The Board of Regents has announced it will not divest from companies linked to Israel, reaffirming its longstanding policy to shield the endowment from political pressures and base investment decisions on financial factors such as risk and return.

“The Board of Regents has heard multiple calls for divestment from our endowment of companies linked to Israel. We have listened carefully,” Regent Sarah Hubbard said at the board’s March 28 meeting. “We are not moving to make any divestment of any kind.”

The primary purpose of the university endowment is to generate the greatest possible income, subject to the appropriate amount of investment risk, in support of the university’s missions of teaching, research, patient care and service.

Hubbard noted that, to accomplish this, it is important that the university maintain a diversified investment portfolio. “To do otherwise would be to increase our investment risk and decrease our investment returns,” she said.

This investment approach has been reviewed and consistently affirmed by university leaders, including the regents, most recently in 2015 and in 2017.

“The university’s governing board and officers have a fiduciary responsibility to protect our assets for the long term so that we may leave to succeeding generations a university at least as strong as the one with which we have entrusted,” she said. 

Regent Michael J. Behm noted he had seen inaccurate information shared about the university’s investments, specifically that one-third of the endowment was invested in companies with ties to Israel.

“I asked the endowment team about that and, in actuality, less than one-tenth of 1% of the endowment is invested indirectly in such companies,” he said. The university has no direct investments in such companies.

The university’s endowment is essential to sustaining academic excellence because it provides a guaranteed, perpetual source of income through distributions, over 90% of which last year supported scholarships, instruction, health care and research.