NONPROFITS & INSTITUTIONS
Nonprofit, Endowment, and Foundation Investment Advisory
As a nonprofit, you face unique challenges — ensuring long-term financial sustainability, balancing mission with financial returns, and managing funds in alignment with your values.
MISSION-ALIGNED APPROACH
Your mission drives your decisions.
Riverwater Partners manages investment assets for endowments, foundations, and nonprofit organizations. We work with boards and investment committees as a fiduciary: developing and monitoring your Investment Policy Statement, building an asset allocation matched to your goals, risk tolerance, and time horizon, selecting and monitoring investment managers, and reporting on performance.
Engagements are structured either as discretionary outsourced CIO (OCIO) or as non-discretionary advisory, depending on how much decision-making your committee retains.
Riverwater is a Milwaukee-based, employee-owned Registered Investment Adviser and a Certified B Corporation™, and several members of our team have served on nonprofit boards and investment committees themselves.
SERVICES FOR NONPROFITS
Services for Nonprofits, Endowments, and Foundations
Every engagement is built around your Investment Policy Statement and the committee that oversees it. Learn more about our investment philosophy and our approach to responsible investing.
Investment Strategy & Oversight
- Customized asset allocation strategies built around your organization’s goals, risk tolerance, and time horizon
- Withdrawal rates modeled against your portfolio and time horizon so your committee can set and document a spending policy with the numbers in front of it
- Rigorous investment manager selection and ongoing due diligence, reviewed continually rather than set once
- Regular rebalancing to keep the portfolio aligned with your investment policy
- Long-term modeling that connects your investment assets to the obligations and commitments they support
Fiduciary & Committee Support
- Independent fiduciary — we are legally obligated to act in your organization’s best interest.
- Education for boards and investment committees on their fiduciary responsibilities, so members understand the duties they carry
- Investment Policy Statement development, monitoring, and revision as your circumstances and your committee change
- Attendance at investment committee and board meetings to present results and answer questions directly, rather than sending a report and leaving the interpretation to you
- Recommendations are made in your organization’s best interest and aligned with its Investment Policy Statement.
Mission Alignment & Responsible Investing
- Responsible investing criteria are integrated into investment selection and ongoing monitoring, led by our Director of Responsible Investing
- Benchmarks aligned with your organization’s liquidity needs and investment goals, rather than a single off-the-shelf index
- Guidance for committees weighing long-term financial sustainability against mission fulfillment, including where the two pull in different directions
How We Engage & Report
- Two engagement models — discretionary outsourced CIO (OCIO), where we implement decisions within your IPS, or non-discretionary advisory, where your committee retains the final say. You choose how much authority to delegate.
- Performance reporting delivered within three weeks of each quarter-end and available on demand in the client portal
- Cash flow and liquidity planning, so cash is available for your operations and grantmaking when it’s needed
- Coordination of donated stock and other gifted securities through your custodial relationship, from receipt through liquidation
HOW WE WORK WITH YOUR COMMITTEE
How We Work With Your Committee
Our nonprofit advisory process integrates your mission and values into every investment decision — from discovery through implementation and oversight. Here is what working with us looks like.
01
Discovery
We start by understanding your mission, your financial goals, and your risk tolerance through collaborative dialogue with the board or investment committee. This is where we learn what the assets are actually for.
02
Strategy Development
We build or refine your Investment Policy Statement, design your asset allocation, and align benchmarks with your liquidity needs. If your committee is setting or revisiting a spending policy, this is where we model draw rates against the portfolio.
03
Implementation
We execute the strategy, select and monitor investment managers, and handle cash flow management so the portfolio reflects both your policy and your mission.
04
Monitoring & Reporting
We provide board-ready reporting in person and through the Schwab and Black Diamond portals, rebalance as your policy requires, and deliver performance updates within three weeks of each quarter-end.
MEET YOUR NONPROFIT ADVISORY SERVICES TEAM
WHY RIVERWATER
Fiduciary
We put your interests first.
Independent &
Employee-Owned
Objective advice.
A long-term perspective.
Comprehensive
Planning
A more complete view
of your financial life.
Responsible Investing
Investing for a more
sustainable tomorrow.
QUESTIONS WE OFTEN HEAR
Common questions from nonprofit boards and investment committees
Does Riverwater serve as an outsourced CIO (OCIO) or as a non-discretionary adviser?
Both — your committee chooses. In a discretionary OCIO engagement, we implement investment decisions within the boundaries your Investment Policy Statement sets. In a non-discretionary advisory engagement, we research and recommend, and your committee makes the final decision. The choice comes down to how much day-to-day authority your committee wants to delegate.
Who is responsible for our organization’s investment decisions?
Your board’s fiduciary duty to the organization stays with your board. What a committee can delegate is investment authority — the work of implementing and monitoring the program. Riverwater acts as a fiduciary to your organization in the advice we give, and we document decisions so your board has a record of how it exercised its own oversight. Your counsel can advise on how your governing documents and state law allocate that responsibility.
Will you help us write or update our Investment Policy Statement?
Yes. We build an Investment Policy Statement with your committee if you don’t have one, and refine the one you have if you do. We then monitor the portfolio against it and revisit it as your circumstances, your committee, and your spending needs change. The IPS is the document the rest of the engagement runs on.
How do you help our committee set a spending policy?
We model draw rates against your portfolio, your time horizon, and your liquidity needs, so your committee can see what different spending levels would mean before it sets one. The committee sets the policy, and your counsel advises on how state law and your governing documents apply. We provide the modeling and the documentation the decision rests on.
Will you attend our investment committee and board meetings?
Yes. We attend investment committee and board meetings and present board-ready reporting in person, alongside the Schwab and Black Diamond portals your committee can access at any time. Several members of our team have served on nonprofit boards and investment committees themselves.
Who holds our organization’s assets?
Your assets are held at Charles Schwab as independent custodian, not at Riverwater. Performance reporting is delivered through Black Diamond.
Can we contribute donated stock or other gifted securities?
Yes. We coordinate the receipt and liquidation of donated stock and other gifted securities through your custodial relationship, so gifts convert to investable assets without your staff managing the mechanics.
How often will we receive performance reports?
Performance reporting and reviews are delivered within three weeks of each quarter-end. Your committee can also see positions and performance at any time through the Schwab and Black Diamond portals.
Do you work with nonprofits outside Wisconsin?
Riverwater offers investment services to nonprofit organizations in Wisconsin and across the Upper Midwest, including Minnesota, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, and Indiana.
How does responsible investing affect our portfolio?
Responsible investing criteria are integrated into how investments are selected and monitored, led by our Director of Responsible Investing. For a nonprofit, that generally means the portfolio can reflect the same commitments your mission statement does — and where your committee has specific exclusions or priorities, those are written into the Investment Policy Statement rather than applied informally. Read more about our approach to responsible investing.