WRAPUP 1-Harvard and Yale endowments suffer heavy losses

WRAPUP 1-Harvard and Yale endowments suffer heavy losses: "Harvard and Yale, America's two richest universities, said on Thursday their endowments lost roughly 30 percent of their value last year, showing how severely the financial crisis battered even the world's best managers.

Both schools, long admired for delivering top-notch returns for years, warned about the declines late last year when their presidents told students, faculty and alumni about upcoming heavy cutbacks.

Harvard, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said its endowment dropped 27.3 percent, or $11 billion, to $26 billion in the year that ended on June 30. Despite the loss, the endowment has still returned an average of 8.9 percent every year for the last decade while the average comparable fund has risen 3.2 percent, according to research and consulting firm Wilshire Associates."