A gregarious former U.S. president may seem an odd match for a reclusive British hedge fund manager, but Bill Clinton, that consummate networker, and Christopher Hohn, founder and managing partner of the Children’s Investment Fund Management (UK), have more in common than meets the eye. They share a deep humanitarian streak. Clinton’s eponymous foundation has been one of the big beneficiaries of Hohn’s largesse ever since the 42-year-old shareholder activist launched his hedge fund firm in 2004.
Little was known about the ties between the William J. Clinton Foundation and Hohn’s London-based charity, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (better known as CIFF), until then-President-elect Barack Obama in December nominated Senator Hillary Clinton to be secretary of State. That triggered the disclosure of the names of donors to the Clinton Foundation — and there at the top of the list (outcontributing the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Dubai Foundation) was Hohn’s charity, which was credited with giving “greater than” $25 million since 2006.
The truth is it was much greater than $25 million. CIFF, which is run by Hohn’s Harvard-educated American wife, Jamie Cooper-Hohn, apparently has been far and away the largest single contributor to the Clinton foundation, which was established in 1997 and has $46 billion in pledges. Gerry Elias, a CIFF trustee (and executive director of KoryoAsia, a London-based financial adviser), says that last year alone CIFF approved a $50 million grant to the foundation, on top of smaller previous grants, to promote access to HIV/AIDS treatment, especially by expectant mothers in Africa. “This is a multiyear commitment,” says Elias, noting that most of last year’s $50 million pledge has yet to be doled out.
CIFF’s munificence is supported by its unique structure, which links it to the success of the hedge fund firm: one third of the fund’s 1.5 percent management fee goes to the foundation and 0.5 percent of TCI’s assets go to CIFF if the fund earns more than 11 percent net. Because TCI had annualized returns in excess of 40 percent through 2007, CIFF had amassed a $1.77 billion endowment as of December 31, 2007 (the latest figure available). Though the global financial crisis cost CIFF dearly — it invests heavily in TCI’s flagship hedge fund, down 43 percent in 2008, according to investors — Elias insists the foundation won’t curtail its spending. “We’re going to be as ambitious as ever,” he says.
