资委员会，以及他口中那些富有远见且思想开明、能在关键时刻做出理性判断的董事会成员。他强调，良好的治理机制以及不盲目追求短期收益同样至关重要。
"We have a great structure," Lee said, adding that having a separate university-owned management company — as opposed to an outside firm — manage the school's portfolio allows it to have a much longer time horizon.
尽管李列举了诸多优势，但据专门为高校及基金会物色外部首席投资官的Leita Advisory公司创始人安娜·邓恩·塔布克介绍，自十年前兴起以来，聘请外部机构担任首席投资官的模式在过去五年里愈发流行。“内部设立首席投资官的成本高昂；即便学校负担得起，单靠一人也难以胜任所有工作。他们需要配备完整的团队，还需要外部机构协助进行管理人筛选与尽职调查，”她说道。
It also lets the school move faster, Lee said, crediting a dedicated investment committee and a board he described as forward-thinking and open-minded, with critical thinking at the right moments. Good governance matters, he said, as does not going after short-term results.
聘请外部首席投资管理机构还能让各高校将资金集中起来，从而具备与大型基金抗衡的实力。
Despite the advantages to which Lee speaks, the shift to the outsourced CIO model which picked up a decade ago has accelerated over the past five years, according to Anna Dunn Tabke, founder of Leita Advisory, which runs searches that help colleges and foundations pick outsourced chief investment officers. "An in-house CIO is expensive, and even if a school can afford one, that one person can't do everything. They need a team and often outside manager research and due diligence," she said.
李在采访了20位外部基金经理后表示，他们都很精明、一致且有洞察力，而“归根结底，你是在押注人”。他说，这是一项模式识别业务，需要技能、高诚信度、一致性以及赚取费用，这些都是基本门槛。
Hiring an OCIO can also allow schools to pool their money with other institutions and help to invest competitively alongside larger endowments.
ACU的投资组合不仅仅是股票和债券。李表示，该基金会略多于一半的资金投入私募投资，略少于一半投入公开市场。他补充说，私募股权和公开交易股权在2026财年为ACU带来了相近的回报，很难将回报归因于某一方，因为公开市场部分包括现金，而现金几乎不产生收益。
Lee said after interviewing 20 outside managers of investment funds, they all sound smart, aligned and insightful, and "at the end of the day you are betting on people." It's a pattern-recognition business, he said, with skill, high integrity, alignment and earning their fees all table stakes.
该基金也附带条件。大学有义务动用基金会资金惠及在校及未来学生，同时也有许多限制，因为部分资金是捐赠者在特定条件下遗赠的，例如仅用于化学专业学生或贫困学生的资金。
The ACU portfolio is not simply stocks and bonds. A little more than half of the endowment is in private investments and a little less than half is in public markets, Lee said. Privately held equity and publicly traded equity returned similar amounts for ACU in fiscal 2026, he said, adding that it's hard to credit the return to one side or the other because the public portion includes cash, which earns very little.
ACU并非唯一一所在投资组合表现上超越更大规模竞争对手的小型学校。
The endowment also comes with strings attached. The university has a mission of drawing upon the endowment to benefit current and future students, and there are also many stipulations on the money, as some is bequeathed by donors with certain conditions, such as funds that go only to chemistry majors or underprivileged students.
据各校报告，位于俄勒冈州波特兰、拥有8.85亿美元基金会的文理学院里德学院，在截至2025年6月的过去三个财年内分别实现了7.5%、12.4%和11.6%的回报，领先于耶鲁大学同期的1.8%、5.7%和11.1%。里德学院表示，它还在过去五年和十年里跑赢了传统的60/40股票-债券组合以及由投资咨询公司剑桥协会（Cambridge Associates）追踪的中位数高校基金会回报。
ACU isn't the only small school outperforming far larger rivals in terms of portfolio performance.
科尔比学院（Colby College）是缅因州沃特维尔的一所文理学院。根据学校提供的数据，截至2026年6月30日的财年，其年回报率为18.2%，过去10年的年化回报率为10.5%（扣除管理费用后）。截至2026年6月30日，其基金规模为14亿美元。
Reed College, a Portland, Oregon liberal arts school with an endowment of $885 million, reported returns of 7.5%, 12.4% and 11.6% over the past three fiscal years through June 2025, ahead of Yale's 1.8%, 5.7% and 11.1% in the same years, according to each school's reports. Reed says it has also beaten a traditional 60/40 stock-and-bond portfolio and the median college endowment, as tracked by Cambridge Associates, an investment consulting firm, over the past five and 10 years.
一年前，科尔比学院的10年年化回报率为8.5%，低于耶鲁大学同期报告的9.4%，但高于哈佛大学的7.7%和哥伦比亚大学的7.8%。科尔比学院表示，去年没有任何单一公司对回报的贡献超过1%。
Colby College, a liberal arts school in Waterville, Maine, reported an 18.2% return for the year ended June 30, 2026, and a 10.5% annualized return over the past 10 years, net of manager fees, according to data provided by the school. Its endowment was $1.4 billion as of June 30, 2026. A year earlier, Colby's 10-year annualized return was 8.5%, below the 9.4% Yale reported for the same period but ahead of Harvard's 7.7% and Columbia's 7.8%. Colby said no single company contributed more than 1% to last year's return.
科尔比学院副校长兼首席投资官德博拉·舒夫林（Deborah Shufrin）表示，学校的长期关系是其获得竞争性回报的一个因素。
Deborah Shufrin, associate vice president and chief investment officer of Colby College, credits the school's long-term relationships as being a factor in its competitive returns.
舒夫林说：“科尔比的回报之所以能够与规模更大的机构竞争，很大程度上得益于与顶尖私募基金管理人的早期/长期合作关系，以及识别和进入新兴顶尖私募基金的能力。”她补充道，这些关系使科尔比能够利用其永续存在和长期投资视野的优势。
"Colby's returns have been competitive with much larger institutions in large part due to early/long-standing relationships with premier private fund managers as well as the ability to identify and access newer emerging top-tier private funds," Shufrin said, adding that these relationships enable Colby to take advantage of its perpetual life and long-term investment horizon.
捐赠者也发挥了作用。科尔比学院高级副总裁马特·普罗托（Matt Proto）表示，学校的“敢想北进”（Dare Northward）筹款活动为新学术项目和设施、财政援助、体育以及沃特维尔市中心的重建提供了资金。“许多捐赠增强了基金规模，几项捐赠启动了新项目和设施，还有其他捐赠支持了年度运营，”普罗托说。
Donors also play a role. Matt Proto, senior vice president at Colby, said the school's Dare Northward fundraising campaign has paid for new academic programs and facilities, financial aid, athletics and the redevelopment of downtown Waterville. "Many gifts enhanced the endowment, several launched new programs and facilities, and others supported annual operations," Proto said.
大卫战胜歌利亚的投资优势可能不会对所有人持续存在。并非所有人都同意这种优势像数据所示那样明显。
The David v. Goliath investing edge may not last for all Not everyone agrees the edge is as clear as the numbers suggest.
塔布克表示，小型基金与耶鲁大学等巨头之间的比较需要谨慎，因为时间段可能不匹配。她指出，一些学校已经公布了截至2026年6月30日的数据，而耶鲁的10年数据仅截至2025年6月。她说，这一一年的差距目前非常重要。
Tabke said comparisons between small endowments and giants like Yale need care, because the time periods may not match. She noted the fact that some schools have already reported results through June 30, 2026, while Yale's 10-year figure runs only through June 2025. She says that one-year gap matters a lot right now.
使用Confluence数据库，这是一家投资数据提供商，覆盖259个小型和中型捐赠基金及基金会，平均投资组合规模为2.2亿美元，她表示，截至2025年6月，过去10年进入前5%的门槛约为每年8.45%，耶鲁大学达到了这一水平。一年后，该门槛升至约10.5%，而中位数回报率为8.65%。换句话说，典型的10年回报率在一年内上升了近两个百分点。去年的结果也呈现出异常分散：表现最好的前5%的学校收益率接近19.5%，而表现最差的后5%的学校收益率低于4%，这一差距大约是前一年的两倍。
Using a database from Confluence, an investment data provider of 259 small and mid-sized endowments and foundations, with an average portfolio of $220 million, she said the bar for ranking among the top 5% over 10 years was about 8.45% a year as of June 2025, a level Yale topped. A year later, it had jumped to roughly 10.5%, with the middle of the pack at 8.65%. In other words, the typical 10-year return rose almost two points in a single year. Last year's results were also unusually scattered: the best-performing 5% of schools earned nearly 19.5%, while the bottom 5% earned under 4%, roughly double the gap of the year before.
尽管阿比林的首席投资官指出，其私募基金的回报——这些基金占其投资总额的一半以上——与公开市场投资的回报相当，但塔布克表示，私募股权是大型捐赠基金投资者的宠儿，但在过去大约三年里几乎没有分红，回报也很低。而那些投资组合较为简单、以股票为主的学校，尤其是持有大量美国科技公司股票的学校，则表现更佳。
Despite Abilene's CIO noting that its returns from private funds — which comprise a little over half of its investments — were on par with returns from public market investments, Tabke said that private equity, a favorite of big-endowment investors, has paid out little and returned little for about three years, while schools with simpler, stock-heavy portfolios, especially large U.S. tech companies, pulled ahead.
随后，一些采用类似耶鲁投资方式的学校，部分通过外包管理，在2025年6月SpaceX上市时持有其股票，从而提升了回报。她表示，仅仅一年这样的表现，就能显著拉升10年的回报数字。
Then a few schools that invest like Yale, some through outsourced managers, held shares in SpaceX when it went public in June, which lifted their returns. One year like that, she said, can move a 10-year number noticeably.
较小的学校也会更频繁地遇到流动性问题，这限制了它们在各市场中能够承担的风险。
Smaller schools will also more frequently run up against illiquidity issues which limit the risks they are able to take across markets.
“较小学校通常无法承担耶鲁那样的流动性风险。耶鲁的捐赠基金是超过300年捐赠积累的成果，耶鲁及普林斯顿等同类院校还能通过筹款和借贷，除了依赖捐赠支出和学费收入之外，获得额外资源，”塔布克说。
"Smaller schools generally can't take on Yale's level of illiquidity. Yale's endowment is the product of more than 300 years of gifts, and Yale and peers like Princeton can also draw on fundraising and debt alongside endowment spending and tuition," Tabke said.
“无论规模大小，集中度都是一种风险：以股票为主的投资组合可能依赖于少数几家大型科技公司，而持有大量SpaceX股票则构成自身的集中风险，”塔布克补充道，并指出资源是另一项限制因素。
"Concentration is a risk at any size: a stock-heavy portfolio can depend on a few large tech companies, and a large SpaceX position is a concentration of its own," Tabke added, noting that resources are the other constraint.
根据Farther Finance高等教育捐赠基金和基金会集团负责人、特许金融分析师R. Keith Sauls的说法，时间是故事的重要组成部分。Farther Finance是一家财富管理公司，他同时也是查尔斯顿学院基金会的即任前主席，在那里他还曾担任投资委员会主席。
Timing is a big part of the story, according to R. Keith Sauls, CFA, who heads the higher-education endowment and foundation group at Farther Finance, a wealth management firm and the immediate past chair of the College of Charleston Foundation, where he also chaired the investment committee.
Sauls表示，近年来小型学校确实占了一些优势，但他补充说，远离难以快速变现的投资有助于让它们看起来更灵活，并有助于近期战胜更大的同行。不过，他指出，随着时间的推移，较大的捐赠基金通常每年能领先约1到1.5个百分点，他将这一优势描述为将资金锁定在这些投资中的回报。
The recent edge for small schools is real, Sauls said, but he added that staying out of investments that are hard to sell quickly can help make them look nimble and contribute to beating bigger peers recently. Over time, though, he said larger endowments generally come out ahead by about one to 1.5 percentage points a year, which he described as the payoff for tying money up in those investments.
Sauls说，大型捐赠基金持有大量风险投资和私募股权，这些资产不会经常重新估值，而股市在此期间出现了上涨，一些小型学校的领先优势更多是源于时间点的选择，而不是更好的模式或更好的渠道。例如，财政年度何时结束，以及它是否恰逢市场崩盘或反弹，都可能左右三年、五年和十年的业绩表现，他如此表示。
Sauls said big endowments hold a lot of venture capital and private equity, which aren't revalued often, while the stock market surged, and some of the smaller schools' lead was timing, not a better model or better access. For example, when a fiscal year ends, and whether it catches a crash or a rally, can swing three-, five- and 10-year results, he said.
与此同时，有人可能想前往阿比林基督教大学，报名参加FIN 411《投资原理》课程。
In the meantime, one might want to head to Abilene Christian University and sign up for FIN 411, Principles of Investment.
Sauls表示：“所使用的模型很重要，因为它可以克服小型捐赠基金的局限性。”
"The model being used matters because it can override the limitations of being a smaller endowment," Sauls said.