PANews reported on February 9 that according to FT, American foundations and university endowment funds are increasing their investment in cryptocurrencies. Although cryptocurrencies are highly volatile, they have performed far better than other asset classes over the past five years, and many people who originally stood by are now joining in, fearing that they will miss out on the surge in prices.

One-year-old Austin College is raising a $5 million Bitcoin fund for its $200 million endowment, the first of its kind among U.S. endowments and foundations.

In October, Georgia’s Emory University became the first university endowment to disclose its holdings in a bitcoin exchange-traded fund. The $4.8 billion Rockefeller Foundation is considering increasing its investments in cryptocurrencies if its user base becomes more diverse after investing in a crypto venture fund two years ago, according to the foundation’s chief investment officer.

Pantera Capital, a leading California-based venture fund focused on digital assets, has seen an eightfold increase in its endowment and foundation client base since 2018.

Leading U.S. endowments and foundations were among the first institutional investors to embrace cryptocurrencies. Yale University’s endowment invested in two cryptocurrency venture funds in 2018, when bitcoin prices were less than one-tenth of today’s prices.

Britt Harris, former chief investment officer of the $78 billion University of Texas/Texas A&M Investment Management, said that under his leadership, the largest U.S. university endowment made a “small experimental” investment in a cryptocurrency venture fund in the early 2020s, considering it a “potentially attractive future strategy.”