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Get a refresher on Social Finance & FASE
Selected Publications about and by FASE
Pioneers Post (7/2023) „Deep impact – or just managing risk? Pathways from ESG to investing for system change“
by Christina Moehrle
Pioneers Post (12/2022) „Impact investing in 2023: doom and gloom or silver linings?“
by Christina Moehrle
EVPA Policy Matters: Interview with Laura Catana, FASE „Access to funding“ (video)
EVPA blog series „Unlocking EU Funds for Social Economy“ „FASE’s EU success story: From Capacity Building to Risk Sharing“
Pioneers Post (4/2022) around the FASE Impact Fire Talks „How impact investors can avoid the risk of mission drift and impact washing“
by Laura Joffre
Euraktiv special report „Financing the social economy“ supported by EVPA „The bankers of the social economy“
by János Ammann
Pioneers Post (3/2022) „Better terms, better impact – but can impact-linked finance overcome a chicken-and-egg situation?“
by Laura Joffre
Impact Investor (12/2021): „EIF: A closer look at impact investing’s quiet achiever“
by Christian Nielsen
Pioneers Post (6/2021) including the ESIIF
„Beyond warm glow: why early-stage social ventures need more impact-first finance“
by Dr. Markus Freiburg and Christina Moehrle
EVPA Success Stories (9/2019):
„Social-Bee and FASE: Integrating Migrants the Easy Way“
by Caroline Cornil (EVPA) with input from Social-Bee and FASE
Alliance Magazine (9/2018):
„Why we should think out of the box to build a single European market for social innovation“
by Dr. Markus Freiburg
More Social Finance knowhow
2022
A new guide by Ashoka, Generation Pledge, Echoing Green, Catalyst 2030 and McKinsey for „Highly Resourced Individuals“ (people with considerable wealth and a general ability to influence social, business, and political circles): If you are one of them, find out how you can strengthen your capabilities for systemic change and a better world.
Social innovation guide alert: Two new complementary EU guides by the DG EMPL group aim to help both the EU Member States as well as the stakeholders to support and develop social innovation. (1) Find the Practical guide for project promoters on social experimentation that gives a solid understanding of social experimentation as well as pragmatic advice for project development. (2) Study the Toolkit for scaling-up social innovation that looks at social innovation from the perspective of expanding those which have proven to work.
2021
A new position paper by the EU recommends 5 action items for a better social economy, e.g. ensuring better access (for social enterprises) to financial and non-financial resources as well as strengthening impact measurement and management. We had the pleasure of contributing our insights. For details and other recommendations please check out the EU position paper here.
Would you like to know how effective the European Commission’s „Social Business Initiative (SBI)“ has been? This study analyses the impact of the SBI on the development of social enterprises/social economy and their operating environments at national and EU levels.
2020
Securing small transactions below EUR 500k continues to be a challenge for social enterprises. One of the reasons is that transaction cost is relatively high for investors. With valuable support from the EU, FASE set out to address this barrier in the ecosystem in a project called „Building an open, pan-European pipeline of investment-ready, early-stage social enterprises with customized deal-by-deal support“. Our final report illustrates the background of this complex challenge and provides many insights and practical examples how to successfully address it.
More innovative recipes: the EU sponsored a second edition of the „Recipe Book for Social Finance (2019)„. If you are on the hunt for inspiring initiatives, the latest in social finance knowledge, and a step-by-step „cooking class“ to contiribute to a thriving finance market for social enterprises, this is the publication to dive in.
2019 and before
For readers interested in how to shape the social finance ecosystem and use powerful blueprints for replication in other European countries, we have two new reports: FASE’s 2018 project report to the EU on rolling out customized deal-by-deal support, as well as FASE’s recommendations how to use innovative financial instruments to provide public services in Poland.
For those who have an appetite for innovation: a hybrid investment fund to empower social enterprises to scale. FASE, Ashoka and McKinsey designed this blueprint and illustrate the details in Taking Off – A Hybrid Investment Fund to Unlock the Growth Potential of Social Enterprises in Germany.
Market study Achievieving Impact for Impact Investing: Ashoka, McKinsey&Company and FASE joined forces to provide both, a reality check on the impact investing market and a fresh perspective : “hybrid finance”. This is a summary of the main findings as well as a road map to a functioning social finance ecosystem as of March 2016.
EU Publication A Recipe Book for Social Finance. Based on the experiences with an EU project (see our seperate report below) that included FASE and many other market players, this study published by the EU in February 2016 is a step by step guide through the process of designing and implementing initiatives to develop social finance instruments and markets.
EU project report: Creating Collaborative Funding Models for Social Enterprises: How fine-tuned, state-of-the-art hybrid financing packages can build bridges and channel more investment capital into the social entrepreneurship sector, a detailed report written by the FASE team about new hybrid financing and collaborative models as well as pilot cases developed in the course of the EU project (as of July 2015).