David F. Swensen – Successful investment
In my regular perusal of the financial press, I read some articles about David Swensen a couple of days ago. I have now started to read his book “Unconventional Success: A Fundamental Approach to Personal Investment”, though it will take a while for me to really understand it :-) David F. Swensen is head investor at the US elite university Yale. In any case, I am inspired by his central claim about the fee structure for private investors and even in part for large investors as compared to unit trusts: “The fee structure is fundamentally unfair”.
Private investors do not even get access to investment possibilities in selected assets, and are mostly reserved for the professionals :-( I could make the problem with the cost structure of most investment classes far less severe in the era of the internet via online platforms and direct banks, even becoming free for investment funds. In this way I have managed to get the cost side of David F. Swensen’ thesis under control, but the potential returns that David F. Swensen could achieve remain unreached for me. Selected top assets in closed investments (such as Private Equity), are sometimes only possible for me via the "Wealth Management" of a well-known private bank. Banks with a good reputation in the area of "Wealth Management" are able to find selected investments for their customers due to the high entry capital level and their reputation in the industry. Or they use their expertise to take part in other vehicles in other corporations. It costs fees, of course, when a product is only available to a select customer base. The argument that the above-average fees are cancelled out by the above-average value growth may be correct, but David F. Swensen finds their level unfair. One interesting investment possibility would be shares in the fee structure of investment corporations :-) Or is there already a product for that!?
Article with David F. Swensen:
David F. Swensen’s book at amazon Deutschland:
Unconventional Success: A Fundamental Approach to Personal Investment
