Major U.S. universities posted their strongest endowment returns in five years, lifted by investments in Elon Musk's space company SpaceX and in artificial intelligence.
Harvard University said its endowment returned 27.1% in the fiscal year ended in June, according to The Wall Street Journal on the 15th. The gain pushed the endowment to $68 billion (about 90.6 trillion won).
The University of North Carolina returned 37.8%, with roughly half of that coming from its SpaceX investment. Washington University in St. Louis returned 37.3%, and Stanford University returned 31.7% at its main investment vehicle. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, by contrast, returned 10.3%.
SpaceX's record initial public offering was a particular driver of the universities' gains. Harvard disclosed that it directly held $2.2 billion (about 2.93 trillion won) of SpaceX shares as of the end of June, equivalent to half of its public equity holdings.
Changes to tax law under the Donald Trump administration are set to raise the tax rate on net investment income at some university endowments. Harvard estimated the change would cost it an additional $300 million (about 399.7 billion won) a year.