Paul Brest discusses impact investing

Social impact investing takes many forms these days.

Investors can bring capital to worthy causes that otherwise wouldn’t be funded by investing in privately held businesses, or engage with other shareholders to put pressure on less socially motivated companies. They, too, can make so-called “sacrificial” investments in innovative social enterprises by accepting below-market, risk-adjusted returns as the price for doing public good.

But vetting both the philanthropic causes and the potential financial returns takes work, says Paul Brest, faculty co-director of Stanford PACS and professor at Stanford Law School, who discussed impact investing with Insights by Stanford Business following a symposium sponsored by the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Read the full article here…