Abstract
Social Impact Investment (SII) is high on the international agenda. Nevertheless, only recently have some international organizations tried to clearly define the boundaries of SIIs. Existing data shows that microfinance is one of the major developed branches. The aim of this study is to investigate if microfinance investment vehicles (MIVs), listed on the market and identified as “impact investment” through registration in the Global Impact Investment Network (GIIN) or through the publication of an impact report, are compliant with the new definition of SIIs suggested by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD, Social impact investment. Building the evidence base. Paris. Available at: http://www.oecd.org/sti/ind/social-impact-investment.pdf. Accessed 18 Feb 2015). The methodology applied is content analysis. Findings demonstrate that there is still much to do in order to “mind the gap” between MIVs management approach and the OECD definition.
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Notes
- 1.
Investment vehicles includes both Funds and SICAVs.
- 2.
Other relevant issues are access to basic services (136 investment vehicles), employment generation (117 investment vehicles), green technology (93 investment vehicles), environmental market and sustainable real assets (88 investment vehicles), sustainable consumer products (63 investment vehicles), followed by other themes (97 investment vehicles).
- 3.
Stemler (2001) recognized these two variables as dimensions of research ‘Reliability’. In particular, stability refers to the possibility for the same researcher to obtain same results ‘try after try’; reproducibility means obtain same content analysis results changing researchers.
- 4.
‘The Client Protection Principles articulate the standards of care that clients should expect to receive when doing business with a financial service provider’. These principles are: ‘Appropriate product design and delivery, prevention of over-indebtedness, transparency, responsible pricing, fair and respectful treatment of clients, privacy of clients data, mechanism for complaint resolution’ (The Smart Campaign 2015).
- 5.
The return goal of Dual Return Vision Microfinance is ‘Euribor+2 %’; while the Dual Return Local Currency goal is ‘libor+6 %’.
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La Torre, M., Chiappini, H. (2016). Microfinance Investment Vehicles: How Far Are They from OECD Social Impact Investment Definition?. In: Carbó Valverde, S., Cuadros Solas, P., Rodríguez Fernández, F. (eds) Bank Funding, Financial Instruments and Decision-Making in the Banking Industry. Palgrave Macmillan Studies in Banking and Financial Institutions. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-30701-5_7
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