In the league of elite investors, few can rival the late David Swensen, former head of the Yale Endowment. As Chief Investment Officer of this multi-billion dollar fund, he delivered top performance over multiple decades, and his investing style influenced an entire industry. Swensen’s innovative and rigorous approach to asset allocation and expanding its range was revered, with others rushing to replicate it. This approach became known as the “Yale Model”, and revolutionized endowment investing.

Over the span of three decades Swensen took the Yale Endowment from $1.3 billion to over $30 billion, averaging over 12% annual returns along the way. His investment principles were built on the power of diversification to mitigate risk, something he became enchanted with when he first studied under James Tobin, the Nobel Prize winning economist.

So, what lessons can we learn from the legendary investor?

From the onset, Swensen understood that an endowment’s long life significantly enhanced its ability to search for yield beyond public markets. By eliminating the constraints of a reactive, short-term approach, Swensen delved into private assets, which afford greater access to management, and insight into their strategies as well as value drivers. He realized that private assets that required rigorous research and have no active exchange, offered a premium to patient investors that could forgo the need for immediate liquidity. When he started at Yale, the endowment had 75% of its investments in public equities. Seeing higher yields in alternative assets such as private equity, hedge funds, real estate and natural resources – he aggressively shifted the asset mix.

Superior results followed and his track record outpaced peers. Today, public equities are only 16% of Yale’s portfolio with the bulk of its holdings in private equity, hedge funds and real assets. 

Reade more at https://www.forbes.com/sites/randybrown/2021/06/02/how-to-invest-like-a-legend/?sh=4437ccf03dd2

Cash is the lifeblood of any business, especially a small business. A small business is “small” with limited capitalization and fewer options to raise cash to finance operations. It thus follows that cash management to record and control cash coming in and out of the business is of paramount importance. Everything about the small business must be structured to maximize cash operations, including retaining cash if possible, while ensuring that cash due to the business is collected as soon as possible.

The first consideration given to cash management is how the business is financed. If a small business is financed the wrong way, it will bleed cash. Too often, the only finance available to small businesses is bank loans, which is unfortunate. A bank loan taken too early by a small business will burden the business with interest costs, which will slow down growth.

Source: Nairametrics. Visit site for full article.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has doused fears that its aggressive drive to increase the banking sector’s lending to the private sector will result in a gradual accumulation of non-performing loans (NPLs) in the sector.

The Director, Corporate Communications, CBN, Mr. Isaac Okoroafor, told THISDAY yesterday that with the lending clause introduced recently by the Bankers’ Committee, it would be difficult for habitual loan defaulters to operate in the sector.

With the clause, a lender would be able to recover its loan from the assets of a defaulter domiciled in another bank.

The central bank had last week raised the minimum loan-to-deposit-ratio (LDR) to 65 percent with a December 31, 2019 deadline, up from the 60 percent it had stipulated at the end of September.

Source: Thisday Live. Visit site for full article.

A personal loan is an unsecured loan offered by banks and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs). These are unsecured because a borrower is not required to pledge any asset—property, jewelry or car—to get the loan. For this reason, personal loans come with a higher interest rate compared with secured loans, such as a home or car loan.

A personal loan comes in handy in case of a financial emergency as you can borrow the required amount in 12-48 hours from an NBFC by simply submitting income-related and personal information documents. Banks can take up to seven days to process the loan request. What more? Personal loans come with no strings attached as the lender does not monitor its use.

While personal loans give easy access to credit, they can also be a recipe for financial disaster, if not managed prudently. Here are the most common mistakes you should avoid when applying for a personal loan.

Source: Entrepreneur. Visit site for full article.