RIN Feature

Impact Alpha’s Dennis Price discusses the growing field of refugee lens investing and RIN’s latest work in East Africa.

John Kluge shares news about his transition, reflections on RIN’s progress over the past four years, and hopes for the road ahead.

The partnership will develop an evidence base to mobilize finance and explore how catalytic capital can advance climate resilience, refugee self-reliance, and social cohesion between those displaced and their hosting communities.

2021 is set to be a year of transition — from the rollout of a COVID-19 vaccination to coping with the pandemic’s lingering impacts to a new presidential administration. The Refugee Investment Network is gearing up to expand its mission of inserting a refugee-oriented lens into investments.

The RIN-CEO Social Impact Fund (SIF) closed a $1.5M raise in October, reaching its initial target. The SIF was launched in partnership with the International Rescue Committee’s Center for Economic Opportunity (IRC-CEO) to offer impact investors a unique opportunity to secure a concessional rate of return while directly supporting financial inclusion for hundreds of refugees across the United States.

As the Trump administration was building walls and new restrictions, impact investors and innovative humanitarians were creating a marketplace of financing solutions for migrants and refugees.

A team of NYU grad students adapted RIN’s refugee investing lens to design the first Refugee Exchange-Traded Fund, winning the 2020 Kellogg-Morgan Stanley Sustainable Investing Challenge.

In partnership with the Economist Intelligence Unit, the RIN is proud to announce the Refugee Opportunity Index. The ROI will shine a light on policy shortcomings and serve as a tool to incentivize policy reforms that support refugee economic integration and inclusive growth.

This Euromoney feature on the RIN’s launch details the organizations initiatives, along with the work of its partners to find sustainable and durable solutions to the crisis of forced migration. RIN founder John Kluge is interviewed to discuss the Refugee Lens, as are Lev Plaves from Kiva and Kasra Movahedi from IRC’s Center for Economic Opportunity.

ImpactAlpha details the RIN’s efforts to match investable refugee-focused funds and ventures with investors. “Investors are already participating in refugee and migration deals,” John Kluge of the Refugee Investment Network told ImpactAlpha. “What is new and what is changing is that there are increasingly more investors doing this by design and intent.”

On World Refugee Day, RIN gathers investors, entrepreneurs, humanitarian leaders, and donors to bridge the gap between capital and refugee-owned or -supporting ventures.

This Reuters article illustrates the desire of refugees to build lives and redefine the perception of refugees through entrepreneurship. RIN Managing Director Tim Docking, featured in the article, adds “this is a very entrepreneurial, hardworking, gritty group of folks who want to work, versus get handouts, and need investment capital to get going.”