ImpactAssets Custom Investments Logs Record Number of Impact Deals

Industry-leading service added 108 recommended investments in 2018, enabling donor advisors to be highly engaged impact investors with their philanthropic dollars.

Bethesda, MD April  16,  2019 – ImpactAssets, a nonprofit financial services firm that increases the flow of capital into investments delivering financial, social and environmental returns, today released 2018 figures showing clients sourced and recommended a record 108 Custom Investments totaling $17.34 million in private mission-driven businesses, impact funds and nonprofit organizations.

“We saw a dramatic jump in Custom Investments activity in 2018 and that trend is accelerating through the first quarter of 2019,” said ImpactAssets co-founder and CEO Tim Freundlich. “We’re thrilled that our donor advisors are leading the charge to create innovative opportunities that put philanthropic capital to work to fund the most creative, cutting-edge solutions to the biggest issues facing society.”

Quick Facts:

  • Since the launch of Custom Investments in 2011, ImpactAssets donor advisors have sourced and recommended $85.44 million in 589 direct investments at roughly $150,000 average per deal.
  • Investments span the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). Donor advisors have put the most charitable assets into the following SDGs:
    • Goal #8: Decent Work & Economic Growth, $15.9 million
    • Goal #17: Partnerships for the Goals, $12.8 million
    • Goal #11: Sustainable Cities & Communities, $8.8 million
  • ImpactAssets’ donor advisors have used philanthropic capital as a way to invest in early-stage entrepreneurs, paying it forward and building a larger community of impact investors
  • The Custom Investments capability is part of ImpactAssets’ innovative donor advised fund that empowers donors to increase their impact by adding specific impact investments, in addition to their grant making and other sustainable and responsible investment pool options, to build a sophisticated philanthropic endowment

“As recognition increases around the importance of providing risk-tolerant catalytic capital to early-stage impact investments, we see our donor advisors stepping up,” said Eric Meissner, Director, Custom Investments and Business Analytics. “These private debt and equity investments are bridging the funding gap for entrepreneurs who are bringing new social and environmental innovations across sectors to the marketplace.”

Recent innovative impact investing transactions, and the donor advisors who recommended them, include:

  • Penpal Schools, recommended by Stanford Graduate School of Business Impact Fund
  • Root Studio, by Beth Stelluto Dunaier and Howard Dunaier; Kuo Sharper Impact Fund and Real Leaders Fund
  • Organically Grown Company, by Pi Investments Innovation
  • Capria, by Resonance Impact Fund
  • Komaza, by Libra Social Investment Fund
  • Needslist, by SV2 Impact Fund
  • Terracycle, by The Dana DAF
  • Genusee, by Softmatter Ventures
  • Uncommon Cacao, by 1to4 Giftvest Fund

“We started ImpactAssets because we believed that investment capital in philanthropic endowments—and particularly donor advised funds—needed to move rapidly and fully to impact investing, rather than parked in the stock market doing neutral to negative on the impact scale,” said Freundlich. “Custom Investments epitomize that vision by leveraging our passionate, dynamic donor advisor community to help us find and fund positive impact investments.”

About ImpactAssets:

ImpactAssets is a nonprofit financial services firm that increases the flow of capital into investments delivering financial, social and environmental returns. ImpactAssets’ donor-advised fund (“The Giving Fund”), impact investment notes, and field-building initiatives enable philanthropists, other asset owners and their wealth advisors to advance social or environmental change through investment

About The Giving Fund, the ImpactAssets Donor Advised Fund:

The Giving Fund is an innovative donor advised fund that empowers donors to increase the impact of their giving by combining it with strategic sustainable and responsible investing to build a sophisticated philanthropic endowment. Donors recommend how The Giving Fund’s assets are invested across a range of leading impact investment options including community investment, turn-key portfolios, private debt and equity funds and custom investments. The Giving Fund currently has more than $500 million in assets in roughly 1,200 donor advised funds, working with 350 wealth advisors across 60 financial services firms.

 

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