The Week in Impact Investing: Fair gainsharing

TGIF, Agents of Impact! 

• Roundup: Predistributing the spoils of capitalism
• Podcasts: Community Capital Live, Criterion Institute and This Week in Impact
• The Call: Family offices are committing to impact-first investing
• Spotlight: Islamic finance expands beyond Muslim markets

🗣 Share the wealth. The glimmering of an AI-driven productivity boom raises the question: How should the spoils of such productivity gains be distributed? Power, more than technology, will determine the answer. Instead of (or in addition to) ex post facto largesse, “There should be a citizens’ share” of both the AI companies and the software itself, Rutgers Business School’s Joseph Blasi declared at this week’s inaugural Aspen Ideas: Economy gathering in Newark, NJ. More than a decade ago, Blasi co-authored the book, “The Citizen’s Share,” to argue for broad-based profit sharing and employee ownership. Such “predistribution” strategies, which also include expanded access to home ownership, commercial real estate and financial assets, can cut workers, residents and communities in for a larger share of the gains. On our own panel in Newark, Lyneir Richardson, Santhosh Ramdoss, Catherine Godschalk and I surfaced new financial products and fresh ideas for building a nation of owners. And A to Z Impact’s Alex Evangelides nailed it on this week’s Agents of Impact Call on impact-first investing (see below): “So much of this is just about how we cut the pie differently,” he said. “If you, as the investor, are willing to take a smaller piece of the pie, it can go somewhere else — and a lot of good things can happen if you do.”

Fair gainsharing appears to be the last thing on Elon Musk’s mind as he campaigns for shareholder approval of a pay package worth up to $1 trillion (granted, a lot of other Tesla shareholders would get rich as well if he hits his milestones), as Climate Finance Action’s Mary Cerulli lays out in a guest post. Such proposals make now the time for foundations to wield their shareholder power,” argues Eric Horvath. Power dynamics will also shape the balance between wealth-creation and wealth-extraction as private equity heavyweights get their hands on workers’ 401(k) balances, as Navys’ Amr Jomaa explains. And Gen Z protesters from Nepal to Madagascar to Peru are flexing their own power to protest unemployment, shortages, corruption and out-of-touch leadership, as Amy Cortese reports. “The energy of these young people, that’s what will define this century,” the World Bank’s Ajay Banga said at last week’s bank meetings. With the right investments, he said, “We can unlock a tremendous engine of growth.”

As Agents of Impact know all too well, making change is hard. Nevertheless, they persist. In a guest post, One Acre Fund’s Clémence Michelsen and Brian Heese are admirably transparent in recounting the lessons learned five years after an infusion of $20 million in catalytic capital. “Subordinated debt helped, but it was not enough on its own” to shake stubborn perceptions of risk about financing smallholder farmers in Africa, they write. With five years to go, most of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals remain stubbornly out of reach. ImpactAlpha’s Erik Stein wrote about how the UN Development Program is trying to do more with less. Erik and Jessica Pothering detailed the investors backing food waste reduction even as federal funding dries up. And Erik, again, reported from the Mexico City gathering of the Global Alliance of Impact Lawyers (yes, that’s a thing), who are trying to simplify impact transactions. A worthy assignment: making fair gainsharing a standard feature of deal structures and investment term sheets. – David Bank

Next Week’s Event

SOCAP’s ImpactAlpha track. Step up and step out as ImpactAlpha helps kick off SOCAP25 in San Francisco with a night of music and momentum, co-hosted with Candide Group and Partners in Equity. Special feature: live music by Candide’s Morgan Simon and the Iya Lingua Quartet. Only a few spots left – RSVP now.

On Tuesday, the “ImpactAlpha track” at SOCAP gets going with the opening panels of many of the conference’s major themes. Dennis Price is tackling the future of global finance with Amit Bouri of the GIIN and Elizabeth Boggs Davidsen of GSG Impact. Amy Cortese will introduce climate and nature-based solutions with Betsy Fore of Velveteen Ventures, Kate Williams of 1% for the Planet and Chante Harris of the Eunoia Group. Roodgally Senatus is teeing up “justice and economic prosperity for all” with Curt Lyon of Transform Finance and Susan Gouijnstook of Jobs for the Future. And David Bank will kick off “Catalytic Capital 2.0” with MacArthur Foundation’s Urmi Sengupta, Ceniarth’s Greg Neichin and Carolina Suarez Visbal of Latimpacto.

And on Wednesday, Amy will talk about unlocking small business potential with the Navajo Nation’s Alisha Murphy, Winrock International’s Tonitrice Wicks and Mayor Frank Scott, Jr., of Little Rock, Ark. To help close out the three-day gathering, David will lead a timely discussion, “Surviving four more years: Protecting and advancing impact,” with Candide Group’s Morgan Simon, VertueLab’s Aina Abiodun and Adriana Abizadeh-Barbour of Kensington Corridor Trust. “If you’ve been wondering when was the time to step up,” Simon says, “here we are.” Check out the full agenda. 

The Week’s Podcasts

🎧 This Week in Impact. Host Brian Walsh takes up ImpactAlpha’s top stories with editor David Bank. Up this week: The surprising resurgence of impact-first investing; how lawyers, yes lawyers, are working to simplify impact transactions: and, at Aspen Ideas: Economy in Newark, new products and fresh ideas for building a nation of owners.

• Listen to the new episode of This Week in Impact. Get the podcast in your feed by subscribing on Apple, Spotify, or YouTube.

🏘️ Community Capital Live: Blake Jones on Kachuwa Impact Funds’ cooperative investment model. Host Joel Skene is joined by Blake Jones of the Kachuwa Impact Fund, which pools money from accredited and non-accredited investors to invest in mission-driven, employee-owned, or cooperatively structured businesses (see, “Making co-ops work for investors, too.”). “We wanted to create a fund where everyday people can own pieces of the companies that are doing the most good in their communities,” Jones says. Watch the conversation, and RSVP for the next Community Capital Live, Wednesday, Nov. 5. 

📯 The Criterion Institute Podcast: What’s in a name. In this special birthday episode, host Joy Anderson muses on the meaning of her name in her life and work. Check out the latest episode.

The Week’s Call

The surprising resurgence of impact-first investing. For at least some wealthy families, it’s impact on. Hundreds of Agents of Impact showed up for Agents of Impact Call No. 73, featuring Trimtab Impact’s Caleb Ballou, Spring Point Partners’ Margot Kane, Ceniarth’s Greg Neichin and A to Z Impact’s Alex Evangelides and MacArthur Foundation’s Debra Schwartz. “Family offices have flexibility. They can be patient, they can be risk-tolerant,” Schwartz said. “We have to have impact-first as well as finance-first strategies.” (Disclosure: Through the Catalytic Capital Consortium, MacArthur supports ImpactAlpha’s coverage of catalytic capital).

• Multi-additionality. With Trace Welch, Ballou launched Trimtab Impact as an impact holding company to make catalytic investing accessible for more families (for background see, “Trimtab’s unapologetic pitch to wealthy families seeking outperformance – on impact”). Trimtab looks to “invest where others are not,” says Ballou. “We underwrite for impact.” Added A to Z’s Evangelides: “What’s important for us when we’re looking at individual deals is, why do you need money at a below market rate? What does that unlock for you as a fund or direct organization?”
  
• How, not why. Ceniarth has deployed more than $400 million in impact-first capital. Neichin brought his usual straight talk. “The ultimate beneficiaries – small farmers, shop owners, low-income workers –  don’t care why we do this,” he said. “They just care that money gets into communities that actually help vulnerable and marginalized people.” The notion of “market rate” returns is a subjective construct, noted Kane of Philadelphia-based Spring Point. “We are trying to back the next generation of managers who are going to make decisions differently, who are going to back overlooked founders and solutions, who are going to envision a different way in which early-stage risk taking capital shows up in society.”
  
• Read the recap and watch the replay.

The Week’s Deal Spotlight

The ‘ethical nature’ of Islamic finance opens new markets. Islamic finance may be the original impact investing. To comply with Islamic law, or Shariah, transactions must meet certain parameters to ensure they are not extractive. Charging interest on loans, for example, does not comply. Credit arrangements instead may be structured around revenue- and profit-sharing to ensure both lender and borrower are invested in a business’s success. “Inclusivity is the raison d’être of Islamic finance, bringing the Muslim community into the modern economy and having a strong emphasis on serving underserved and vulnerable communities,” states a report by the Islamic Development Bank and the London Stock Exchange Group on the state of Islamic finance. The field has grown to nearly $6 trillion in assets, up from $1 trillion in 2010.

• Shariah-compliant. The “intrinsically ethical nature” nature of Islamic finance is helping it grow beyond Muslim-majority countries, according to the “2025 Islamic Finance Development.” The UK, for example, is now a key hub for listings of green and Islamic bonds. Other areas of Islamic finance that appeal to non-Muslim markets are home financing and exchange-traded funds. UK-based Janus Henderson earlier this month raised $125.5 million for its fourth private credit fund for mid-sized businesses in the Middle East and North Africa. The $457 billion asset manager was among the first to launch an institutional Shariah-compliant private credit fund in the region. Its fourth iteration, which is aiming to raise $300 million, is backed by Saudi Industrial Development Fund, Abu Dhabi Catalyst Partners and the Saudi Venture Capital Company. 

• Market growth. Banking anchors the sector. But Shariah-compliant bonds, known as  sukuks, insurance and funds like Janus Henderson’s are also on the rise. Shariah-compliant fund managers have about $300 billion in assets under management. Sukuks have surpassed $1 trillion. Since the UAE hosted the COP28 climate summit, there has been an uptick in green and sustainable sukuk issuances to fund renewable energy, green buildings, small businesses and low-carbon transport. “Sustainability is an increasingly important area of the Islamic finance industry,” finds the report. 

• Share this post, and catch up on all of this week’s dealflow reporting.

The Week’s Talent and Jobs

💼 See and share more than a dozen new impact jobs posted this week on ImpactAlpha’s Career Hub and view hundreds of more jobs in impact investing and sustainable finance. Have a job listing to post? Submit it here.

The Principles for Responsible Investment appointedCambria Allen Ratzlaff as interim CEO. She replaced David Atkins, who is staying on as an advisor to facilitate the leadership transition… Mesirow addedMikiyon Alexander as managing director and Ryan Carter as a director on its impact finance team… Jaspal Sandhu will replaceMargaret Laws as president and CEO of Hopelab, effective January 1. Laws will become executive in residence to support Hopelab’s mental health and wellness projects (listen to ImpactAlpha’s podcast conversation with Laws). 

Impact Capital Managers promoted Justin MacLennan to senior analyst of impact management and research… Charles Wade resigned as investment director of Black Farmer Fund. Myra Marcellin, currently business support director, stepped into the role… Amy Skoczlas Cole was named director of NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business. She replaced founding director Tensie Whelan, who is stepping down at the end of the year.  

Thrive Impact Fund brought on Nicole Bradbury as senior advisor… The Neighborhood Impact Investing Fund added Eric Stephenson, formerly with Southway Builders, as a construction lending specialist… Macro hired Jeremy Stein as executive vice president of development and production… US Green Bank 50 tapped Dan Adler, formerly with IBank, as executive director.

Oakland Thrive welcomed Camille Walker Banks, formerly with BUILD Institute, as CEO… Suma Capital tapped Nicolo Balice, previously with Ancala Partners, as an investment director… Watchen Harris Bruce, Baltimore Community Lending’s president and CEO, will retire at the beginning of 2026. The CDFI is looking for a replacement.

That’s a wrap. Have a wonderful weekend.

– Oct. 24, 2025