Hi there, Agent of Impact! Welcome to ImpactAlpha Open, a preview of top news, views and moves from last week on ImpactAlpha.
In this week’s Open:
- Amy Cortese and David Bank on the playbook community lenders are using to preserve the CDFI Fund
- In his latest Pop Impact reviews, Dmitry Ioselevich takes on apocalypse bunker shows
- From Nairobi, Lucy Ngige profiles a VC fund focused on African climate-tech.
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📞 Tomorrow’s Call: Sharing the wealth through employee ownership. Obstacle, meet innovation. Impact lenders and investors are finding ways to simplify worker buyouts and finance transitions to employee ownership. Apis & Heritage’s Michael Brownrigg, Essential Owners Fund’s Malini Ramanarayanan Moraghan, Social Capital Partners’ Jon Shell, Ownership Capital Lab’s Alison Lingane, Lafayette Square Institute’s Jack Moriarty, and other Agents of Impact will share emerging strategies for helping workers become owners, tomorrow, Mar. 26 at 10am PT / 1pm ET / 5pm London. RSVP today.
Must-reads on ImpactAlpha
- Threat to CDFI Fund gives community lenders a chance to flex bipartisan support.A whirlwind mobilization is defending the CDFI Fund’s seed capital for small businesses, affordable housing and economic development. Check out the playbook.
- In Canada, employee ownership trusts offer a path to shared prosperity. With Canada’s economy under threat from an escalating trade war with the US, employee ownership is becoming something of a nationalist rallying cry. Keep reading.
- Systemic investing as a transformative strategy for impact. A growing number of high-net-worth investors want to go beyond dealmaking to address the root causes of complex global issues with “systemic investing,” write Falko Paetzold and Jason Jay in a guest post on ImpactAlpha. Learn more.
Agents of Impact
🏃🏽♀️ On the move
- Project Equity welcomes David Kenney, previously with VertueLab, as manager of its Employee Ownership Catalyst Fund, which is co-managed with Mission Driven Finance.
- Daniela Fernandez will step down as founding CEO of the Sustainable Ocean Alliance to launch a new ocean venture.
- CarbonQuest appoints Jake Wellman, previously with McKinsey & Co., as director of strategy and market analysis.
The Week’s Podcasts
🎧 This Week in Impact: Defending Main Street lending
Host Brian Walsh takes up ImpactAlpha’s top stories with editor David Bank. Up this week: Opportunity Finance Network’s Harold Pettigrew on Trump’s order to cut a Main Street lending program, Canadians embrace employee ownership trusts, and how GPs are differentiating on impact as private equity fundraising becomes more competitive.
- Listen to the new episode of This Week in Impact.
Pop Impact
🎥 Hunkering down in a post-apocalyptic world
Sustainability themes and climate disruptions are all over the proverbial airwaves – but what are the shows’ impact bona fides? In the latest installment of our Pop Impact series, Dmitriy Ioselevich of 17 Communications reviews two “bunker” shows, in which people navigate life in the aftermath of ecological disaster. What can the streaming series’ “Paradise” and “Silo” teach us about human nature and environmental disruption? More importantly, are they worth watching?
Get in the Game
💼 Step up
- British International Investment is looking for an infrastructure and climate investment associate in Singapore.
- San Francisco Foundation has an opening for a program-related investments associate director.
- Climate-KIC is recruiting an investment innovation specialist in Brussels.
Dozens of job opportunities are available to subscribers each week on ImpactAlpha’s Career Hub.
🤝 Meet up
- April 1-2: Phenix Capital’s Impact Summit Europe (Amsterdam)
- June 4-5: IMPAQTO’s Latin American Impact Investment Summit (Quito)
- June 23-25: ReFED Food Waste Solutions Summit (Seattle)
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