Recent Posts

The Impact of Impact Investment – a Talk With Root Capital

As with other impact investors, the rate of return is not the key issue for Root Capital. Poverty reduction and empowerment of small enterprises are highest on the wish list for this investor company based in Boston, USA. The company has for 13 years been focusing on smallholder farmers primarily in Latin America, and since 5 years, also in Africa. They have provided 1100 loans of an aggregate amount of $350 million to 350 different enterprises. The repayment rate of these loans is 98%, an impressive rate commercial banks have a hard time beating.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Menstrual Cups and Impact Investments – The Experiences of a Social Entrepreneur

The SOCAP – conference works as a annual meeting for investors and social entrepreneurs from all over the world. Coming together and listening to examples from both worlds is a great start to understand and co-create solid business models with a positive social and environmental impact. I was excited to explore how it is to come to an event like this as a social entrepreneur prepared to get funding? I grabbed Veronica D’Souza after a panel session to get an answer to my question. D’Souza represents the start-up Ruby Cup, a venture selling menstrual cups to women in developing countries.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Social Capital Markets – On Impact, Measurability and Trust

Social capital markets attempt to connect social entrepreneurs with impact-oriented investors. The ability to measure “impact” is still considered to be important in order to create such marketplaces, even though this measurability might often not be given. To create market structures that efficiently transfer resources from investors to entrepreneurs, an old resource rises anew – trust! This would be a lesson from SOCAP 2012. The promise
A new understanding of value creation is at the core of a social capital market.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Earth Security Initiative: “Ecological Limits Create New Risks and Opportunities for Impact Investors”

This article is cross-posted in NextBillion. The Earth Security Initiative is bringing attention to the new investment agenda emerging around the notion of ecological limits. Among other things, argued its founder Alejandro Litovsky at SOCAP in Malmo last week, the limited quantity of resources like water and fertile land present a series of risks to investors, as well as opportunities for creating long-term value.  

Changing Perspectives: Risk and Resilience

This initiative aims to focus financial markets and political leaders on ecological limits as an issue of economic risk and national security. Over the last year the Earth Security Initiative has launched high-profile agendas on resources like the the Amazon (Amazonia: The Focus on Risk) and fisheries (Fisheries: A Security System) which show why investors and policy makers must factor the risks of losing the resilience of these ecosystems. At the same time, the Earth Security Initiative calls upon investors and businesses to allocate capital in ways that build the resilience of natural capital and human security.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Pop-Up HUBs, Human Libraries & Co.

How to make conferences productive? The Pop-Up Hub is a co-creation space beyond networking and idea development – it is creating action steps – a crucial element that is often missing at conferences that fail to walk the talk. We probably might all come across a certain kind of conferences: we are running from one session to another – while hardly having any time for networking and proper conversations. We are chasing other peoples’ thoughts in sessions – while hardly giving ourselves the time to develop our own ones. We are listening to panel discussions where issues of interest are defined by the moderator – while having almost no chance to discuss what really matters to us.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Impact Investment or Philanthropy – a Case for Both

Impact investment is receiving increasing attention. It is seen as the financial sector’s answer to inclusive business to benefit the poor in developing countries. More and more capital is flowing into this sector due to popular demand. However, as for any incubator, the step from blueprint to scale is big and for social entrepreneurs, the step is even bigger as they are embarking on a journey that in most cases is truly innovative and hasn’t been done before. The solution, according to Acumen Fund and the Monitor Group lies with philanthropy, to use grants and donor aids as catalyst to get these social enterprises to the stage where they can start scaling up, the stage where impact investors come in.

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)

Microfinance in Sweden?? Yup.

Mikrofinansinstitutet's device is that 'Everyone is bankable' - not far from their counterparts in the developing world.

The SOCAP conference in Malmö Sweden has gathered around 400 people interested and involved in investment with a social impact. One of the participants is Johan Sundholm from Mikrofinansinstitutet i Sverige (the Microfinance Institute Sweden) that is giving loans to the otherwise unbankable segment in society. The bank targets entrepreneurs and helps them to build their businesses in order to repay their loans. So far so good – we’ve heard it all before. But!

By: | | Social Capital Markets (SOCAP/Europe)