Expanding Access to Catholic Values Investing

Student: RT Hall, 2024-2025

Throughout the first quarter of the 21st century, the concern with sourcing investment opportunities that align with one’s ethical and social values has become a prominent aspect of investing behavior. For Catholics, the issue has become front-of-mind.

Since 2011, IWP Capital has found itself on the cutting edge of Catholic-values investing, initially offering investment screening for institutional clients hoping to invest within the bounds of Catholic Social Teaching, but evolving to expand their mission into proxy voting and corporate engagement.

Finding success in the institutional investing space, IWP now looks to democratize this experience, developing a tool for individual investors. This capstone seeks to test the efficacy of this plan with the retail investing app Sanctify. The student will first and foremost seek to quantify demand for screening materials amongst the Catholic consumer demographic. Next, the student will look to identify a specific target market within that demographic and subsequently design a go-to-market strategy. Considerable attention will be paid to better understanding the customer’s previous investment behavior in order to better tailor the product to their needs.