Scott Richland, Chief Investment Officer at Caltech sits down with David Weisburd to discuss key portfolio secrets inside Caltech’s $4.5B endowment strategy, the importance of strategy discipline in asset management and how direct investments are chosen behind Caltech's opportunistic bucket. (0:00) Introduction to Caltech's endowment and investment approach (2:19) Team dynamics and decision-making processes (4:21) Tax considerations in portfolio optimization (5:38) Evaluating evergreen fund structures (7:08) Governance and the investment approval framework (9:55) Sponsor: Carta (10:36) Debating conservative investment strategies (12:51) Leveraging alumni networks for venture capital access (14:32) Analyzing private equity performance trends (15:59) The Chief Investment Officer's perspective on macro trends (18:33) Perspectives on the private credit market (21:06) Historical financial crisis and current lessons (24:32) Asset allocation strategies during market downturns (27:50) Comparing asset allocator and direct investor roles (30:03) Investment themes and achieving consensus (32:33) Managerial assessment and capital return considerations (35:18) Public equities strategy: Index exposure and active management (37:10) Hedge funds in risk management (39:15) The CIO's role in filtering market information (43:34) Leadership principles within investment management (45:33) Transition to Caltech and adapting to academic culture (49:10) Conclusion and sponsor acknowledgments