The Brief

The Week in impact investing: System stewardship

ImpactAlpha · December 12, 2025

TGIF, Agents of Impact! 

☎️ Next week’s Call: Muni impact investing for shared prosperity. Innovative strategies are helping small cities and rural jurisdictions tap municipal bonds and integrate impact investments into public finance strategies. Join Lourdes Germán of Public Finance Initiative, Michael Gaughan of the Vermont Bond Bank, Damon Burns of Finance New Orleans, Eric Glass of Clarion Call Capital, and Brian Boland of Delta Fund, Wednesday, Dec. 17 at 10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm London. RSVP here.

In today’s Brief: 

  • Roundup: Active engagement
  • Podcasts: Stackwell’s Trevor Rozier-Byrd and This Week in Impact
  • The Call: Tackling advisor roadblocks

🗣Active engagement. Many large institutional investors have long understood that the breadth of their portfolios means they effectively own the entire economy and thus own responsibility for system-level risks that could bring it down. More recently, individual investors with 401(k) and other diversified investment accounts have come to realize that system-level effects impact their returns more than any stock-picking genius they might possess. Even more broadly, families, neighborhoods and whole communities that ride on the strength of a shared social fabric also face system-level risks including, but not limited to, economic and environmental collapse. Heightened awareness of that common predicament is giving the theory of “universal ownership” salience beyond the confines of finance. We all have a fiduciary duty of care and mutuality.

Opportunities to put that into practice abound. The Sierra Club Foundation considers climate change to be an “un-hedgeable systemic risk,” and is dumping unresponsive fund managers, embracing innovative fixed-income indexes, and advocating “system-level” investing, as Roodgally Senatus and I reported this week. Strong methane rules could support US competitiveness and mitigate risks as the US and other countries rush headlong into data-center construction, wrote CERES’ Andrew Logan. Instead, the Trump administration has moved to weaken such rules. FinDev Canada, the newest development finance institution among the G7 developed countries, has prioritized speed and efficiency in deploying about $1 billion in Africa, Asia and Latin America. “We need to have a degree of urgency about what we do,” FinDev Canada’s Paulo Martelli told Erik Stein. 

The rise within modern corporations of “management primacy,” at the expense of shareholders along with other stakeholders, “all but ensures structural inequality and facilitates value extraction at an accelerated pace,” Fran Seegull of the US Impact Investing Alliance wrote, offering “system stewardship” as a path forward. In Portland, the 1803 Fund’s Rukaiyah Adams has begun deploying some $400 million from Nike billionaires Phil and Penny Knight to revive the historically Black neighborhood of Albina and transfer assets to a community-owned real estate investment trust. The ambition, Adams said, is “to demonstrate a new way of doing capitalism.” MacKenzie Scott has given away more than $7 billion in 2025, to a diverse array of grantees, and at least $26 billion since 2019. “What if care is a way for all of us to make a difference in leading and shaping our countries?” Scott wrote. The apt title of her annual letter: “We are the ones we have been waiting for.” – David Bank

The Week’s Podcasts

🎧 This Week in Impact. Host Brian Walsh takes up ImpactAlpha’s top stories with editor David Bank. Up this week: How the Sierra Club Foundation is leaning into system-level investing; the 1803 Fund’s ambitious plans to restore historically Black neighborhoods in Portland; and, how financial advisors can meet clients’ demand for impact investing opportunities, and other takeaways from this week’s Agents of Impact Call.

Agents of Impact. Two particular life experiences set Trevor Rozier-Byrd on the path to create Stackwell Capital, a financial wellness and wealth app to get young, diverse investors started on compounded wealth in the stock market. The first was back in 2005, when he purchased a few shares of Apple stock as a 22-year-old just out of college. The gains on that single purchase later paid for a full year of law school. The second was on the investment banking team for a company led by Bob Johnson, co-founder of BET and founder of The RLJ Companies. “That was the first time I had ever seen an all-Black management team in my career. It’s also the only time I’ve ever seen that,” Rozier-Byrd says on the latest episode of the Agents of Impact podcast. “In that moment, I believed that I could do what they were doing.”

The Week’s Call

How financial advisors are starting ‘the values conversation’ with their clients (video). Financial advisors who engage with clients about their values and offer credible impact strategies can deepen their relationships and prepare for the Great Wealth Transfer. Advisors “are the front door to this conversation,” says ImpactPHL’s Cory Donovan. “They already have the relationships, they already have the trust. They’re already managing the money.” Donovan joined CapShift’s Liz Sessler, Westfuller’s Randall Strickland, Glenmede’s Julia Fish and ImpactAlpha’s David Bank on Agents of Impact Call No. 75 to offer practical advice for advisors seeking to meet client demand for impact investment opportunities. 

  • Next gen. Strickland pointed to powerful tailwinds: the generational transfer of as much as $125 trillion is well underway. “The next generation is more purpose-driven and does want to align their values with their investments,” he said. “There are foundations that are realizing that their funds are out of step with their mission and so are seeking to align.” Fish suggested advisors skip the jargon and not let the conversation get derailed by confusion over ESG or sustainable or other potentially triggering words. “‘Let’s talk about how you think about your passions and your legacy and your purpose’,” she suggested. ImpactAlpha’s Advisors’ Corner, in partnership with CapShift, offers “Getting Started” primers and “Deep Dives” around specific strategies, such as, “How recoverable grants enable clients to give today — and tomorrow,” by Capshift’s Jordana Pleat.
  • First steps. Sessler encouraged clients to overcome their own hesitancy and initiate the conversation. “The client hires an advisor to be the expert, and they don’t want to be seen as foolish for asking about impact investing, for asking about values alignment,” she explained. “And the advisor likes to be an expert, and so they stay focused on what they know and understand. This is a real opportunity for people to grow together.” Donovan said that when ImpactPHL started in Philadelphia a decade ago, “most people, most asset owners, had not talked to their financial advisors about their values. They had never been asked about it.” In the last few years, more than a dozen foundations in the region have changed advisors as they seek local investment opportunities and deeper alignment between their portfolios and their missions. “I’m hoping that in another 10 years, if you’re not doing this, people will look at you and ask, ‘Why not?’”
  • Keep reading, “How financial advisors are starting ‘the values conversation’ with their clients,” and watch the video replay. 

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. And catch up on all of this week’s dealflow reporting. 

Steven Meier, who last month stepped down as chief investment officer of the New York City Retirement Systems, became vice chair of Neuberger Berman’s institutional business, where he will advise pension funds and other limited partners on asset allocation… The Inter-American Development Bank Group appointed Graham Macmillan, former head of the Visa Foundation, as general manager of IDB Lab, effective Jan. 5. 

Natalie Shriber is supporting the Sea Forward Fund as a senior investment consultant… Citi promoted Randy Alcala to social finance head for Latin America and the Caribbean… Dalus Capital’s Laetitia Marcadé became a board member of La French Tech Mexico… Upwardly Global appointed Gregory Haile, previously with Strategos Group, as CEO, starting Jan. 5…  SJF Ventures promoted Jacqueline Lipkin and Perry Clarkson to managing directors.

CalSTRS welcomed Nick Abel, previously with Wespath Institutional Investments, as director of sustainable investment and stewardship strategies… Jodie Tapscott returned to Morningstar Sustainalytics as head of climate and nature solutions… Waheera Mardah, formerly with the New York City Economic Development Corp., joined JPMorgan Chase as vice president of corporate responsibility… JPMorgan tapped Karen Purcell, previously with Bank of America, as head of community development banking.

Joe Sarci joined Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco as senior vice president and chief information officer… Lisa Jackson, Apple’s vice president of environment, policy and social initiatives, plans to retire in January… Minneapolis Foundation welcomed Nathan Wade, formerly at McKnight Foundation, as chief investment officer… The Nature Conservancy tapped Jeff Mindlin from Arizona State University’s Enterprise Partners as chief investment officer.

That’s a wrap. Have a wonderful weekend. 

– Dec. 12, 2025