December 10, 2021 | Podcasts

Briefing: The Reconstruction This Time

ImpactAlpha Editor

Isaac Silk

On this week’s podcast, host Monique Aiken reflects on the themes of The Reconstruction podcast – rethink, redress, liberate – with selections from conversations with Anne Price, Rodney Foxworth and Nwamaka Agbo. 1863 Ventures’ Melissa Bradley discusses the surge in Black entrepreneurship and Aiken sets up next week’s Agents of Impact Call with a stirring call to action from… Frederick Douglass. Plus, the headlines.

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ImpactAlpha Editor

Isaac Silk

January 30, 2023

The Brief

Featured: Growth Markets

What 672 private debt and equity funds show about impact investing in emerging markets. After a pandemic-related pause, institutional investors are again moving money into private impact funds in emerging markets. But only a small fraction of those funds are managed locally. In its latest market snapshot. The Swiss impact investing specialist Tameo identified a whopping 672 fixed income and equity funds, run by 346 fund managers, which collectively manage $84 billion in assets focused on emerging and frontier markets (representing about 7% of assets in the $1.2 trillion impact investing market). U.S.-based firms manage 25% of the total; another 43% of assets is managed out of Switzerland, the Netherlands, the U.K. and Germany (for context, see, “To drive more capital to small businesses, invest in local fund managers as entrepreneurs”). Ten investment firms manage roughly one-third of private impact assets in emerging markets. Still, Tameo’s Ram Narayanan tells ImpactAlpha, “There are more and more smaller fund managers emerging in developing countries.”

Dealflow: Catalytic Capital

Invest Appalachia secures $19 million to bridge investment gaps in Appalachia. Central Appalachia’s forests and ecosystems are some of the most biodiverse in the world, and its mountains among the oldest on Earth. The majority-white region is also home to a significant Indigenous population, as well as Black, Latino and Asian descendants of the region’s former coal mine workers. Invest Appalachia, a new community-based impact fund, is taking a catalytic capital approach to advance economic inclusion, health equity, climate resilience and place-based impact in Central Appalachia. “Appalachia’s natural resources and people have fueled the development of America’s economy for generations, and the region has suffered extraction and disinvestment in return,” said Invest Appalachia’s Andrew Crosson. The fund, which is targeting $40 million, secured a $10 million anchor investment from UnitedHealth Group. Other investors include Sugarbush Valley Impact Investments and the Laughing Gull Foundation. LOCUS Capital manages the fund.

Impact Voices: ESG Wars

Is ESG an emergency from which the public needs protection? Oklahoma legislators ride to the rescue. Don’t say ESG, at least in Oklahoma. A group of state senators are seeking to quash the use of environmental, social and governance practices not just by state agencies, but by companies, citizens and even visitors to the state. To drive home the point, lawmakers want to declare a state of emergency around ESG. “Imagine that,” as Oklahoma’s official tagline suggests. The bill, SB 974, states: “No governmental entity including but not limited to this state, any state agency, political subdivision, any trust, committee, or commission of any political subdivision of this state, and business operating in this state, or any citizen of this state or individual within the boundaries of this state, shall use, promote, enforce, provide data for use in, or otherwise participate in the creation or use of ESG or ETI policies related to hiring, firing and evaluation of employees.'' (ETI, for "economically targeted investments," is Labor Department terminology for socially responsible, or ESG, investing.) The bill is unlikely to become law, but if it did, Ryon Harms of Manifest Social writes in a guest post on ImpactAlpha, “it would impact many of the state’s largest employers and could cause irreparable harm to its economy.”

Agents of Impact: Follow the Talent

Enterprise Community Partners is recruiting a chief executive officer in New York… Upstart Co-Lab seeks an impact investing coordinator for its inclusive creative economy strategy… The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is looking for a program officer for digital learning research and development in Seattle… Quantified Ventures has an opening for a health and human services associate director and senior associate in the Washington, D.C. area.

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January 30, 2023

The Brief

Featured: Growth Markets

Sponsored by J&J Impact Ventures

Dealflow: Catalytic Capital

Impact Voices: ESG Wars

Agents of Impact: Follow the Talent

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