2024 review: a year of growth

Our editorial team is taking a short break until 6 January 2025. Until then, here are some highlights of how the impact investing sector has evolved over the last year, from market growth and ecosystem building, to other key topics such as biodiversity and natural capital, and social impact.

Our editorial team is taking a short break until 6 January 2025. We look forward to bringing you all the latest developments and insights from our industry on our return, but for now, here are some key highlights of how the impact investing industry has evolved over this last year.

In October, the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) revealed that the size of the global impact investing market now stands at $1.571trn (€1.45trn) of assets under management (AUM) managed by 3,907 organisations. Organisations participating in the GIIN’s market sizing exercises in both 2019 and 2024 showed a 21% compound annual growth rate in impact investing AUM over that period, revealing that the industry is growing at a substantial pace.

In the UK, the Impact Investing Institute in the UK released its own findings, which showed that the market had grown to £76.8bn (€91bn) of AUM by end-2023. This represents a £19.3bn rise compared to the figure at the end of 2020 – a 10.1% compound annual growth rate.

Meanwhile, UK institutional investors and managers believe that the country’s impact market will grow substantially over the next decade, according to an October survey from Pensions for Purpose, the UK-based platform. The survey was conducted amongst asset owners and managers representing over $11trn in AUM, $438bn of which were comprised of pension assets. It showed that impact investing could grow to represent up to 15% of assets by 2030, a substantial rise from the 1% that they are today.

In December the European Impact Investing Consortium, a partnership that brings together organisations including Impact Europe, GSG Impact and several of its European national partners, and leading academic institutions, found that the European private impact investing market has reached €190bn, with the UK, Netherlands and France coming out as the leaders in the space. The findings were unveiled at Impact Europe’s annual conference held in Bilbao in December.

In Spain meanwhile, the impact investment market grew to €3.34bn at the end of 2023 according to the latest market study published by SpainNAB, the GSG’s national partner in Spain, and Esade Center for Social Impact (Esade).

In the Netherlands, the National Advisory Board on impact investing has said that the average allocation to impact-related investments has increased, but needs to scale up further. The NAB called for Dutch pension funds, asset managers, insurance companies and banks to allocate at least 10% of their assets to impact investments by 2025.

With 2025 just around the corner, whether that goal is realistic or not remains to be seen, but growth figures this year reflect increasing investor appetite for the sector, a further evolution of the impact ecosystem, and a broadening of the investment landscape.

More 2024 editorial highlights