Christ Church

Christ Church relies on its endowment to provide nearly half of its annual income. This dependency will almost certainly increase in future years as other sources of income are likely to grow slowly, if at all, in real terms. As a result, maintaining and increasing the purchasing power of the endowment whilst providing a significant annual cash income is a vital part of preserving Christ Church in perpetuity.

Some years ago, Christ Church realised that it did not have the budget to support an in-house investment capacity and sought to outsource this activity in cost efficient ways to third party managers who shared our very long term investment horizon. The establishment of OUem provided a suitable vehicle for Christ Church to work in co-operation with the University and other colleges. About two-fifths of the endowment is now invested in the Oxford Endowment Fund.

Christ Church greatly values the ability to diversify into a range of alternative asset classes which the Oxford Endowment Fund offers. Identifying, obtaining access to and monitoring such investments requires infrastructure which is very difficult for Christ Church to acquire or maintain.