ImpactAlpha, June 16 – Despite all the efforts at diversity, equity and inclusion, little has meaningfully changed about how, where and to whom capital flows. Known Holdings is out to break the logjam.
“Our goal is to shift capital through all of the ways of wealth creation” says Valerie Red-Horse Mohl, who cofounded Known in 2021 with Nathalie Molina Niño, Jim Casselberry and Ushir Shah. “We manage assets, we deploy assets, and we shift capital to focus on eliminating the racial wealth gap.”
“We all have to recognize that the majority of wealth in this country was garnered by the taking of native lands for no money and the free labor of African slaves,” Red-Horse Mohl tells David Bank on this week’s Impact Briefing podcast. “We are not anywhere near an equitable distribution of capital.”
Known is the rare Black, Indigenous, Latina and Asian American-owned asset management firm. It has quietly attracted investors looking to move 100% of their assets toward impact. “We have big ambitions to really shift capital in significant ways,” Red-Horse Mohl says.
The ambitions can be seen in one of the firm’s latest moves: the acquisition of Living Cities $100 million Catalyst Fund III, which invests in women and fund managers of color. Living Cities’ Demetric Duckett has joined Known as a managing director.
Expect more deals like this as Known consolidates talent and capital for greater impact. “Our thesis is to invest in the best and the brightest. It’s also a thesis around positive impact in their strategies,” says Red-Horse Mohl, who at the East Bay Community Foundation moved most of the organization’s assets to managers of color. “It’s exciting to be able to do it in a much bigger way as we scale with Known.”
