Brown University’s endowment, Providence, R.I., returned a net 13.4% for the fiscal year ended June 30, surpassing its 11.1% benchmark return, spokesman Brian E. Clark said in an email.
Brown’s return also exceeded Cambridge Associates’ preliminary mean and median returns for colleges and universities with endowments at 12.9%, according to a news release.
Mr. Clark declined to provide a breakout of asset class returns.
As of June 30, the endowment had an asset allocation of 27% public equity, 18% absolute return, 10% each buyout/growth private equity and market-neutral strategies, 9% venture capital, 7% multistrategy/other investments, 6% each fixed income and cash, 5% real assets and 2% other private equity.
For the three, five, 10 and 20 years ended June 30, the $3.5 billion endowment returned an annualized 5.8%, 9.1%, 5.2% and 8.6%, respectively. Benchmark returns for the three-, five- and 10-year periods were an annualized 4%, 6.9% and 3.7%, respectively. Benchmark returns for the 20 years ended June 30 were not available.
Last fiscal year, Brown’s endowment returned -1.1%.
