Financier: a social stock exchange is likely to fail

By Helen Warrell, Third Sector, 12 March 2008

Plans to set up a social stock exchange to give sector enterprises access to capital would marginalise social enterprises and be likely to fail, according to a social enterprise financier.

Rod Schwartz, chief executive of Catalyst Fund Management and Research, which raises venture capital for social businesses, said social financiers should resist the temptation to be lured into such a scheme, despite political and private interest. "The social capital market is still very immature," Schwartz said. "An exchange could easily...