“Game on” is the rallying cry from Australia where a likely government change at the weekend will hopefully only underpin moves towards encouraging SIBs. Meanwhile, a slightly different approach is apparent in the new platform, SharedImpact.
New Donation Recycling Platform Launches
Civil Society
A new online platform that allows donors to recycle their charitable donations by buying social investment products, has launched.
SharedImpact, a registered charity, is the brainchild of Paul Cheng, who used to lead CAF Venturesome. It is an innovative mix of donations, social investment and online transactions.
Cheng describes SharedImpact as a global donor-advised fund. “We support people who have philanthropy capital. This is money which they want to give away. But they don’t want to use it as a one-off donation.”
A person makes a donation to SharedImpact and opens an account through which they can buy a social investment product listed on SharedImpact’s website.
Any returns from the social investment product are paid into their account, and the donor can redeploy the funds in a new social investment product.
SharedImpact charges a two per cent fee for each transaction.
CSI Calls ‘Game On’ For Impact Investment In Australia
Pro Bono Australia
The Centre for Social Impact is holding a major event in October to explore what an impact investment market could look like in Australia.
Called ‘The Social Marketplace’ the two-day event promises to be ‘a game changer for impact investing’ in Australia. Around the world, innovative financial models to fund social initiatives are emerging.
Government funding is shrinking, social need is increasing, and the social sector is having to do more with less. Innovative products have been developed in recent years in Australia.
We can see increases in social procurement in corporates, the launch of the NSW social impact bond, the Western Australian Social Enterprise Fund was initiated in 2012 – to name a few.
We’ve also seen social stock exchanges emerge in the UK and Singapore. The aim of The Social Marketplace is to bring together capital and cause to build a better economy.