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SIGNATURE JOHN R ELDER
TITLE TREASURER
<TABLE> <S> <C>
<ARTICLE> 6
<LEGEND>
This schedule contains summary financial information extracted from the August
31, 1996 Excelsior Institutional Money Fund Annual Report and is qualified in
its entirety by reference to such Annual Report.
</LEGEND>
<CIK> 0000914535
<NAME> EXCELSIOR FUNDS
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</TABLE>
October 18, 1996
To the Trustees of
Excelsior Institutional Money Fund
In planning and performing our audit of the financial statements of
Excelsior Institutional Money Fund (the "Fund"), a series of the Excelsior Funds
(the "Trust"), for the year ended August 31, 1996, we considered its internal
control structure, including procedures for safeguarding investments, in order
to determine our auditing procedures for the purposes of expressing our opinion
on the financial statements and to comply with the requirements of Form N-SAR,
and not to provide assurance on the internal control structure.
The management of the Fund is responsible for establishing and maintaining
an internal control structure. In fulfilling this responsibility, estimates and
judgements by management are required to assess the expected benefits and
related costs of internal control structure policies and procedures. Two of the
objectives of an internal control structure are to provide management with
reasonable, but not absolute, assurance that assets are appropriately
safeguarded against loss from unauthorized use or disposition and that
transactions are executed in accordance with management's authorization and
recorded properly to permit preparation of financial statements in conformity
with generally accepted accounting principles.
Because of inherent limitations in any internal control structure, errors
or irregularities may occur and may not be detected. Also, projection of any
evaluation of the structure to future periods is subject to the risk that it may
become inadequate because of changes in conditions or that the effectiveness of
the design and operation may deteriorate.
Our consideration of the internal control structure would not necessarily
disclose all matters in the internal control structure that might be material
weaknesses under standards established by the American Institute of Certified
Public Accountants. A material weakness is a condition in which the design or
operation of the specific internal control structure elements does not reduce to
a relatively low level the risk that errors or irregularities in amounts that
would be material in relation to the financial statements being audited may
occur and not be detected within a timely period by employees in the normal
course of performing their assigned functions. However, we noted no matters
involving the internal control structure, including procedures for safeguarding
investments, that we consider to be material weaknesses as defined above as of
August 31, 1996.
This report is intended solely for the information and use of management
and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
PRICE WATERHOUSE LLP
