More than Money: Impact Investing for Development

Abstract

Will the emergence of a new kind of investment and new class of investor that aims for social impact in addition to financial returns bring new ideas and new sources of capital to tackle problems in the developing world? There is much talk about “impact investing” and its potential to be transformative, but as John Simon notes in this report, prepared with Julia Barmeier, impact investing is new and still small. Simon joined CGD as a visiting fellow in February 2009 after serving as the executive vice president of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and holding various positions in the National Security Council, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the State of Massachusetts, and in the private health care industry. He and Barmeier define the new trend as investment specifically targeted to create development out- comes in addition to a financial return and map the main players and what we know about this nascent marketplace. They then suggest concrete steps that will help the market mature and grow, with separate and specific recommendations for practitioners, development finance institutions, and regulators