If you say $3.3 billion in the right tone of voice, you can sound a lot like Dr. Evil making a significant financial demand on the United Nations, the fate of the world in his hands.
When Landis Zimmerman says $3.3 billion, however, his delivery isn't quite so profound. His voice is calm, and his facial expressions are composed. His hands remain folded on the tabletop, and he does not laugh.
Then again, Landis Zimmerman is not Dr. Evil. Moreover, the $3.3 billion that he is talking about refers to Penn's endowment, not a blackmail arrangement. As the chief investment officer at the University, he may control large sums of money, but he doesn't show half as much excitement about it.
Zimmerman -- along with the University Board of Trustees, a six-person investment board and University Treasurer and Vice President for Finance Craig Carnaroli -- holds the University's financial fate in his hands. Responsible for making sure that this $3.3 billion increases enough each year to support the University's operating costs, the rate of inflation and a profit margin for future investments, these people help keep Penn in its place among peer institutions.
It's not an easy thing to do. Then again, this isn't the movies.
Penn's endowment -- or its "largest single asset," according to Carnaroli -- didn't just appear on the doorstep of College Hall. Derived from the gifts of alumni and other donors, this money represents the University's extensive fundraising efforts, not to mention some generous gifts from past graduates.
Even so, the process that goes on when the University receives a check for $100 -- or $1 million, for that matter -- is not as simple as going to the bank and making a deposit.
"The endowment comes in two forms -- money Penn can spend currently, and money it cannot spend but must add to the corpus of the endowment," Chairman of Penn's Investment Board Howard Marks said.
Essentially, this money is either spent on a specific area that a donor has specified -- like the Pottruck Health and Fitness Center, for example -- or it becomes part of a larger pool of money that is invested in a wide variety of places.
