Farm Report

ENDOWMENT Riding the Bull Market

CEO: After eight years, Hoagland steps down. Courtesy News Service WHEN LAURANCE "Laurie" Hoagland and his wife, Gay, fell in love as Stanford undergraduates, they planned to settle in the Bay Area. But his work took them elsewhere, first to Indiana and then Missouri. "My wife had long since given up on ever getting back," Hoagland, '58, says. "Then the phone rang." The call that brought them back to the Farm came in 1991, when Hoagland was offered the job as founding president and CEO of Stanford Management Company, a post he will leave later this year. The trustees established the company to consolidate management of the University's investments, from the endowment to extensive real estate holdings. The idea was to professionalize an enterprise where in times past "one or two members of the Board of Trustees who were in the investment business would get together over lunch . . . and decide what stocks to buy for the old alma mater," Hoagland recalled in a 1998 Faculty Senate meeting. Hoagland was a natural choice for the top post. He was born while his father was attending the Business School and he earned his undergraduate degree in economics at Stanford. His wife, his four children and 15 other family members hold Stanford degrees. And his most recent job had been building a successful money management firm in St. Louis. "To me, this was the closest thing to a call that you can have in the investment business," Hoagland says. "It was a real privilege to come work for Stanford." Gay Hoagland, '59, also has rekindled her ties to the Farm by serving as a member of the Stanford Alumni Association board from 1997 to 2000. Laurie Hoagland headed the company during a remarkable boom time for stocks, but he wasn't content simply to match benchmarks -- he beat them. Under his watch, the Merged Endowment Pool, which includes most of Stanford's endowment, has grown from $1.87 billion to about $6 billion. Part of that growth came from gifts added to the fund, but a good chunk is due to the 15.7 percent annual return Hoagland and his staff achieved. Today the endowment is worth $500 million more than it would have been if Hoagland had just matched the benchmark. "He has exceeded the goals and objectives that were established when he came," says Gregor Peterson, '54, MBA '59, chair of the Management Company board of directors. Hoagland also oversees Stanford's real estate holdings, including the shopping center and research park. Hoagland will stay until his successor is in place. Then he plans to take over as treasurer of the Hewlett Foundation -- working alongside former Law School dean Paul Brest, who became the foundation's president on January 1. The Hoaglands, it seems, are home for good.