Supreme Court’s attack on regulatory policy threatens SEC climate-disclosure rules. Fighting climate change just got even harder. In a case that reverberated across the regulatory landscape, the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority curtailed the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to rein in climate-warming greenhouse gasses. The 6-3 vote in West Virginia v. EPA came amid heat waves, droughts and wildfires across much of the country and the globe. “It is difficult to fathom what drives the majority members of the court to tear down the very systems that have made life livable, the sky clear, and waters clean,” said Danielle Fugere of As You Sow. The ruling opened the door to legal challenges for any regulatory policy deemed to exceed explicit direction from Congress. First up could be rules for corporate climate disclosure proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission (see, “Call No. 38: Inside the generational opportunity to reshape rules of corporate disclosure”).
Tender offer. The Microfinance Enhancement Facility is launching a tender to select portfolio managers to implement an enhanced impact and investment strategy. MEF, a microfinance fund with $725 million under management, provides short and medium-term financing to microfinance institutions to improve livelihoods and income generation. Its board of directors and key sponsors – IFC, KfW and OeEB – wish to enhance the mission and investment strategy of the fund to invest in gender-smart and responsible financial services for underserved women as well as women-owned or women-led businesses in emerging markets.
LeapFrog backs Shubham to deliver housing loans for low-income buyers in India. The Gurgaon-based mortgage lender launched in 2011 to give low-income families and workers in India’s informal economy access to affordable housing loans. Most such first-time buyers don’t have the documents required by other lenders. Shubham uses data collection, machine learning and other tech-enabled tools to underwrite its loans. LeapFrog’s investment will help Shubham “deliver home ownership to thousands of low-income Indian families for the first time,” said LeapFrog’s Michael Fernandes.
How private equity firms can fulfill the promise of employee ownership. Private equity giant KKR generated positive headlines in May (including in ImpactAlpha) when it shared with employees some of the proceeds of its exit from C.H.I. Overhead Doors. Impact investors who care about wealth inequality should be wary of private-equity firms’ claims of social impact, caution The Democracy Collaborative’s Marjorie Kelly and Karen Kahn in a guest post on ImpactAlpha. C.H.I. workers received an average $175,000, a life-altering sum for many, but puny compared to the nine-figure sums that KKR execs pull in annually. When KKR bought Gibson Guitars in 2018, write Kelly and Kahn, it piled $250 million in new debt on the company, channeling $225 million of that to the fund’s partners as a special dividend. Just $7 million went to Gibson’s 800 employees, or less than $9,000 each. “What these PE firms are doing falls far short of what authentic employee ownership represents,” the authors say, “which is the beginning of a truly democratic economy where ordinary people have more control over their lives, more stability in their work, a fair share in the wealth they create, and the chance to own and control the places where they work.”
Tideline presents "State of the Impact Investment Market: Trends, Tailwinds, Challenges," as part of its Compass series, July 12 at 11am ET.Big Path Capital’s Impact Capitalism Summit convenes July 20-21 in Nantucket, Mass.The Global Steering Group on Impact Investing gathers for the second part of its virtual Impact Summit Series, “Boosting Capital Flows in Emerging Markets,” September 22.The GIIN Investor Forum will convene in The Hague, Netherlands, Oct. 12-13.SOCAP will return on Oct. 17-20 at a new venue, the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco.GenderSmart hosts its global summit, “Traction to Transformation,” Oct. 17-19 in London.Enterprise Community Partners will hold its 40th anniversary conference Oct. 19-20 in Washington, D.C.
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ImpactAlpha, Feb. 25 – Bottom-up policies for access to capital in divested communities. Top-down strategies to reshape capitalism to work for all stakeholders. “We …
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‘Tis the season for our lookaheads to 2022 and, thanks to ImpactAlpha subscribers, we are able to make the roundups freely available. So …
ImpactAlpha, Dec. 3 – The New Capitalism Project has over the past two years dissected the failings of the current system and crafted a …
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David Bank joins host Brian Walsh to discuss parallels between the LGBTQ+ community and the impact investing community. We also hear from Megan …
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FullCycle’s Stephan Nicoleau deconstructs the climate conversation at the recent Davos meeting of the World Economic Forum with podcast host Monique Aiken, and …
ImpactAlpha, May 26 — Donnell Baird arrived at Davos this week with his partners from Brooklyn and Ithaca, where BlocPower is greening thousands …
“My question when I’m really quiet, or even when I’m talking to close friends and colleagues, is one word: Why? Why does this …
David Bank joins Monique Aiken to discuss the politics of ESG and the importance of flexible financing for startups and small businesses. Plus, …
David Bank joins host Brian Walsh to preview next week’s Agents of Impact call (3:45). And Bank checks in with Kevin Jones from …
ImpactAlpha, May 3 – The Pasatiempo apartments on the edge of Silicon Valley near downtown Fremont, Calif., are a mix of market-rate and …
Host Monique Aiken is joined by Jessica Pothering to explore the, yes, social impact of private investment trends on the African continent. Plus, …
Host Brian Walsh is joined by roundtable regulars Imogen Rose-Smith and David Bank to decide which type of “activist investor” Carl Icahn is …
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Every three seconds another person is forced out of the rhythms of normal life and into crossing a border to find safety. From …
Diversity, equity, and inclusion overall has drawn interest from impact investors in recent years, driven in part by the pandemic’s ravaging effect on …
The growing food crisis has become a global catastrophe. The combined impact of the invasion of Ukraine, climate-related disasters like droughts, and other …
Editor’s note: This post is part of ImpactAlpha’s series, “Seeding Impact,” authored by participants in the Catalytic Capital Consortium (C3) Seeding Learning Labs. Key insights …
Catalytic capital is a fast-growing subset of impact investing that addresses capital gaps left by mainstream capital. From reaching underserved populations and geographies, …
The message received from private funding activity into food waste solutions over the last ten years is clear: Food waste is an established …
Largely missing from conversations around the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure deal has been an acknowledgement of the impact of past infrastructure investment to …
Find great companies, add growth capital, and the result are bigger, stronger, more scalable companies. This analysis demonstrates what happens when the “missing …
Public policy and regulatory action have helped accelerate and catalyze the flow of private capital for public good for decades. The historic regulatory …
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ESG investing – short for Environment, Social and Governance – now accounts for about $15 trillion of assets under management in the USA, …
If the rise of a Black former maid to vice president was once unthinkable in Colombia, so too was the idea that the …
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ImpactAlpha, Jun. 7 – Where you stand on the incipient tech slowdown may depend on where you sit. Investors and executives in climate …
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ImpactAlpha, May 6 – Kevin Jones played an early role in convening the disparate, and sometimes unruly, tribes of impact investing under the tents …
ImpactAlpha, Apr. 29 – The climate disruption is spurring a long overdue upgrade for 500 million smallholder farmers, who produce up to 80% of …
If it feels like one calamity after another, put yourself in Maya Winkelstein’s shoes. Open Road Alliance, which Winkelstein has led for a …
ImpactAlpha, April 8 – The U.N. chief and former Portuguese prime minister has a simple critique of government and business leaders saying one …
ImpactAlpha, March 25 – “I’m a horrible banker,” admits Holdsclaw, who served as director of strategic initiatives at the National Cooperative Bank. Holdsclaw …
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ImpactAlpha, February 18 – The risk factors for a venture fund based in Ramallah, Palestine are obvious; the opportunities perhaps less so. “The …
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