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Special features
Where do the new ideas come from?
All foundations, sooner or later, must face the issue of how to avoid becoming too set in their ways, too fixed in the same views about the same areas of work – with the same …
Learning visit or invasion?
‘I liked it because it wasn’t a straight in, straight out visit. We really got an idea of how people lived, and the whole village welcomed us.’ ‘I was impressed that people in the village …
What have we learned?
The moon has a shadow side but since we always see only the bright side we could only guess what the other side was like and we had to go on a journey to outer …
Case study – BRAC launches world’s first microcredit securitization
Bangladesh anti-poverty NGO BRAC has agreed the world’s first microcredit securitization structured by a group including RSA Capital, Citigroup, FMO and KfW. The securitization will provide an aggregate of BDT 12.6 billion (US$180 million) of …
Hybrid transactions in the US social capital market
The US social capital market is the largest in the world, with the affordable and supportive housing sector representing a key asset class. Common Ground, the leading developer of supportive housing in the US, has …
Case study – Media Development Loan Fund
Working in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Russia and the CIS, and the Balkans, the Media Development Loan Fund (MDLF) seeks to secure a strong and independent press in countries with a history of media oppression. …
Case study – GEXSI – making development investment safe
Greater access to finance would help thousands of viable small, grassroots enterprises engaged in local development and generating employment in varied fields. More needs to be done to make this happen, and to make development …
Case study – Grameen Danone: a case for ‘hybrid’ models
Over the last decade, the terms socially responsible investment and corporate social responsibility have become common currency, yet no one has fully translated them into practice. Mainstream SRI-oriented investors fail to see that genuinely implemented …
Foundation investment managers, it’s up to you
Foundations pay out only a tiny proportion of their asset value, typically around 5 per cent, in the form of grants. This begs the obvious question of what happens to the other 95 per cent. …
Developing an equity capital market for social purpose businesses
The rise of social entrepreneurship has resulted in an increasing number of businesses seeking to maximize both social and financial returns. Like traditional businesses, they need equity capital to grow and achieve their objectives. With …