Guides, Articles and Publications

We hope the following resources will help you get started in navigating the broad world of social investing. If you would like to suggest an additional article or publication for this page, please let us know.

Program-Related Investing

Investment strategies for achieving program goals.

Reports and Guides

PRI Primer
The PRI Makers Network's basic FAQ about program-related investing. 

Guide for Use of PRIs
October 2006, Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. A brief guide to PRI fundamentals, when to consider a PRI, and their benefits from the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation.

Program-Related Investments: A Technical Manual for Foundations
This book provides foundations with guidelines for evaluating PRIs, monitoring grant recipients, and tracking returned funds. Chapters include: The PRI Decision: From Policy to Program; Federal Tax Considerations for Private Foundations; Documenting Direct Investments; Investing in Intermediaries; Supporting Ventures; and Evaluation.

GrantCraft Guide - Program-Related Investing: Skills & Strategies for New PRI Funders
In this guide, experienced PRI makers walk through the process, offering practical advice at each step - from explaining the concept to your board to structuring and closing your first deal. HIGHLIGHTS: skills for getting started; making the first deal; lessons learned by PRI makers. GrantCraft interviewed five experienced PRI funders to find out how they handle the challenge of assessing and managing risk within their foundations.

Leveraging Your Assets with Loans and Other Program Related Investments (PRIs)
Small foundations are using PRI loans and other investments to enhance the power of their grantmaking, build capacity, and leverage the impact of their assets. Visit the ASF Bookstore ($10 for ASF members, $15 for non-members) or contact Janice Simsohn Shaw.

The PRI Directory: Charitable Loans and Other Program-Related Investing by Foundations (3rd Edition)
This directory from the Foundation Center lists leading PRI providers and includes tips on how to seek out and manage PRIs. Foundation listings include funder name and state; recipient name, city, and state (or country); and a description of the project funded. There are several helpful indexes to guide PRI seekers to records by foundation/recipient location, subject/type of support, and recipient name, as well as an index to officers, donors, and trustees.

Impact Capital Measurement: Approaches to Measuring the Social Impact of Program-Related Investments, Melinda Tuan, 2011, published by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
As philanthropic institutions are increasing interested in measuring the social impact of their investments, especially PRIs, Melinda Tuan posits "it may be helpful to do three things: 1. Identify and review the leading and promising approaches to measuring the social impact of PRIs; 2. Analyze the relative strengths and weaknesses of these approaches and identify any cross-cutting issues; 3. Understand how these examples and insights can inform the philanthropic sector's explorations about measuring the social impact of PRIs." Tuan goes on to examine the social impact measurement policies of five foundations, all PRI Makers Network members: The David and Lucille Packard Foundation, The F. B. Heron Foundation, The Annie E. Casey Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and KL Felicitas Foundation.

Articles

Program-Related Investments: A User-Friendly Guide
David S. Chernoff, adapted from a speech delivered at the Annual Conference of the Council on Foundations.

Program-Related Investments: More Complicated Than Grants, But Worth Considering
Robert Jaquay, Shelterforce Online

Should We Consider a PRI? Basic Program-Related investment Criteria for Foundations and Nonprofit Organizations
Frances Brody, Christa Velasquez

Where Money Meets Mission: Breaking Down the Firewall Between Foundation Investments and Programming
Jed Emerson, Stanford Social Innovation Review

A Basic Guide to Program-Related Investments
Christie I. Baxter

Matching Program Strategy and PRI Cost
Frances Brody, John Weiser, Scott Miller, Phyllis Joffe

The Ford Foundation History of PRIs
This overview provides a history of and insights on the use of PRIs.

Case Studies

Podcast Interview with Susan P. Silver, David & Lucile Packard Foundation
The Consortium of Foundation Libraries' Sophia Guevara interviews Program-Related Investment Officer Susan Phinney Silver, providing a good overview on PRIs and insight about Packard's PRI success. Susan also offers advice for those interested in working in the PRI field and points to other resources for those who seek to learn more. (July, 2011)

Program-Related Investing and the Indianapolis Charter Schools Facilities Fund
This is an in-depth case study profiling an innovative PRI designed to stimulate private investment in charter school facilities and support the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s education reform objectives in Indianapolis.

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Mission-Related Investing

PRIs and market-rate investing for social and financial returns.

For comprehensive information on mission-related investing, please visit the More for Mission Campaign website. The Campaign is building the necessary tools and knowledge, and facilitating a network of foundations to increase mission investing by more than $10 billion in five years.

Reports 

Key Facts On Mission Investing
Steven Lawrence and Reina Muka
This November, 2011 report by The Foundation Center is its first effort to track the use of market-rate as well as program-related investments by U.S. foundations. The survey itself is a welcome signal that the philanthropic community increasingly sees mission investing as a legitimate and potentially effective strategy to pursue.


Cash as a Mission-related Investment: A Report from the Initiative for Responsible Investment at Harvard University
Valerie Berezin, Lisa Hagerman, and David Wood, 2011
This paper explores the asset class of cash as a vehicle for mission investing. Its goal is to help foundations who wish to engage in the practice of mission investing—leveraging endowment assets to achieve financial and mission goals—by providing a simple, practical guide to mission-related cash investing.

Compounding Impact: Mission Investing by US Foundations
Sarah Cooch and Mark Kramer, FSG Social Impact Advisors, 2007
This study offers the first comprehensive look at the landscape of mission investing by US foundations.

Philanthropy’s New Passing Gear: Mission-Related Investing – A Policy and Implementation Guide for Foundation Trustees
Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors
A practical publication that can inform decisionmakers in philanthropy about how to move forward and implement an agenda for MRI in their institutions.


Aggregating Impact: A Funder's Guide to Mission Investment Intermediaries
Mark Kramer and Sarah Cooch, FSG Social Impact Advisors
This report provides a guide to mission investment intermediaries, organizations that collect capital from multiple sources and reinvest it in people and enterprises, whether nonprofit or for-profit, that deliver both social impact and financial returns.

Handbook on Responsible Investment Across Asset Classes
The Institute for Responsible Investment, Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship
A new handbook on responsible investing provides the blueprint for foundation asset managers interested in multiplying their organization’s impact on society through options that link mission with investments that create long-term value to society.

Guides

A Technical Guide to Developing Social Impact Bonds
Social Finance Ltd., London, March, 2011
A Social Impact Bond is a contract with the public sector in which it commits to pay for improved social outcomes. On the basis of this contract, investment is raised from socially-motivated investors. If social outcomes improve, investors will receive payments from government. The financial return is dependent on the degree to which outcomes improve.

Articles

Improving the Social Utility of Philanthropic Investments, Responsive Philanthropy, Summer 2011 
More for Mission director David C. Wood discusses barriers to entry for foundations considering mission-related investing of endowment funds. He discusses how foundations need to build internal staff capacity and engage with savvy investment service providers.

Mission-Related Investing: A Cautionary Tale
The Foundation Center and David Jacobs discuss lessons learned in a September 2011 Latest from Alliance article about the George Kaiser Family Foundation making a PRI with Solyndra LLC, a solar energy equipment manufacturer who suspended operations in August 2011 intending to file a Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Takeaways include (1) don't skimp on due diligence, (2) know when to cut your losses, and (3) avoid any appearance of impropriety.

The Case for Mission Investing
David Wood, More for Mission: The Campaign for Mission Investing, Philanthropy Journal, June 1, 2011
"Mission investing has an obvious appeal: It offers foundations the chance to use more of their resources to achieve their mission by leveraging their financial capital to create impact. This is similar to the way foundations might draw on other forms of cultural, intellectual, and political capital, like networks or data sets, to achieve their goals. In times of constrained resources and a fuller understanding of foundation potential, it makes sense that foundations would view their financial capital as another tool in the toolbox. And for many foundations, aligning investment strategy with organizational values is a natural outcome of designing those values in the first place. Recent interest also is a response to growth in the field of investable products."

Case Studies

Case Study: Expanding Philanthropy - Mission-Related Investing at the F.B. Heron Foundation 
Prepared by the Southern New Hampshire University's School of Community Economic Development, this case study explores the details of the F.B. Heron Foundation's rationale, exploration, and implementation of its mission-related investment strategy, and reviews tools (including PRIs), specific investments, interim outcomes, and lessons learned.

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Community Investing

Investing in community development organizations.

Reports

Community Development Financial Institutions: A Study on Growth and Sustainability, Bethany Chaney, June 2011
Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) are for-profit and non-profit financial institutions that provide access to credit and other financial services in low-income and minority markets that traditionally have been underserved by mainstream institutions. The Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation commissioned this paper on CDFI growth and sustainability in order to continue to support this critical piece of infrastructure for addressing poverty. Among the report's conclusions, it finds that the ability and willingness to leverage debt and other resources is important for sustainability and growth of CDFIs. Foundations can encourage and facilitate leverage through its capital investments and by convening stakeholders around CDFI sustainability and growth.

4th Quarter 2010 CDFI Market Conditions Survey Report
The Opportunity Finance Network CDFI Market Conditions Report is a quarterly publication based on quarterly surveys of community development financial institutions (CDFIs).

Community Investing: Opportunities Across Assets
Janet Kawalt, director of Responsible Investing Research at Evaluation Associates explores various approaches to "creating a virtuous circle establishing underserved communities as viable economic entities." Evaluation Associates provides investment guidance and research on behalf of insitutional investors.

Articles

Community Development Financial Institutions: Challenges and Opportunities
Speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke at the Global Financial Literacy Summit, Washington, D.C.

Changing Capital Markets and Their Implications for Community Development Finance
Kirsten Moy, Alan Okagaki, The Brookings Institution

CDFIs: Providing Capital, Building Communities, Creating Impact
Community Development Financial Institutions Data Project

The Double Bottom Line: Competitive Advantage through Community Investment The Foreclosure

Opportunity-Re-Imagining Urban Landscapes 
Blog post from the PRI Makers Network 2010 National Conference about the impact of program-related investments in neighborhood stabilization programs.

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Community Foundations

Reports

Exploring Impact Investments for Donor Advised Funds at Community Foundations Part II: Assessing Feasibility
This September, 2011 presentation by Imprint Capital and The Greater Cincinnati Foundation, funded by The Rockefeller Foundation, describes options for donors to participate in impact investment programs and provides a case study of a step-by-step process for assessing the feasibility of engaging donors in impact investing. Future webinars in the series will cover program design and structure and a toolkit for community foundations to participate in inpact investment efforts. For more information, contact Taylor Jordan at Imprint Capital.

Equity Advancing Equity
This report from Blueprint R&D and GPS Capital Partners describes how community foundations are deploying social investments to increase their impact.

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Impact Investing

Philanthropic, private and commercial investments that generate financial, social and environmental returns.

For more information, please visit the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) website.

Reports
A new report, Impact at Scale: Policy Innovation for Institutional Investment with Social and Environmental Benefit, released February, 2012 by the Initiative for Responsible Investment at Harvard University and InSight at Pacific Community Ventures and funded by PRI Makers Network member The Rockefeller Foundation, examines the practices of the largest U.S. investors in investing for both financial return and positive social and environmental impact. Almost $600 billion of the world's $22.4 trillion institutional assets are owned by private foundations, with the vast majority controlled by pension funds. Many PRI Makers Network and More For Mission members make mission-related investments, advancing their philanthropic priorities while attaining market-rate financial returns.

"This new report clearly demonstrates that Institutional Investments that have social and environmental value are also earning a competitive rate of financial return, allowing institutions to maintain their fiduciary duty while simultaneously having a social impact, according to The Rockefeller Foundation president Judith Rodin. "Policy makers can now only build on this track record and provide institutions with even more opportunities to invest for positive social impact in addition to market rate financial return."

The report articulates three strategies for government support of "impact investing" by institutional asset owners. An "enabling" strategy – focused directly on the asset owners – providing greater flexibility for institutions to mitigate the real or perceived risks of investing for social and environmental impact in addition to financial return. An "integrative" strategy – focused on financial intermediaries – bringing social impact to conventional investment vehicles, using tools such as tax credits and embedding performance standards into sub-markets. Lastly, a "developmental" strategy – focused on market infrastructure – supporting the application of research and development as well as technical assistance programs toward an effort to foster under-developed markets, for example in education or health care, so they may become suitable for the deployment of larger amounts of capital.

The report was authored by David Wood and Katie Grace of More For Mission and Ben Thornley of InSight. Click here to read the executive summary and here for the full report. (February 21, 2012)

Insight into the Impact Investment Market: An in-depth analysis of investor perspectives and over 2,200 transactions
This January 2012 report, authored by Yasemin Saltuk, Amit Bouri, and Giselle Leung of J.P. Morgan and the GIIN, finds that the majority of surveyed impact investors have tempered optimism about the impact investing industry, believing it is "in its infancy and growing." Most expect that 5-10 percent of overall portfolios will be allocated to impact investments within a decade. The lack of track record of successful investments is identified as the industry's biggest challenge, with the biggest risks around investment illiquidity and uncertainty of financial returns.
 

Taking Stock of Microfinance: Perception Survey Among Wealth Holders and Their Advisors in the US, Europe and Asia
This 2012 white paper, published by Credit Suisse Microfinance Capacity Building Initiative in collaboration with the Microfinance Communications Council, reports on a survey aimed at gauging perceptions about microfinance and the microfinance industry among wealth holders and their advisors. It finds microfinance is still viewed positively as an effective tool to alleviate poverty and to support entrepreneurship. Other findings include that most respondents believe the industry needs to address the risk of client over-indebtedness and rapid industry growth, and they believe both investments and donations are necessary and complementary. The report can be viewed by following the instructions on the right column here.

Solutions for Impact Investors: From Strategy to Implementation
This 2009 monograph, authored by Steve Godeke and Raul Pomares et al, and published by Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, provides impact investors with tools to tighten the link between their investment decisions and impact creation. The authors identify their intent as threefold: to attract more capital to impact investing; to assist impact investors as they move from organizational change to executing and refining their impact investment decision-making process; and to narrow the gap within foundations between program professionals and investment professionals thereby contributing to a mutual understanding and implementation of a portfolio approach to impact investing.  

Guide to Impact Investing
This May 2011 report from Grantmakers in Health, in partnership with Lisa Richter, GPS Capital Partners, offers a framework to help funders think strategically about the potential of impact investing, part of a growing practice that incorporates environmental, social, and governance criteria into investment decisionmaking. Such investments create opportunities for funders to reach a scale of social impact not achieved through grantmaking alone.  

Impact Investing: A Framework for Policy Design and Analysis
This report presents a framework for thinking about the role government policy can play in creating an enabling environment for impact investing. Written by the Initiative for Responsible Investment and InSight at Pacific Community Ventures with the support of the Rockefeller Foundation, the report includes three tools to lay the groundwork for future research: a model for locating the role of government in impact investing markets; a set of criteria that offer a practical starting point for the design and evaluation of policy; and sixteen case studies that provide detailed insight into a range of policies around the world.

Investing for Social and Environmental Impact
This report from The Monitor Institute examines impact investing and how leaders could accelerate the industry's evolution and increase its ultimate impact in the world. It explores how impact investing has emerged and how it might evolve, including profiles of a wide range of impact investors. The report also provides a blueprint of initiatives to catalyze the industry.

Maximizing Impact: An Integrated Strategy For Grantmaking and Mission Investing in Climate Change
Provides a framework for foundations to identify the different ways social challenges, particularly climate change, may be addressed through a combined approach of mission investments and grants.

Green Approaches to Fixed Income Investing: Research, Best Practices, and Opportunities
This report from Community Capital Management explores how green fixed income investments benefit the environment, reviews types of market-rate and fixed income securities that can positively impact the environment, and provides an overview of how investors can incorporate green fixed income investments into their portfolios.

Handbook on Climate-Related Investing across Asset Classes
This Handbook is a guide to market-rate investments that take into account climate risk and opportunity.

Articles

Leading the Way to More Impact Investing
This article in the March 2011 issue of Financial Advisor magazine traces the history of impact investing and PRIs, citing the leadership of Network members such as the Ford, MacArthur, Heron, Skoll and Calvert foundations in implementing PRIs to support a broad range of philanthropic goals.

How Grant Makers Can Curb Global Warming
Steve Viederman, Jessie Smith Noyes Foundation. Chronicle of Philanthropy, January 2008.

Case Studies

IRIS (Impact Reporting & Investment Standards) KL Felicitas Foundation Case Study
Apart from maximizing its own impact through strategic investing and grant making in social enterprises, the foundation is an early adopter of emerging standards measuring the impact of these investments. Because of its close relationships with the Rockefeller Foundation and the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN), starting in 2009 the foundation began applying IRIS across its investment portfolios and is using IRIS performance indicators as a key evaluation tool to identify new grants and investments.

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Shareholder Advocacy

Reports

Changing Corporate Behavior through Shareholder Activism: The Nathan Cummings Foundation's Experience
Lace E. Lindblom, President & CEO, and Laura Shaffer Campos, Director of Shareholder Activities,The Nathan Cummings Foundation, September 2010

ProxyPreview™ 2011: Helping Foundations and Endowments Align Investment and Mission
Heidi Welsh, Sustainable Investments Institute, and Michael Passoff, Proxy Impact
Proxy Preview 2011 is a compendium of shareholder resolutions that will be voted on this year.

ProxyPreview™ 2010: Helping Foundations and Endowments Align Investment and Mission
Michael Passoff, Proxy Impact
The 2010 edition is a compendium of that year's shareholder resolutions.

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Screening

Choosing investments based on specific criteria - coming soon!

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