MSN Money - The Speculator: "over a five-year period is meaningful from a practical standpoint, the variability of the data, about 300% standard deviation, make the difference not significantly different from randomness in statistical analysis."

Nevertheless, our study suggests that the Ivy-equivalent CEOs are the best performers. We attribute it partly to the tendency for companies to choose Ivy League CEOs partly on the basis of prestige. Ivy-equivalent executives, on the other hand, are quite as able but are selected based on merit. This translates into performance.

How the Ivy League CEOs perform on Nasdaq
CEO pedigree Number of companies Stock price gain Jan.-July 2003 5-year stock price gain
Harvard 9 33% 90%
Other Ivy League 7 49% 110%
Ivy equivalent 9 52% 183%
Second tier 9 29% 72%
Other 66 35% 95%

Note: If a CEO earned degrees from different schools, all degrees are counted. Source: Bloomberg Management Profile Database