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Research

The Risk, Reward, and Asset Allocation of Nonprofit Endowment Funds (79 pages)

Using tax filings from 374,351 U.S. nonprofit organizations from 2008 to 2020, Andrew Lo & others provide the first large-scale analysis of endowment prevalence, function, asset allocation, and returns. They find that most endowments underperform passive benchmarks, and advisory fees are positively correlated with gross returns but negatively with net returns.

Bridgewater - What Would It Take to Bring Back US Manufacturing? (11 pages)

Bridgewater published a two-part report on US manufacturing.

• Part I looks at the structural pressures that make growing US manufacturing so challenging.

• Part II explores the existing technologies that can be transformative for US productivity, and what it will take for them to be applied at scale.

Morgan Stanley - Cash Holdings (36 pages)

Michael Mauboussin’s latest examines the optimal amount of cash to hold for maximizing value, covering trends, theories, and capital deployment strategies. He finds a positive correlation between the level of cash holdings and how much a company invests in intangibles, how small the company is, how concentrated the company is, and if it’s in the introduction stage of the life cycle.

Bonus Content - Global Markets

KKR - Thoughts from the Road: Asia (15 pages)

KKR’s Head of Global Macro & Asset Allocation, Henry McVey, shares some takeaways from a recent trip to China and Japan.

Marquette Associates - Why Are Emerging Markets Investors Removing Their China Exposure? (7 pages)

Marquette Associates highlights a growing trend: investors are increasingly excluding China from emerging-market allocations amid geopolitical tensions, economic slowdown, and regulatory uncertainty.

Deutsche Bank Research Institute - How will European companies ever catch their US peers? (13 pages)

Deutsche Bank argues that Europe’s corporate underperformance stems from lower efficiency, with asset turnovers falling sharply and leaving returns lagging U.S. peers significantly. To close the gap, European firms must improve efficiency through strategic spin‑offs, AI adoption, and stronger management techniques, or risk losing market relevance.

Man Group - Indian Summer? (19 pages)

Henry Neville explains why India’s GDP growth that’s 2x the rest of the world, a rapidly expanding middle class, along with political and geopolitical risk lead him to view India as a hold and forget allocation.

MSCI - Long-Term Investing in Emerging Markets (25 pages)

MSCI seeks to identify the drivers of total shareholder returns in emerging-market equities, finding higher profitability, disciplined capital return (including share buybacks), stable earnings and meaningful dividend payouts were common traits by ‘compounders’.

Morgan Stanley - Brazil: Rewiring the Economy (6 pages)

During the 2000s, Brazil’s GDP nearly quadrupled in size as it rode the commodity supercycle. But over the following decade growth stalled, echoing the “lost decade” of the 1980s. While political turmoil and lax fiscal policy have dominated headlines, the country’s economic story has become more nuanced and is likely improving.

Verdad - Japan's Dividend & Buyback Surge (5 pages)

Verdad looks at the dividend and buyback surge in Japan, noting that the Japan Exchange Group says the market reform is only 20% complete.

Podcasts

What Else Is Happening

• Meb Faber spoke with Alex Morris about accessing fixed income ETFs. Apple | Spotify | YouTube 

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