University of Colorado Foundation returns 8.7% for fiscal year, well below benchmark

University of Colorado Foundation's $2.7 billion long-term investment pool returned a net 8.7% for the fiscal year ended June 30, well short of its benchmark.

The return fell below its policy benchmark return of 15.9% for the period, a performance report on the Denver-based foundation's website shows.

For the three, seven and 10 years ended June 30, the investment pool returned an annualized net 3.2%, 9.2% and 7.9%, respectively, compared with their respective benchmarks of 3.8%, 8.3% and 7.2%.

The long-term investment pool had posted a net return of 7.8% for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2023.

While the latest fiscal year was the second in a row with positive performance, the single-digit returns did not reflect the extremely strong year for public equities. For the year ended June 30, for example, the Russell 3000 index returned 23.1%.

The foundation did not provide returns by individual asset classes.

As of June 30, the investment pool's actual allocation was 42% global public equities, 26% global private capital, 13% real assets, 12% global hedge funds, and 7% fixed income and cash.

The long-term investment pool includes $2.2 billion in endowment assets.