Through its relationship with a carefully-selected team of national and international professional money managers, United Methodist Foundation, Inc. is able to offer high quality asset management for its long-term funds at a cost that may be lower than available elsewhere.
UMF currently partners with Smith Barney Consulting Group and has nine portfolio managers handling our custom portfolio of investments for the Balanced Fund and Fixed Income Fund. Total investment in the nine funds is allocated based on percentages determined by our Board of Directors as the best to have reasonable returns while minimizing risk. View a graph of the allocation guidelines. Our Short Term Investment Fund was created in partnership with the Self-Help Credit Union of Durham.
The Foundation provides full portfolio performance reporting to include comparative analysis against relevant indices and benchmarks on a quarterly basis. Additional reports are available upon request to include an overall comprehensive annual report containing information consistent with that required by The Book of Discipline for Charge Conference Reporting.
Because of the economy of scale available to church Investment Partners, the Foundation is able to provide all administrative and investment management services for a low annual cost. The fees include all expenses incurred for professional fund management plus the Foundation’s administrative services and free planned giving education offerings.
All monies invested with United Methodist Foundation receive top quality, expert professional fund management resulting in excellent returns over the long-term at a lower cost. For example, among the Foundation’s current fund managers, several have minimum investment requirements that would preclude most local churches from opening new accounts. Some of these long-term managers require minimum investments well above what most churches would have to invest.
United Methodist Foundation employs Smith Barney Consulting Group (Atlanta Region) for custody and direct oversight of all investment manager services. This provides local church trustees and finance leadership with an “arm's length” level of protection for the liability of specific investment decisions. Church leaders have expressed appreciate this level of due diligence in helping meet their fiduciary responsibilities as required by The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church and the Uniform Prudent Investor Act. All funds invested with United Methodist Foundation are protected by the Securities Investment Protection Corporation (SPIC) against fraud up to $75 million.
The Foundation’s Board of Directors reviews investment manager performance quarterly. This information is available to all Investment Partners upon request.
UMF's Audit Committee is developing guidelines which will help the Foundation exceed requirements for non-profit corporations and has been called “on the leading edge of best practices.”