Porter County’s
financial gains from the investment of the proceeds of the sale of the
county owned Porter Memorial Hospital continue to grow.
According to
investment advisor Amanda Black, chief executive officer with Capital Cities
LLC, the County’s Nonprofit Charitable Foundation ended its second quarter
of the year with $151,462,130 in its portfolio.
That’s a $4 million
increase since the first quarter and so far the investment has earned
roughly $5.5 million in interest.
Black said the
portfolio has reached an interest rate of 4.4 percent since its inception,
higher than the performance target of 2.47 percent.
“(The investment)
is beating all the benchmarks we’ve set for it,” Black told the Foundation’s
Board of Trustees which consists of all members of the County Council and
the Board of Commissioners.
The Foundation was
initiated earlier this year to gain a higher return on investment from the
hospital sale principal than conventional investment methods. Officials have
suggested the interest could be used to fund capital projects in the county,
help community non-profit organizations or bonding for local municipalities
and schools.
County officials
said it is their goal for the investment earn 5 percent in interest and any
gains above that will be put back into the fund to continue to build the
portfolio.
Black said the
Foundation benefited from a growing marketplace which has bounced back from
the downward pressures that Brexit caused in June. The strongest
performances were seen in small cap growth stocks which returned 9.2
percent. Equity styles all display positive returns and so did fixed income
styles, although at a slower rate, she said.
The Foundation
investment includes more fixed income than equities but all are still
performing strongly, Black said. “Every one of your investments have green
stoplights.”
After Black’s
report, County Council President Dan Whitten, D-at large, said he would like
for his colleagues to further discuss a procedure for taking requests of
non-profit groups wanting to use the interest money. “I’ve been getting many
calls, as I am sure a lot of you have, on how we are going to do this,”
Whitten said.