New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Yale University endowment names a new chief investor
2007 graduate to succeed Swensen
“In addition to being an exceptional institutional investor, Matt is widely recognized for his ability to build and lead teams and for his devotion to mentoring aspiring investors.”
Yale President Peter Salovey
NEW HAVEN — Matthew S.T. Mendelsohn, a director in the Yale Investments Office, has been appointed by Yale President Peter Salovey to succeed the late David Swensen as chief investments officer.
Mendelsohn, 36, who graduated from Yale in 2007 with a major in physics and joined the Investments Office the same year, has responsibility for the portion of the university’s endowments invested in venture capital assets, which comprise more than 25 percent of the total endowment, according to a press release.
Swensen, who led the investments office for more than 35 years, died in May of cancer. Mendelsohn will begin in his new post Sept. 1.
As of June 30, 2020, Yale’s endowment was valued at $31.2 billion. Spending from the endowment covers about one-third of Yale’s budget.
“In addition to being an exceptional institutional investor, Matt is widely recognized for his ability to build and lead teams and for his devotion to mentoring aspiring investors,” Salovey said in a message to the university community. “And as his former students from
Yale’s endowment management course can attest, he welcomes opportunities to impart both the skills and the core values of ethical and successful institutional investing.”
Mendelsohn was selected after an international search led by former Yale Provost Ben Polak and advised by David Barrett Partners. He and his wife, Lauren Martini, have two children.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better set of investors to learn from and work alongside for the past 14 years,” Mendelsohn in a statement. “From David Swensen, Dean Takahashi, and all of my current and former Investments
Office colleagues to the illustrious members of our Investment Committee, Yale benefits from an enormously talented and experienced group of missiondriven investors rooted in time-tested investment principles. Though we will evolve to face new challenges, the future will no doubt rhyme with the past as we build off of a strong foundation.”
“The committee left no stone unturned in the search,” Polak said in a statement. “In the end, the right answer was immediately before us. Matt Mendelsohn has the respect of his colleagues, of managers, and of his peer CIOs — and an extraordinary record of investing, building and leading teams, and representing what is best about Yale.”