An education in finance

摘要

In the lecture halls of America's universities, capitalism is far more likely to be damned than praised. Those who run the universities, however, have a keen appreciation of the capital markets. It is well known that some institutions, notably Harvard, have benefited greatly from putting top-notch managers in charge of their endowment funds. Less well known is the increasing willingness of colleges to borrow in the markets, too. On May 15th, for example, Cornell University sold $250m-worth of bonds. In recent weeks both Harvard and the University of Texas have also raised hundreds of millions of dollars in this way.