To: Members of the University Community
From: Robert J. Zimmer
Date: November 6, 2008
Re: $300 million gift to the University of Chicago
I am very pleased to announce a remarkable gift of $300 million to the University of Chicago for the benefit of the Graduate School of Business by University Trustee and alumnus David G. Booth, MBA ’71, his wife Suzanne Booth, and their children, Erin and Chandler Booth. This is the largest donation in the University’s history and the largest gift ever in support of any business school. In recognition of the Booth family’s extraordinary generosity, the Board of Trustees has voted unanimously to name the school the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
This gift from the Booth family is a resounding endorsement of the University’s commitment to groundbreaking theory and rigorous examination of empirical data, which captivated Mr. Booth as a student and guided his career. In making the gift, he noted that his successful investment firm, Dimensional Fund Advisers, was built on principles he learned at the University and particularly from Professor Eugene Fama.
Dean Edward Snyder has announced that the school will use the gift to support several new initiatives, including aggressively attracting and retaining outstanding faculty. Other uses being considered include developing new faculty groups in academic areas not normally associated with business schools, expanding existing research centers, and launching ambitious programs to better leverage the school’s intellectual capital, including programs that extend its international presence.
Mr. Booth founded Dimensional Fund Advisers in 1981 with classmate Rex Sinquefield, MBA ’72. His deep commitment to the University of Chicago has been long-standing, including his service on the University Board of Trustees from 2002 to the present, and on the GSB Council from 1999 to the present. He earlier gave the University $10 million to help fund construction of the Charles M. Harper Center.
Mr. Booth’s success and his decision to make such a significant investment in the University are a testament to the power of the ideas developed by University of Chicago faculty, students, and alumni. I want to express my appreciation to the Booth family for their profound commitment to the ideals of the University and their unparalleled generosity, which will ensure that the University of Chicago Booth School of Business remains one of the leading schools in the world.
Cha-ching!!! FIRST!
Looking at DFA’s website, they have Eugene Fama, Myron Scholes, Robert Merton and Kenneth French on its board.
That’s absurd…
University of Chicago rules the world
Those are all professors associated with the University of Chicago, mostly former Professors
AQR is also run by Chicago alumni.
too wasp; didn’t read
@5: not quite… Kabiller went to Northwestern… twice (ouch!)
Still like the $100m “anonymous” donation last year, classy (or strange, whatever)
test 1,2,3,
11/07/2008 10:19:54 AM GS Goldman Sachs rallies off lows (77.80 -2.92 )
The move is being attributed to speculation that Goldman Sachs (GS) may take itself private. The speculation is likely getting fueled by a comment on TheStreet.com, where columnist Scott Rothbort, who admits he is long the shares, repeats a call that Goldman will go private. GS has moved off a low of $75.
he’s gonna pull a T. Boone and ask for it back in a year
“In making the gift, he noted that his successful investment firm, Dimensional Fund Advisers, was built on principles he learned at the University and particularly from Professor Eugene Fama.”
Interesting to note that an invesment manager making a private $300 million donation to a school is shouting out the father of the efficient market hypothesis as a mentor. If markets are so efficient, where did this $300 million (and hundreds of millions more, presuming he didn’t donate his entire net worth) come from?
sellouts
Better hedge that shit.
7-
Asness was Fama’s teaching assistant and Fama and French were his thesis advisors.
@4 – Merton is an MIT guy… who now teaches at Harvard (I think).
Still, between Fama, Merton, and Scholes – that’s the three biggest names in the history of finance.
hey cy @ 12 smart guy, dfa is all about the emh, they make their bones on block trades that reduce transaction costs. Wooooooooooooooooooooo
@ #8
Anyone that gives away $100 mln anonymously is the definition of class.
17-
Just read some of the DFA site. I stand corrected! Thanks.
@16:
i know an eminent finance professor who can’t mention scholes without bursting into laughter, apparently the guy is a joke.
what a waste…
much better uses for this money elsewhere than a well-endowed, already well-respected university.
yet he isn’t eminent enough that we would recognize his name? Sorry, but your Econ 101 Professor from SUNY Ithaca does not count
What the fuck?!? Now I have to call it the Booth School? Fuck that, it will always be “Theeee GSB” to me.
U of C does rule the world now. Trott, Dugan, Winkelreid, BO and his cabinet. Suck it you Ivy League pussies, suck it long.
@20
I have the smae problem with Ryan Leaf
-Jay Feidler
I went to undergrad there. We still have the best economics department by far right?
@4, 16, 20
Don’t forget about Markowitz and Friedman.
-Abs
Would love to hear all the acadmeic egg heads at UC explain away the current state of the financial system. Not the best time to be teaching free market economics.
@27
Truth, but we’re still blazing the trail others will follow.
This is a common phenomenon known as “Buyvie.” Buyvie means donating such an absurd amount of money so that your school can pretend it’s an Ivy.
$300 million later and still not there. How sad.
Hah, and for what conceivable reason or miracle was Cornell present when the Ivy League was set up? Happening to have been around for a meeting does not make you a good school
@12
You are confusing Perfect Competition with the Efficient Market Hypothesis. Go reread your economics book. Nice try, though.
@25, nice double entrende
@27, start here: http://igmchicago.org/
@32, yeah I could read that garbage as well. I’m a MBA student as well and watching these professors try to teach the bell curve and basic finance courses can be pretty comical when you throw in some, you know, facts and current events.
#29 The only people who say “Ivy League” are the ones who couldn’t get into Harvard, Yale or Priceton.
@12: Gene hasn’t been as big a proponent of EMH for the last 15 years or so. His papers with Ken French demonstrate that to say the least–plus to the guy who says DFA is totally an efficient markets shop, that’s a bunch of bs that they sell to clients. Their trading methodology is only one of the ways they (may) add alpha.
Dang! I invented the most popular financial invention ever created. No “Nobel” for me. No “business school” named after me. I am a little bitter.
~Merton Cashmachine
Vienna Bologna University
OK you finance brainiacs, isn’t giving assloads of money to schools that already have assloads of money about the least efficient way you could possibly utilize all that capital?
Or is there some equation that stipulates that all the rules of finance go out of the window when engaged in atavistic worship of great piles of capital?
@ 37 – There are emotional ties to have attended a certain school, and yes, the top schools produce the top earners so the rich get richer!
BTW – Booth School? What a retarded name for a respectable school.
mktmkr, who cares if you could read it. Anyone can. Go read it. Their opinions include facts and current events.
It’s funny that you wonder what the eggheads are saying, yet when their opinions are pointed out in total, you ignore them. Pontification at its best.
Bottom Line:
They said a lot and it was correct. They called for the equity injections while Bald was still trying to unfold his TARP.
My personal favorite is the rant about fair value accounting rules:
http://faculty.chicagogsb.edu/brian.barry/igm/ShootingtheMessenger2008-10-12.pdf
@37
I’m not sure about stipulations in this donation, but the $100mm donation last year was to pay for scholarships to kids who couldn’t afford to attend GSB otherwise.
That sounds like a pretty good allocation of capital to me, no?
@37, It’s called R&D.
#31 you’re cute
@ 39
My point is that these explanations and conjectures are all after the fact. It’s all moo. Like a cow’s opinion, it doesn’t matter.
37 here,
Used be these schools didn’t admit women, jews, blacks or asians, let alone poor people. They could fill to overflowing with qualified Chinese and Indian applicants, too.. If the school stays the same size while the economy, and qualified applicant pool, explodes, it isn’t exactly extending its mission, is it? Not even keeping up.
Are you people really so dense?
@40. No, not a good alocation. Either make the money ahead of time, get your employer to pay, or go into hock like everyone else.
If that doesn’t convince you, let me introduce you to my ‘Patek for InnerCity Schoolkids program’. These children can not afford gold watches, for $100 dollars a day, you can keep the smile on their faces.
@37 – Also has a lot to do with creating a legacy.
@ 33 – Need the basic building blocks of economics/finance to build a better understanding of what is happening currently. And a lot of this stuff does hold if you get past the basic 101 and dig into the theories
@45
Gold watches? What is this 1982?
DFA = enhanced index shop. Who cares.
@43, YGTBFKM: did you actually unwittingly quote Joey from friends? when he confused “moo” with “moot”… thus you’re more confused than he???
you do sound like the cookie-cutters from GSB
the gsb is for r-tards. everyone knows gsb douches range in intelligence from .5 an undergrad to .75 an undergrad.
get fucked gsb losers.
#50: Way to go full retard.
@ 49
Yes I “unwittingly” made a comment that is coincidently a direct lift from Friends. Are you that thick? Do any of you shmucks have a sense of humor?
And I would never go to GSB. Bunch of high functioning retards.
“DFA = enhanced index shop. Who cares.”
Ummm … and the guy just gave $300 million of his own money to the GSB so … do you have $300M to give?
Didn’t think so.
Tosser.
@50
Sounds like someone went to Kellogg. Or maybe DePaul.
#50 here
naw, went to uchig. just trying to be a dickhead and elicit some good responses.
@ 3 and 23
“University of Chicago rules the world”
How cute.
@anal-yst, last year’s donation was to the college, not the GSB.
#50 is for the most part correct. MBA students there are fucktards. People like Booth and the dudes at AQR were PhDs at GSB, not MBAs. There are certainly exceptions, but myself and most of the other undergrads found GSB classes easier then classes at the College while the MBA students seemed to think every fucking problem set was akin to splitting the atom.
Real quants go to Chicago Economics. GBS was/is the petting zoo.
wtf you cant find something more productive to go than give it to Chicago?
This sets a bad precedent. What if the next guy gives $305 M? Will they change the name again?
#61 – go get your $305 million, and we’ll name a urinal after you.
I imagine everyone had the same points about Tuck, Darden, Wharton, etc when they changed the names.
Poor bastards who are in the first grad class are going to be Booth grads. Common response, is that like Devry?
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