GAWA Capital and Blended Finance: "It's a Dance"

Case summary/description

GAWA Capital is a Madrid-based impact investment firm founded in 2009 by Luca Torre and Agustín Vitórica. Set in 2016, the case follows GAWA's journey from its origins in microfinance to the design of a proposed third fund targeting agricultural finance in emerging markets across Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Asia. The case describes GAWA's efforts to structure this fund using blended finance tools, including first-loss tranches, concessional debt, technical assistance facilities, and tranched capital structures, in partnership with COFIDES, the Spanish development finance institution. It provides the opportunity to examine the trade-offs investors face when considering blended finance tools. The case enables class discussions about blended finance theory and practice, the mobilisation of private capital through concessional instruments, impact investing, and the governance and operational challenges of public and private sector investor collaborations.

Learning objectives

The case is meant to illustrate the trade-offs investors face in considering blended finance tools: blended finance enables access to larger pools of private capital and allows investors to more directly achieve non-financial impact, but can come at the cost of increased complexity, higher operational cost and longer timelines.

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