The Brief

ImpactAlpha LP/GP: Why impact LPs are buying and selling stakes in the secondaries market

ImpactAlpha · July 15, 2026

Greetings, Agents of Impact!

☎️ Today’s Call: Crafting a positive agenda for faith-based investors. Can faith-aligned investors become known for what they are for, not just what they’re against? To help such investors move beyond negative screens to a positive agenda, Impact Evaluation Lab’s Terry Keeley and Sovereign’s Capital’s John Coleman have developed metrics for “human flourishing” for both fund managers and portfolio companies. Sue Ernster of the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration, and Jean Baptiste de Franssu, until recently president of the Vatican Bank, will join Keeley and Coleman on the next Agents of Impact Call at 7am PT / 10am ET / 3pm London. RSVP for login details.

Background reading: “How faith-based investing could and should become more impactful,” by Jim Sorenson and Terrence Keeley. “The impact portfolio hiding inside US Islamic finance,” by HalalWallet’s Kyle Natter.

🟢 Live on Edge: Faith-based investors. ImpactAlpha Edge is tracking faith-based LPs and GPs, including more than 20 investors channeling capital in line with religious values. Trinity Church – Wall Street invested in MSquared’s second Equitable Housing Solutions Fund, while Catholic Campaign for Human Development invested in Seed Commons’ Shared Capital Pool. Learn more and book a demo of ImpactAlpha Edge.

In this week’s LP/GP newsletter:

Secondaries, impact-style
CalSTRS’ sustainable infrastructure strategy
BlackRock buys Summit Ridge Energy
Galvanize’s real estate play

Featured: Impact Secondaries

Liquidity for sellers and discounts for buyers in the budding impact secondaries market. Earlier this year, Manan Mehta of Unshackled VC received a call from Gratitude Railroad, the asset manager and impact network. Did the venture firm have any limited partners that were itching to sell their positions? Unshackled, which backs early-stage impact-focused startups with immigrant founders, did have a few LPs interested in selling stakes in an earlier fund, as is the case for many emerging managers. Within months, Gratitude Railroad had analyzed Unshackled’s portfolio and purchased two stakes, one from a high net-worth LP and the other from a venture capital firm. “My job, as a steward of LP capital, is to constantly give my LPs the option to rebalance and realign,” says Mehta. Call it secondaries, impact-style. Unshackled “is a good fit for our inclusive capital strategy,” Rebekah Saul Butler of Gratitude Railroad tells ImpactAlpha. “It’s a fund we are excited about bringing into our portfolio and community.”

Market maturity. The secondaries market – for buying and selling stakes in private funds and companies – has surged amid a prolonged exit drought that has some limited partners antsy to recoup capital to redeploy. The growing market also gives buyers a chance to get into more seasoned funds with known portfolios that they can readily assess for both returns potential and impact. “We’re saying, ‘Hey, we’re in the market for secondaries. We know you, we like your thesis,’” Saul Butler says. “We’re going outbound to folks that we know might be interested in having that conversation.” Investment bank William Blair projects PE and VC secondary deal value could hit $250 billion this year. “We’re seeing an increased interest in secondaries as an investment option for those that are investing within the impact ecosystem,” says Tom Jorgensen of North Sky Capital, which raised an initial $235 million for its fifth secondary fund. “I think that’s a natural evolution and shows the continuing maturity of this market.”
Recycling capital. For buyers, “the current environment has created attractive opportunities to acquire seasoned impact assets at compelling valuations,” says Javier Hernandez of California Wellness, a private foundation. Unlike primary investments, secondary transactions do not directly provide growth capital to impact ventures. “The impact thesis,” he says, “rests less on financing new outcomes and more on strengthening the impact investing ecosystem by providing liquidity, helping investors recycle capital into new opportunities, and supporting the maturation of the impact market.” Another mission-aligned nonprofit investor is in the market looking to sell stakes in three edtech funds, to which it initially committed a total of $20 million. The fund managers drew down $10 million. The LP, who declined to be named, is negotiating with potential buyers and expecting to take a 20% to 30% discount. “I sell my stake for $7 million, I lose $3 million, but it releases the other $10 million so that I can invest in other things,” the LP tells ImpactAlpha. “It’s a quick liquidity of $17 million, where otherwise I’d be locked up for 10 years.”
Keep reading, “Liquidity for sellers, discounts for buyers in budding impact secondaries market,” by Amy Cortese.

Dealflow: Infrastructure Week

CalSTRS anchors Nuveen’s sustainable infrastructure credit strategy. Data centers, reshored factories and an electrifying economy are putting immense pressure on the US grid. One of the country’s largest public pension funds, the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, is committing up to $2 billion to building up the US’s clean energy supply in partnership with the asset manager Nuveen. CalSTRS is anchoring Nuveen’s second Energy and Power Infrastructure Credit fund with an investment of undisclosed size. The fund, which is targeting $2.5 billion, reached a $1.3 billion first close a year ago with backing from Nuveen’s parent company TIAA, Canadian, Japanese and Korean pension funds, and global insurers. The agreement also gives the $408 billion CalSTRS the option to invest in future funds from Nuveen’s energy infrastructure credit group.

Private credit. Nuveen’s energy credit business provides structured debt, credit facilities and preferred equity to energy and infrastructure developers. Recent deals have supported Pattern Energy’s SunZia wind and transmission project, battery storage developer Spearmint Energy, community solar operator Solar Landscape, and energy efficiency companies Budderfly and Redaptive. The group has invested more than $13 billion over 20 years. Nuveen’s Energy and Power Infrastructure Credit fund strategy includes natural gas and midstream infrastructure, but CalSTRS’ allocation will be directed to “sustainable” deals, including renewable power, energy storage, industrial decarbonization, energy efficiency, and investments related to domestic manufacturing and AI data centers. The commitment to Nuveen is aligned with CalSTRS’ goal of achieving net-zero portfolio emissions by 2050.
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BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners acquires community solar provider Summit Ridge Energy. Arlington, Va.-based Summit Ridge Energy has raised more than $7 billion in more than 275 commercial solar and energy storage facilities delivering power to more than 60,000 homes and businesses in the US. It plans to expand project acquisitions and developments, a large share of which will be held directly on Global Infrastructure Partners’ balance sheet. “As the market evolves, success increasingly depends on access to capital and a fully domestic supply chain,” said Summit Ridge Energy’s Steve Raeder. “Our partnership with GIP strengthens these aspects of our business.”

Energy transition. GIP, a green infrastructure investing unit of BlackRock, purchased the controlling stake in Summit Ridge from Apollo Global Management, which paid $175 million to acquire a majority stake in the commercial solar company in 2022. Early Summit Ridge investor Aligned Climate Capital will retain its stake. Also in Virginia, Global Infrastructure Partners leads a consortium that includes EQT and CalPERS that is acquiring AES Corporation, a utility-scale renewable energy and battery storage developer, owner and operator, in a potential $10.7 billion cash deal.
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Warren Equity Partners closes $2.8 billion fund to maintain and upgrade critical infrastructure. The Florida-based private equity firm invests in mid-sized infrastructure operators and services providers to maintain and upgrade US and European power and utilities, water and wastewater, transportation and waste assets, as well as some types of buildings and digital infrastructure. More than 60 global pension funds, insurance companies, asset managers, endowments and family offices invested in its fifth fund in the strategy. Warren Equity made its first investment from the new fund last month, acquiring USG Water Solutions, an Atlanta-based services provider to municipal water utilities. It bought the company from New York-based private equity firm Turnspire Capital Partners. Separately, Warren Equity manages the $590 million Elido Fund that invests in smaller companies in the same sectors.

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Dealflow overflow. Investment news crossing our desks:

UK-based Quinbrook closed its second Renewables Impact Fund at £587 million ($786 million), passing its £500 million target. The fund invests in infrastructure in the UK and Ireland that supports the UK’s Clean Power 2030 goal and Ireland’s ambition of being 80% renewably powered by 2030. (Quinbrook)
South African impact investor E Squared Investments backed Old Mutual’s sixth South Africa Private Equity Fund, supporting it as a local jobs and employment opportunity play. It is the first private equity investment from E Square’s fund of funds, Africa Private Equity News reported. (Africa Private Equity News)

Galvanize’s real estate group acquired a three-property industrial portfolio in the Boston area. The sustainable asset management firm will revamp the sites, its first in Massachusetts, by adding on-site renewable energy generation and battery storage, improving energy efficiency, and making electrification upgrades. (Galvanize)
Morgan Stanley Investment Management is acquiring a majority stake in Nicollin Environnement, a French family-owned business that provides waste collection and sorting, street cleaning and water-related services. MSIM cited the deal, part of its European infrastructure strategy, as an opportunity “to support the circular economy.” (MSIM)

Switzerland-based InPact Partners is ramping up its impact commitments to private credit and private equity funds, New Private Markets reported. (New Private Markets)

Agents of Impact: Follow the Talent

Purpose Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for steward ownership, is launching SO Capital and looking for a managing partner to develop and lead a steward-owner business investment strategy (see, “‘Purpose trusts’ power a business movement toward broader ownership and stakeholder governance”)… Elemental Impact is looking for a director of data strategy and insights… CrossBoundary Group seeks an investment associate or analyst for its Fund for Nature… Aruwa Capital Management is hiring a principal in Lagos… Colorado Health Foundation is recruiting a senior director of impact investing.