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Comment by rcar | Hacker News Reader

Cash. It's the (mostly) the cumulative sum of revenue - expenses.

no it's not.. look at 2007/2008 for an obvious example

You're right - it's just pretty close. Presumably, most of their net assets are cash based on that though with other stuff thrown in.

threw the numbers into excel.. the difference is $88.6m.. so about $3.2m difference between that and net assets

That's pretty indefensible. Safe assets like US Treasuries could give them about 1% in one year maturity yield. And since they're non-profit, would probably have no tax to pay on it.

It probably isn't cash in a bank account. Balance sheets typically list "cash and cash equivalents", which can include short-term investments of various sorts.

The WMF balance sheet for 2015-16[1] shows that they held $46.7 million in cash and cash equivalents. Long term investments are listed as $11 million.

Fun trivia from their Statement of Activities[2]: they spent more on processing donations ($3.6m) and conferences/travel ($2.3m) than on hosting costs ($2m).

[1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/4/43/Wikim...

[2] What a for-profit company might call Income Statement or Profit & Loss.

They also have a short term investments line in balance sheet too, separate from cash. Leads me to believe it's cash. Although you are correct many companies lump them together.

> They also have a short term investments line in balance sheet too, separate from cash. Leads me to believe it's cash.

I can see how you'd come to that view.

But there's no need to guess, here. These terms have legal meanings derived, in the USA, from the GAAP standards. "Cash and cash equivalents" doesn't mean "actually it's all cash because we also listed 'short term investments'".

It is cash. IIRC, there was a fuss a couple of years ago when it was found out that the WMF was losing money on that invested cash.

Is it still cash? I'd be surprised if they held 40-odd million in a plain deposit account. It's not as though they need that much working capital.

Actually, locking cash in a 1-year US Treasury would be indefensible. If they ever needed the funds they would have to sell it, possibly for a loss. They should be investing in commercial paper with maturities between 1-3 months and would receive a higher return than treasuries with much less risk of loss of principal. (This is what I do for a living)

My guess is, they probably plan their budget annually like any other non-profit, and are probably well insured against loss. If you do this for a living, can you explain why would a non-profit need almost 50% that liquid? I often read that other cultural institutions like museums are into much riskier assets under professional management. Am I mistaken about what is commonly done, or are you expressing your opinion that widespread practice is wrong?

From their statements: "The Foundation’s current practice is to maintain at least six months of cash and cash equivalents to support a combination of operating cash and a current reserve fund."

So, looks like their annual budget needs that cash. From the OP's chart, expenses are increasing exponentially, maybe their budget is continuing that pattern. We also don't know how lumpy their donations are. Maybe it all comes in during their donation drive.

To answer your specific question, I think Wikipedia is not well funded. Many museums and foundations are funded for years to come, so they can take a bigger proportion of risky assets. Wikipedia seems to spend donations as they come in. Needing 50% of their assets liquid highlights what the OP is complaining about - they spend too much. They are simply unable to invest more long-term.

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