Deutsche Bank launches £10m social investment fund

Fundraising | Celina Ribeiro | 7 Nov 2011

Deutsche Bank has become the first investment bank to launch a UK social investment fund, in a move it predicts could help create a whole new asset class.

The bank today announced its £10m Impact Investment Fund which will act as a fund of funds, working with portfolio managers to invest in social projects which have a financial return. Deutsche Bank said that the launch of the fund could help establish the UK as a social investment “hub”, and “pave the way for a new asset class”.

The fund will seek out social businesses with growth capacity, and plans to invest in such businesses over the next three years and more than cover its outlay in ten years. At launch, the bank identified preventative health treatment, long-term care and rehabilitative skills and training as possible areas of investment. Bankers will also be released to advise social entrepreneurs on their business.

Colin Grassie, chief executive of Deutsche Bank UK, said, “Deutsche Bank will help to create a new asset class that we hope will attract a wide range of investors and deliver a significant amount of money to social enterprise.

“We believe that with sufficient backing from financial institutions prepared to invest not just with money but time and skills as well, a new sector of socially responsible businesses can emerge.”

The move comes just a week after charity Scope launched its own social bond and only months after the minister for civil society Nick Hurd indicated he expected commercial players to start to take an interest in the social investment field.

Directory: Scope
Who's Who: Nick Hurd

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