Hedge Funds Care Spreading the Wealth from June 2008 Magazine
At the time this article (see button below to read entire article) was written, total giving by the top 25 hedge fund foundations increased 61%, to $459 million, compared with the previous year. Charities aimed at children, education and healthcare have long been the most popular causes among hedge fund managers – a fact consistent with the broader philanthropic community. The causes receiving donations from hedge fund philanthropies now range from human rights, to prevention of child abuse and the environment and even an effort to lower the U.S. drinking age. What results is an increasingly powerful group of donors.
A personal experience was the basis for the creation of Hedge Funds Care, a collaborative effort among many hedge funds to prevent child abuse and treat its victims.
Hedge Funds Care was founded in 1998 by Rob Davis, whose experience as a teacher early in his career informed the group’s mission. After seeing first hand the effects of abuse in a few of the students in his class, Davis was instilled with the desire to address the problem.
Years later, when the high-profile blowup of Long Term Capital Management led to a flurry of negative publicity about hedge funds, Davis saw an opportunity to counteract that image by gathering the industry’s participants to support programs that prevent child abuse and provide clinical treatment to those who have been victimized.
Thus was born – www.HFC.org – now a multi-country/continent organization providing clinical treatment to thousands of children globally and saving countless others through multiple approaches to prevention.
“Family and relatives form a natural constituency to support a child with leukemia, or some other childhood issue, but that doesn’t exist for a child who is abused,” says Davis, noting that the problem is usually well hidden. “It’s one of the most important childhood issues that exists, but at the very bottom of the list of what gets funding.”
As HFC now approaches its 21st year with Davis a continuing Board Member and Chairman Emeritus, he says the organization is in good hands on its continued quest to save children from the trauma of abuse
