The U.S. election and the crisis in Syria have driven charitable giving in new directions, according to an updated 2017 Fidelity Charitable Giving Report released Tuesday.
An increased number of Fidelity Charitable donors supported the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation, the Southern Poverty Law Center, Planned Parenthood and Natural Resources Defense Council after the November election, the report said. Each moved onto the list of agencies receiving grants from more than 1,000 donor accounts.
The donations are coming to the aid of areas that many see as being under attack by the Trump administration. “This support reflects how national or international events can activate groups of donors to give in new or different ways,” the report said. Conversely, “in the years after the 2008 election [when President Obama was elected], conservative think tanks Heritage Foundation and American Enterprise Institute each broke fundraising records.”
In addition, the International Rescue Committee saw a 22 percent increase in grants because of the continuing Syrian humanitarian crisis. Doctors Without Borders is actively addressing the Syrian crisis, and it maintained a strong level of support last year.
“The Syrian refugee crisis moved into its sixth year in 2016. While the crisis victims have received a consistent stream of support since it began, events such as the fall of Aleppo and cease-fire issuances served as catalysts for notable spikes in giving,” the report said.
Fidelity Charitable, a donor-advised fund, also reported growing support for impact investing. Last year, Fidelity Charitable donors made 3,150 grants to impact investing nonprofits, totaling $19.1 million. The amount has increased each year. Donors have also increasingly recommended that their account balances be invested in Fidelity Charitable’s impact investing pool.
“The increasing popularity of impact investing in recent years signals the strategy’s move from a relatively niche concept to a trend gaining in support among individual donors at all levels.” Fidelity said.
Overall, donors supported 114,000 nonprofits last year, twice the number of charities that were given grants 10 years ago. The average grant has remained the same at about $4,200, but major gifts ranging from $50,000 to more than $1 million account for two-thirds of the total dollars given.
In total, Fidelity Charitable donors recommended a record-breaking $3.5 billion in grants in 2016, a 15 percent increase over 2015. They have given nearly $2 billion in the first half of 2017.
Another recent trend that is continuing this year is the increase in Bitcoin donations. Donors contributed $9 million in Bitcoin in the first 6 months of 2017, more than the amount of Bitcoin contributions in all of 2016.