Impact investment deal flow and Sustainable Development Goals: "Mind the gap?"

We examine the linkage between the available impact investment deals and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to ascertain to what extent those deals are likely to achieve the aims of the SDGs, that of a sustainable and prosperous world. Drawing on 292 available deals, we find that most deals are directly or indirectly linked to only four of the 17 SDGs and are concentrated in two regions of the world. Accordingly, we conclude that impact investing has a significant imbalance in the SDG-deal flow-region nexus. Without addressing such an imbalance, impact investing will have only a limited impact on overall SDG attainment. Therefore, we also share some thoughts on addressing the imbalance.