Giving Compass' Take:

• In this Medium piece, the author describes how blockchain can help streamline transactions and increase transparency in the impact investing world, with the opportunity to scale capital for social change.

• Blockchain for philanthropic purposes isn't a new idea, but organizations still seem hesitant to go all-in. Better understanding for how the technology works may ease fears.

• Here's more about the decentralization of good and the future of charity through blockchain.


Investors and Donor Bases are the financial life-blood to non-profits, entrepreneurs, start-ups, inventors and creatives of all kinds. What investors are most concerned with is return on investment (ROI) which translates as money for a venture capitalist. For an Impact Investor the return could be in a non-monetary form … maybe they get bragging rights for funding a cutting-edge technology, a program that helps people or addresses an important environmental issue. For monthly donors to a charitable organization maybe the “return” is a photo of a family in a third-world country they have adopted or a monthly update and a tax write-off. For each of these examples, the exchange goes both ways, the rewards also go both ways. Recipients of funding need new tools to quantify, and report on their successes to their donors/investors.

Blockchain allows reciprocal exchanges to occur in real time, transparently through a secure dashboard that cuts out middle-men, and lag-time for reporting. The transparency also does a number of other amazing things for all involved parties. For one it can cut out expenses and time spent on reporting necessary data/statistics back to investors or donors. It can also restore investor, donor confidence, which will open the gates for more funding. It also makes all transactions easy to review and compare, allowing best practices to emerge across competitive markets. The end result is a public, transparent assessment of cost-to-impact-ratio for non-profit executives, investors, and donors to chart and maximize efficiency.

Read the full article about blockchain's role in philanthropy by Jacob Devaney at medium.com.