Venturesome

Mission

• To increase the range of financing options available to charities.

• To demonstrate to existing and potential donors the attraction of the risk funding model.

• To help build the emerging social investment market.
  

Activities

Venturesome is a social investment initiative of the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF). Each year, it provides advice and financing to around 50 organisations in the voluntary sector - usually when a grant or a loan from a mainstream funder is not an option.

It offers unsecured loans, underwriting and other financing methods to provide organisations with cashflow support or investment capital, or a combination of the two.

As client charities develop and are able to pay back their Venturesome loans, funds are 'recycled' to allow other organisations to benefit from the money.

To date, Venturesome's financial achievements include:

• £7.25m in funds raised for the investment fund from investors that include grantmaking trusts, companies and private individuals.

• Offering £9.8m of facilities to 150 clients, of which £4.7m has already been repaid.

• Recycling rate is above target at around 90%.
  

For individual donors

Venturesome offers individuals, grantmaking trusts and companies the opportunity to help build the capacity of charities to achieve lasting social impact while making charitable money work harder.

Unlike one-off donations, an investment in Venturesome aims to be recycled four or five times. This means that the social impact of every pound invested increases several-fold. Venturesome also can help you access harder-to-reach charities. As the organisation assumes a higher financial risk than might a conventional bank lender, it can fund organisations that would have no other way to access capital. The minimum investment in the Venturesome Fund is £100,000. However, CAF Trust Account holders can donate between £10,000 and £100,000 to Venturesome.