OPERA BONDS: �A SOCIAL FINANCE INSTRUMENT FOR OPERA�
With
Christina Loewen, Executive Director AOC
Jo Reynolds, Director of Partnership and Development, SI Canada
PROPOSED WORKING AGENDA
In the chat share what sparks your curiosity when you think about social finance in the arts and how you might use it. No wrong answers.
Let’s talk about …. money
Types of
Income
Grants
Equity
Loans
Retained earnings
Donations
What is Social Finance?
Social finance is repayable investment that enables positive social, cultural, and environmental impact.*
It can take the form of loans and equity investments that organizations can use to advance their mission and carry out activities that generate savings or income than can then be used to repay investors.
When does Social Finance work well?
When social finance funds are designed together with the stakeholders to meet specific social and/or environmental outcomes.
When the terms of the loans are designed to meet the stage and capacity of the borrowers.
When those lending are in relationship with the borrowers and can provide support when needed.
Examples of Social Finance at Work
SKETCH is a community arts enterprise engaging diverse young people, ages 16-29, from across Canada, who live homeless or on the margins and navigate poverty to:
About Sketch Working Arts
Against a backdrop of soaring real estate prices, owning our space was the only way for SKETCH to remain in Toronto’s downtown core.
“How are we ever going to pull this off?”
Why Social Finance?
What was Created? The Giving Bond
Unique Attribute
For further information, see SI Canada’s Case Study of this application, created for the Investment Readiness Program.
4 bonds with varying investment minimums and terms were offered. Bond B was aimed at foundations and corporations, while Bond D had a more accessible $500 minimum.
So that … Sketch could purchase
9000 Sq Foot Space in downtown Toronto
Artists understood that this was about more than ownership, it was about sustaining SKETCH’s programming so that future
generations of young leaders have access to a safe space to explore their creativity
Benefitted from a $1 million bridge loan from the Community Forward Fund in early 2014 to allow the organization to open its newly renovated facility and begin immediate programming.
“We have seen this scenario play-out time and time again in the social finance space. An organization will be able to secure enough funding for a project, but will experience a delay between needing the cashflow and receiving the committed funding. ”
The Theatre Centre is a nationally recognized live-arts incubator and community hub. Our mission is to offer a home for creative, cultural and social interactions to invent the future.
The Arts Impact Fund in the UK brought together public, private and charitable funding to demonstrate the potential and impact of social investment in the arts.
We want to support more arts organisations with social aims to achieve sustainable growth and increase their social impact.
This demonstrator fund also aimed to attract more social investors to the arts to benefit the wider sector.
Between 2015 and 2019, a total of £8.8 million of investment across 27 enterprising arts organisations.
The Association for Opera in Canada launched the Co-Production Loan Fund, which provided working capital as a loan of $250,000 to a consortium of 5 opera companies to co-develop, and co-produce a new production of La Traviata.
TABLE CONVERSATIONS (15 MINS) �
At your tables - take a moment to read the social finance in the arts example
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
AOC – A UNIQUE POSITION TO PROTOTYPE A SOCIAL FINANCE INSTRUMENT
$
Social Finance Fund
Fund capital flows from the Managers of the Social Finance Fund to social finance investors, through to SPOs.
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