Harvard endowment grows to $39B after 10 percent return

Harvard University says its endowment has grown to $39.2 billion after returning 10 percent on its investments in the last fiscal year.

It marks a slight improvement over an 8.1 percent return that disappointed Harvard officials last year but still falls short of returns recently announced by some other elite universities.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology says its investments returned 13.5 percent last year, while the University of Pennsylvania saw a return of 12.9 percent.

Harvard's endowment chief, Narv Narvekar, said the school's portfolio is "still in the early stages of a multi-year transition, with much work ahead."

Further details about the endowment's performance will be released in October.

Harvard's endowment is the nation's largest but has lagged in recent years. Narvekar was hired in 2016 to turn it around.