Nobel's
Assets and the Nobel Prizes
Alfred Nobel,
bio | His Will
In his will, Nobel stipulated that his assets should be
invested in safe securities. That involved realizing his
interests in his worldwide industrial enterprises. By the
time Nobel's young assistant Ragnar Sohlman and the engineer
Rudolf Lilljequist had completed the difficult assignment,
some 31.5 million Swedish kroner - at that time a very large
sum - had accrued to the fund.
The Nobel Foundation was established in 1900, and is responsible
for financial management. It is headed from a Stockholm
office by a Board consisting of six Swedish and (since 1985)
Norwegian nationals appointed by the respective award committees.
The Board itself elects the Nobel Foundation's Managing
Director.
For a long time the capital was held in so-called gilt-edged
bonds, but developments in the money market gradually made such
papers less satisfactory as investments, while inflation also
cut deeply into the value of the fund. With effect from 1953,
amendments to the statutes of the Nobel Foundation permitted
more active asset management: despite a high rate of inflation,
the value of the capital has since been not only maintained
but considerably increased. In 1999, the Foundation's investments
were worth about SEK 3.9 billion.
The Nobel Prize amounted to SEK 150,800 in 1901, and fell to
a low of SEK 115,000 in 1923. Active asset management has increased
it substantially in recent years: from SEK 1 million in 1981 to
2 million in 1986, 3 million in 1989, four million in 1990 and
six million in 1991. In 2000, each prize amount to SEK 9,000,000
