There are $92 trillion in bond markets around the world. Corporations have ready access to those dollars. For example, when Amazon needed $16 billion to acquire Whole Foods, it borrowed it through the bond market.
Now, nonprofit lenders in the U.S. with a mission to make capital meet the needs of poor communities have a foothold into that world.
“When I was in the capital markets I always said, how come we aren’t investing enough here domestically,” says Lisa Jones, who works at the U.S. Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) Fund, which supports those lenders — community development financial institutions, or CDFIs — nationwide. “We can make investments all over the world, and we can assess the risk. Why can’t we assess the risk here in some of our underserved and low-income communities?”
NEXT CITY
BY OSCAR PERRY ABELLO | OCTOBER 5, 2017