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# One type of portfolio did even better this year than the endowments that owned SpaceX.
- URL: https://read.quoin.pub/one-type-of-portfolio-did-even-better-this-year-than-the-endowments-that-owned-spacex/
- Published: 2026-09-30T23:32:03.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-30T23:32:03.000Z
- Description: The right high-conviction strategies did better than the index, the rockets, or the median
- Author: Pedro Henriques da Silva
- Tags: CAPITAL

## 

Colleges and universities are reporting the largest return numbers since 2021, and much of that outperformance is being driven by a single event: a mega-IPO.

(Note: The below report covers the fiscal year that ended June 30th. Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT usually report in October).

![Table: fiscal 2026 returns reported so far. UNC 37.8 percent, Washington University 37.3, Penn 27.4, S&P 500 22.3, University of Colorado Foundation 20.3, median endowment over $500 million 18.9, average endowment fiscal 2025 10.9, with the driver of each.](https://storage.ghost.io/c/82/1e/821ef542-3050-4045-8484-ae1653cf0dd6/content/images/2026/09/data-src-image-5cc4d09c-f506-4798-b467-94e249ac57fc.png)

*Sources:* [*WRAL*](https://www.wral.com/news/education/northcarolina-endowment-spacex-investment-big-gains-unc-investment-fund-september-2026/?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(UNC);* [*Bloomberg*](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-25/spacex-stake-helps-drives-37-3-return-for-washington-university?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(WashU);* [*The Philadelphia Inquirer*](https://www.inquirer.com/education/upenn-endowment-growth-board-finance-20260924.html?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(Penn);* [*Vanguard*](https://workplace.vanguard.com/assets/corp/fund%5Fcommunications/pdf%5Fpublish/us-products/investment-profiles/0040.pdf?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(S&P 500);* [*Institutional Investor via Hoodline*](https://hoodline.com/2026/09/unc-s-17-billion-fund-soars-37-8-as-old-spacex-bet-finally-pays-off/?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(Colorado);* [*Wilshire TUCS via Bloomberg*](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/harvard-endowment-discloses-2-2-123914722.html?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(median);* [*NACUBO-Commonfund*](https://www.nacubo.org/Press-Releases/2026/US-Higher-Education-Endowments-Report-Stable-Returns-Increase-Spending-to-33-4-Billion-in-FY25?ref=read.quoin.pub) *(average).*

SpaceX [went public on June 12](https://www.spacefoundation.org/2026/06/13/spacex-ipo-closes-higher-than-160-per-share/?ref=read.quoin.pub) at $135 a share and raised more than $75 billion, the largest initial public offering in recorded history, at a valuation above $2 trillion. The shares peaked at $225.64 in mid-June, fell to $104.83 in early August after a lockup expired and released as many as 911.5 million shares, and closed at $152.71 on September 18\. Elon Musk holds a 48.4 percent economic interest in the company and more than 82 percent of its votes.

🔎 **Looking deeper:** We are likely to see similar outcomes whenever a private-market darling goes public. A modest position, held for years without liquidity, converts to stock, and suddenly an endowment sees a decade of gains land in a single fiscal year.

UNC is a good example: the UNC investment fund bought in through a venture firm in 2009, and it took 17 years to be able to see the return you see at the top of the table above. Stefan Strein, president of UNC Management Company, told a trustees committee last week that about half of the fund’s growth came from SpaceX and that the position will keep paying out through September 2027.

“We have the ability to lock up capital for a very long time, giving us the opportunity to harvest off illiquid investments.”

Jim Blaine, a UNC trustee, told the same meeting that the smaller schools in the system wouldn’t have had access to the investment without the capital of Chapel Hill and UNC Health.

♟️ **The flip side:** Most investors missed out. Over the same 12 months, the S&P 500 returned 22.3 percent, and the median endowment over $500 million returned 18.9 percent before fees. Meaning the median endowment would have trailed the public markets by over 300 basis points, even without accounting for management fees.

And an investor who bought the index in July 2025 could have sold on any trading day since. UNC’s SpaceX position couldn’t be sold until this summer, and part of it is still locked up. So it’s 17 years of nothing, followed by one year of seismic something. Acceptable to some investors, but tricky when spending is needed.

🌱 **Meanwhile,** the right high-conviction strategies did better than the index, the rockets, or the median.

S&P sorts the 500 stocks in its index into groups by rule, such as the hundred that swing hardest with the market, the hundred that barely move, the cheapest, the highest quality, and the ones with the longest dividend streaks, and it publishes how each group did. The groups are mechanical, so nobody chose the stocks in them.

![Bar chart: S&P 500 factor indices, 12-month total return to August 31, 2026, from High Beta at 40.8 percent to Low Volatility at 4.2 percent](https://storage.ghost.io/c/82/1e/821ef542-3050-4045-8484-ae1653cf0dd6/content/images/2026/09/data-src-image-e3285d65-bd99-45b8-bb14-8c3cdb63bfbf.png)

Total return, 12 months to August 31, 2026\. Source: [S&P Dow Jones Indices, S&P 500 Factor Dashboard](https://www.spglobal.com/spdji/en/documents/performance-reports/dashboard-sp-500-factor.pdf?ref=read.quoin.pub), August 2026.

Over a similar 12 months, the gap between the best group and the worst was 37 points, with the stocks that swing hardest roughly doubling the index and the steadiest barely moving. Anyone could have bought any of those 500 companies on any trading day.

None of those groups holds SpaceX, and none can until 2027 at the earliest, when it first becomes eligible for the index, so the spread came from selection alone and required no lockup.

The same holds over ten years, where the best rule has beaten the worst by more than 11 points a year, and it holds for managers. Morningstar found that about four in ten active funds beat their index over the past year, and the ones that did held stocks the index doesn’t, or held them in larger amounts.

### What else is interesting?

% **The gains have made portfolios more concentrated.** Harvard Management Company [disclosed 12.94 million SpaceX shares](https://fortune.com/2026/08/15/harvard-management-fund-endowment-spacex-stake-university-california-north-carolina/?ref=read.quoin.pub) at June 30, worth $2.2 billion and more than half of its reported U.S. stock portfolio. David Ford, who chairs the investment committee for the University of Connecticut’s $725 million endowment, told Bloomberg that SpaceX is now 7 percent of it: “I don’t like that we have 7 percent in anything.”

🏛️ **The windfall arrives in the first year of the new endowment tax.** Since July 1, private universities pay 1.4, 4, or 8 percent on net investment income depending on endowment per student; Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT are in the top bracket, and [Penn expects to pay 4 percent](https://www.thedp.com/article/2025/11/penn-endowment-returns-2025-fiscal-year?ref=read.quoin.pub). Princeton’s president [has said](https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/2026/0226/endowment-tax-higher-education-universities?ref=read.quoin.pub) the university stands to lose $11 billion in endowment earnings over the next decade, Stanford has laid off 363 people, and Washington University eliminated nearly 500 filled and unfilled positions earlier this year, according to Higher Ed Dive.

Sources: S&P Dow Jones Indices, S&P 500 Factor Dashboard, August 2026; Morningstar Active/Passive Barometer, midyear 2026; Vanguard 500 Index Fund fact sheet, June 30, 2026; Wilshire Trust Universe Comparison Service via Bloomberg; WRAL; Bloomberg; Fortune; The Philadelphia Inquirer; The Daily Pennsylvanian; Space Foundation; Christian Science Monitor; Higher Ed Dive.