Investments

Lankelly Chase is an endowed foundation, meaning that our income comes from our investments. Our endowment originated in the combined legacies of Major Alfred Allnatt and Ron Diggens, who had worked together in the development of land and property. A substantial bank loan from RBS provided the capital for the development of the Chase estate in north London, and this was followed by the creation, acquisition, merger and sale of property companies that allowed both men to accumulate and gift substantial wealth.  The beginnings and early history of Lankelly Chase from the 1960s are set out by our former CEO Peter Kilgarriff in ‘A matter of trust: A brief history of the LankellyChase Foundation’.

Since those times, Lankelly Chase has increased the value of the endowment by investing it in financial assets, including company shares and bonds. It was worth £138 million at the end of March 2022.

We recently reviewed our approach to investing and moved our endowment into the management of investment funds whose approach to capital stewardship and sustainability most closely reflected our mission and values within the universe of public markets strategies: 

• Baillie Gifford Positive Change
• Impax Environmental Markets
• Liontrust Sustainable Future Global Growth
• Montanaro Better World
• Schroders Global Sustainable Growth
• Schroders Cazenove discretionary fixed income portfolio, which includes holdings in the Lombard Odier Global Climate Bond Fund, Rathbone Ethical Bond Fund, and Threadneedle UK Social Bond Fund
• Stewart Investors Asia Pacific Sustainability

Our investment strategy is currently based on holistic objectives to advance our charitable mission, including by contributing to rapid and just decarbonisation, rather than financial returns alone or above all else.  We welcome interest and input and are happy to share further detail about our approach. You can get in touch with our Investment Director at dominic@lankellychase.org.uk 

In addition to what and who we invest in, how we use our status as an investor can also help to advance our mission. We seek to influence and disrupt the wider investment system through our own strategic interventions as well as by resourcing activists, community groups, and others through our grant-making. You can read more about this work on our insights page.

Although Lankelly Chase’s endowment may not appear to have originated in overtly harmful colonising practices, we believe that capital accumulation occurs through ongoing processes of colonial appropriation and exploitation. Our endowment is embedded within the system of what scholars such as Cedric J. Robinson have called ‘racial capitalism’

To be specific, if not comprehensive, the initial loan for the development of the Chase estate came from a bank whose predecessor institutions and directors were owners of slaves and provided loans to plantation owners in the Carribean (this is documented in RBS’s 2006 ‘Historical Research Report: Predecessor Institutions Research Regarding Slavery and the Slave Trade’). Indeed, many of the institutions and practices central to the UK’s centres for global investment, the City of London and Edinburgh – where all of the funds we invest in are based – have their roots in the Atlantic slave trade. 

For example, UCL’s Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery lists James Cazenove as one of 17 signatories who requested British military intervention in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now known as Haiti) in 1794. Their motive was to defend their commercial interests in the island’s plantation economy amidst the successful slave rebellion which took place that year and led to the abolition of slavery throughout France’s colonies. James Cazenove was also father and father-in-law to the founders Cazenove & Co, a firm which continues today as part of Schroders plc and is one of the primary investment managers serving UK foundations and trusts, including Lankelly Chase.  

As an investor in global capital markets over several decades, we have also profited from countless institutions – including, until 3 years ago, fossil fuel companies – which make up the neocolonial economic system.

While we have tried to approach our investments in a way that actively builds towards the change we seek, we can no longer reconcile our position as an owner and active accumulator of private financial capital with a mission anchored in social, and particularly racial, justice and equity. The contradiction is profound and we are currently exploring mechanisms by which this can be resolved, including reparations and redistribution.