Harvard Management hires two from hedge funds

BOSTON Aug 5 (Reuters) - Harvard Management Co, which invests the Ivy League school's multibillion dollar endowment, hired two investment managers away from two prominent hedge funds, the university said on Wednesday.

Emil Dabora, a senior managing director at Caxton Associates, will join as an equity portfolio manager while Michele Toscani, now at Fortress Investment Group, will join the international fixed income portfolio management team.

The hires come after Harvard Management was forced to lay off 50 people and lost some of its top investment managers.

Like other university endowments, Harvard suffered heavy losses during the financial crisis which made it necessary to reduce the investment staff by one-quarter.

Two months ago, Marc Seidner, Harvard's head of domestic bond investing left along with a colleague.

Late last year Harvard said its endowment shrank about 22 percent to about $29 billion during the first four months of the fiscal year. The university's president cautioned that the loss could climb to 30 percent even though Harvard's investments likely benefited this year from rallying markets.

(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Richard Chang)