At the close of trading day yesterday, sources close to Boston College announced that the University had officially lost its $1 billion endowment. Executive Vice President Pat Keating told The Depths that five years ago the University decided to take heed of the advice coming from organizations like the Global Justice Project (GJP) regarding socially responsible investing.
The University took the first steps at socially responsible investing when it formed a committee in the spring of 2001 to evaluate its options. The goal was to preserve BC's nest egg while not investing in companies that were offensive to anyone, ever.
The University started by investing in musical acts like the Backstreet Boys. For a few weeks, BC saw astronomical returns from their initial investment in the Backstreet Boys. Six months into the deal, however, a boy in Cleveland, Ohio was scared by a cardboard cutout of one of the members of the all-male singing group and fell down a flight of stairs. The child filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of all those who have incurred damages as a result of the cutouts bearing the likeness of the band members. The judge awarded the boy a settlement to the tune of $10 million. The BC Board of Trustees rethought the investment in the boy band, and recouped a fraction of their initial investment.
Following the Backstreet Boys debacle, pressure really mounted on Keating and his Committee for Socially Responsible Investing. They turned their attention to the food service industry. After a night out on the town, one of the committee members stumbled upon a man selling sausages at the gate to Lower Campus.
The man's name was Che Chi. Che Chi began wooing the committee member with his array of fresh sausage and pungent peppers. BC then invested the remaining portion of the endowment in Che Chi's Sausages, Inc. Times were high for the hospitable sausage salesman until a hair was discovered in one of his trademark hoagies. The hair was discovered by none other than Red Sox centerfielder Johnny Damon. Damon sued Che Chi for $20 million. The suit was settled out of court for a lifetime of free sausage. The public relations damage for Che Chi was swift and harsh. BC then withdrew its funding, forcing Che Chi to shutdown his overseas operations.
In a final fit of desperation, BC followed the lead of the GJP and O.N.E. in a stricter manner. Keating and his committee determined that the best investment for BC would be hemp futures in Amsterdam. As it turns out, hemp went into a massive decline in the past six months. Hindsight is 20/20 and Keating described the investment by saying, "We figured that there are so many uses for hemp, and hopefully a majority of them are not offensive to anyone." While The Depths applauds BC's attempt to invest socially over the past couple of years, we believe that this only hammers home the point that socially responsible investing does not exist. Someone is always offended. The Depths will be in the McElroy lobby all next week passing a hat to restore the lost endowment funds.
Spring Break
