INQUISITR.COM / News & Politics

Harvard, MIT, And Stanford Invest In Crypto, Joining Institutional ‘Herd’ Triggered By Yale

By Samantha Chang
Published on: 10:33 PST, Oct 11, 2018

Several Ivy League schools, and other top U.S. universities — including Harvard, Dartmouth, MIT, and Stanford — have invested in cryptocurrencies, following the initial foray into crypto recently launched by Yale University.

“A move by endowments into funds that will directly bet on cryptocurrencies signals a major shift in investor sentiment toward the asset class, in the same way that institutions over the past decade became more willing to invest in private tech companies,” The Information reported.

Sources told The Information that investments by multi-billion-dollar university endowments such as Harvard, Yale, MIT, the University of North Carolina, and Stanford could open the floodgates for other major institutional investors to make the jump into crypto.

Combined Endowments Top $108 Billion

The combined endowments of the six universities currently invested in crypto tops a whopping $108 billion.

As the Inquisitr reported last week, Yale became the first university endowment to invest in virtual currencies, in a sign that institutional investors were starting to embrace the burgeoning market.

The move was widely viewed as a signal of confidence in crypto as investment vehicles because David Swensen — the chief investment officer at Yale — is hailed as the Ivy League’s “Warren Buffett” for his savvy investment moves.

Crypto is reportedly a tiny allocation in Yale’s $29 billion portfolio, but experts say the decision will trigger a chain reaction among other major institutional investors, such as pension funds.

Harvard and Stanford getting on-board with crypto is a game-changer, most analysts believe. Harvard’s endowment tops $37 billion, while Stanford’s approaches $25 billion.

Three weeks ago, bitcoin perma-bull Mike Novogratz — the founder of crypto investment firm Galaxy Digital Capital Management — disclosed that an unnamed endowment had invested in digital currencies, as the Inquisitr has reported.

Novogratz did not name Yale University as the “Big Dog” investor, but it is now clear that Yale was the entity he was referring to. And now, five other mega-rich university endowments have climbed aboard the crypto train.

Billionaire Tim Draper: Relax, Bitcoin Is Here To Stay

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies got battered this summer, but crypto evangelists like tech billionaire Tim Draper said the market will only balloon over time.

Draper predicts that cryptocurrencies’ market capitalization will rocket to $80 trillion by 2023, as the Inquisitr has reported.

The California-based venture capitalist said crypto enthusiasts should not be demoralized by bitcoin’s recent price plunges, saying these types of decelerations are normal when it comes to new technologies.

“The Internet started in the same way,” Tim Draper said. “It came in big waves and then it kind of came crashing down. And then the next wave comes concentrated but much bigger. I suspect the same thing will go on here [with bitcoin].”

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