Location: Sayles 252
Time: 3:30 pm
Present Staff: David Schlosser, Shannon Schulz Faculty: Mike Hemesath Students: Amanda Savitt, Nathaniel Rosenblum, Joe Concannon, Kristen Vellinger, Chuck Anderson-Weir
Absent Fred Rogers
Secretary: Laura Garlock
At the final CRIC meeting of the term, the committee had two guests: Jason Matz from the Investment Committee and Megan Bosco from the Investment Office in Minneapolis. Megan Bosco began the meeting by describing the operations at the Investment Office, which has entirely external managers. While Megan covers equity and fixed income, Jason covers hedge funds. At this point, Jason arrived and continued to describe the general operations of the Investment Office. An investment policy statement governs the policies, procedures, and responsibilities of the Investment Committee. The Board of Trustees is not extremely involved in the operations of the Investment Committee on a day-to-day basis, but the Board does monitor the Committee, offer advice, as well as approving or disproving Committee motions. Jason then discussed Carleton’s assets. The primary assets are equities, while hedge funds, or market alternatives, are also a significant component. Additionally, there are fixed incomes and liquidity. After describing each of these, Jason gave an overview of the process of selecting managers, stressing that social factors do not have a large role. However, he said that if certain companies were so socially irresponsible that it would hurt their business, the Investment Committee would avoid them. While Carleton’s equities are disclosed to the CRIC and the public in general, its hedge funds are not. The CRIC has expressed interest in having access to the names of hedge fund managers so as to better oversee Carleton’s social responsibility in its investments. However, Jason said there was little support from the Investment Committee for releasing these names. In communicating concerns to the Investment Committee, Jason recommended having quantified evidence for why the Committee should vote a particular way, saying that a complete economic analysis is expected. However, Jason acknowledged the difficulties of condensed time frame in which to put together an economic analysis, and said that an analysis based on assumptions and a carefully described thought process would work. This should be presented at the Investment Committee Meeting during winter term; Jason said the CRIC would not be able to send an economic analysis after the meeting as they did last year. Furthermore, Megan asked the CRIC to keep the Board of Trustees updated on proxy votes so that the Investment Committee does not miss them.