"It's all what have you done for me recently," said Ernest E. Monrad '51 of Northeast Investors Trust. "It looks good and that's particularly encouraging entering a capital campaign," Monrad said.

The praise of the endowment's performance, however, was not unanimous.

Albert F. Gordon '59, a long-time HMC critic and generous University donor, called the 9.8 percent "lack-luster."

"A 9 percent return is not a very good return given the expense of running HMC and the amount of risk they have in the portfolio," Gordon said. "I don't see why Harvard doesn't join something like the Common Fund and save money."

The Common Fund manages the endowments of a group of universities.

Gordon added that his biggest fear is the amount of derivatives in the HMC portfolio.

"We know they have derivatives, but they won't tell us how much," he said. "The key issue here is disclosure of what they have.