Anna Dunn Tabke in CNBC: The Hidden Risks of Comparing Small Endowments to Yale

Leita Advisory founder Anna Dunn Tabke was featured in CNBC's October 14 article, "Abilene Christian University is giving Ivy League endowments a run for their money in the market."

The piece dives into how smaller schools—including Abilene Christian University, Reed College, and Colby College—have posted investment returns that rival or even surpass those of Ivy League giants like Yale over recent periods. But as Anna emphasized in her interview, headline numbers don’t tell the full story. For trustees and investment committees, adding context is essential.

Compare Like with Like

When reviewing endowment performance, it's critical to align your comparisons. Some schools have already reported results through June 30, 2026, while Yale’s most recent 10-year figure only runs through June 2025. “That one-year gap matters a lot right now,” Anna explained.

Using Confluence data on 259 small and mid-sized endowments and foundations, Anna highlighted how quickly the bar for “top performance” can move. As of June 2025, the top 5% over 10 years earned about 8.45% annually—a level Yale topped. Just one year later, the bar leapt to roughly 10.5%, with the median at 8.65%. Last year’s performance saw the best 5% earning nearly 19.5%, while the bottom 5% earned under 4%. This volatility underscores why direct comparisons require scrutiny.

What Drove the Recent Results

Anna pointed out that the drivers behind these results matter as much as the numbers themselves. Private equity, a longtime favorite of large endowments, has paid out little and returned little for about three years. Meanwhile, schools with simpler, stock-heavy portfolios—especially those holding large U.S. tech companies—pulled ahead. Some schools investing like Yale (including through outsourced managers) benefited from holding SpaceX when it went public in June. “One year like that can move a 10-year number noticeably,” Anna noted.

Size Brings Real Constraints

“Smaller schools generally can't take on Yale's level of illiquidity,” Anna told CNBC. “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.”

Anna also noted, “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.” Resource limitations shape the risks and opportunities available to smaller institutions.

Why More Schools Are Turning to OCIOs

The shift toward the outsourced CIO (OCIO) model, which began a decade ago, has accelerated dramatically in the past five years. “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,” Anna explained.

An OCIO model can let schools pool assets with other institutions and invest competitively alongside larger endowments. Choosing the right partner is one of the most important decisions a committee can make—one that shapes results for years to come.

Leita Advisory specializes in helping colleges and foundations run OCIO searches and select the right outsourced chief investment officer for their needs. If your investment committee is weighing an OCIO, or reviewing your current provider, contact us to start the conversation.

Read the full article on CNBC.