Roy Swan

Ford Foundation

Darren Walker is the highly respected President of the Ford Foundation. In his own words, “My conviction is that this moment offers us an opportunity to be accelerators of justice. And my hope is that, before long, many more foundations will find ways to tap into the power of their own endowments.” He says what he means and means what he says. Under his leadership, the Ford Foundation became the first non-profit in US history to issue a $1 billion designated social bond and several years prior, the Ford Foundation made a $1 billion commitment to impact investing, the largest effort among all foundation endowments. Roy Swan is the inaugural head of the Ford Foundation’s Mission Investments Program, which deploys endowment capital for market rate impact investments, program-related investment capital for catalytic opportunities ranging from market rate to concessionary, and grant capital to support the global impact investing and Environmental, Social, and Governance (“ESG”) ecosystems. Roy’s team covers the U.S., Africa, China, India, Indonesia and southeast Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. His background includes banking, finance, general management, investments, and law. Before joining Ford, Roy served as managing director and co-head of global sustainable finance at Morgan Stanley. During his time at Morgan Stanley, global sustainable finance committed over $13 billion in community development transactions. Ford is proving that generating financial returns and social impact is possible. The Mission Investments portfolio has generated measurable social impact across all areas of investment, including affordable housing, diverse fund managers, financial inclusion, quality jobs, and health tech. Eighty percent of Mission Investments’ fund managers are at least partially owned by women and people of color.