Data sourced from Dakota Marketplace, the global LP and GP intelligence platform trusted by thousands of investment professionals. Learn More | Book a Demo
At a UK charity, investment decisions are made by the trustees, usually through an investment committee, with the finance director running the process. A chief investment officer is rare: of the 10,900 contacts at UK charities, endowments and foundations in Dakota Marketplace, about 8,600 are trustees and only 23 hold a chief investment officer title (Dakota Marketplace, October 2026). A fundraiser who goes looking for the CIO will find one at 21 charities out of more than 1,700.
Key Takeaways
- Trustees are the decision-makers. Around 79% of the 10,900 UK charity contacts in Dakota Marketplace are trustees, and 420 charities have no named contact other than trustees (Dakota Marketplace, October 2026).
- A chief investment officer title appears at just 21 charities. Nine of them hold more than $1 billion, including the Wellcome Trust.
- The investment committee is the working group to find. Marketplace holds 300 contacts with an investment committee title across 161 charities, 105 of them committee chairs.
- The finance director is the most reachable executive: 400 finance leads are named across 321 charities, more than any other executive role.
- Below $250 million, the decision is shared with an external firm. Roughly 70% of charities under that size name their investment manager in Marketplace, against 16% of those above $1 billion.
Who makes investment decisions at a UK charity?
The trustees do. A UK charity's board of trustees carries responsibility for how the charity's money is invested, and the trustees are volunteers, not employees. They typically meet at least quarterly, and manager appointments are made in those meetings.
That shapes the contact list. Dakota Marketplace holds 10,909 contacts across UK charities, endowments and foundations, 10,894 of them with an email address. The table shows who those people are.
|
Role
|
Contacts
|
Charities with at least one
|
|
Trustee
|
~8,600
|
1,105
|
|
Board chair
|
617
|
536
|
|
Finance director, CFO or head of finance
|
400
|
321
|
|
Investment committee member or chair
|
300
|
161
|
|
Chief executive
|
261
|
250
|
|
Treasurer
|
98
|
90
|
|
Chief investment officer
|
23
|
21
|
|
Bursar
|
21
|
19
|
Source: Dakota Marketplace, October 2026. Roles are counted from contact titles; one contact can hold more than one role.
The pattern is the reverse of a pension fund or an insurer. There, a fundraiser starts with the investment team and rarely meets the board. At a charity, the board is the investment team in most cases, and the executives support it.
How does the decision structure change with size?
Size decides who you meet. The largest charities employ investment staff; the mid-sized ones rely on a committee, a finance director and an external manager; the smaller ones rely on the trustees and a single manager.
|
Investment assets
|
Charities
|
With a CIO title
|
With investment committee contacts
|
With a finance lead
|
Naming their investment manager
|
|
$1 billion+
|
31
|
9
|
4
|
9
|
5
|
|
$250 million to $1 billion
|
133
|
2
|
22
|
34
|
54
|
|
$100 million to $250 million
|
210
|
2
|
32
|
49
|
150
|
|
$50 million to $100 million
|
273
|
3
|
34
|
59
|
201
|
|
$25 million to $50 million
|
462
|
4
|
32
|
67
|
340
|
|
Under $25 million
|
637
|
1
|
37
|
103
|
454
|
Source: Dakota Marketplace, October 2026.
Two things stand out. First, the CIO title is concentrated at the top: nine of the 21 charities with one hold more than $1 billion. Second, the share of charities naming an external investment manager rises from 16% above $1 billion to roughly 70% in every band below $250 million.
For a fundraiser, that second point matters more than the first. A charity with $60 million invested will not usually employ a full-time portfolio manager. The trustees, some of whom work in banking or investment management, set the policy and appoint a manager to run it.
Which UK charities run in-house investment teams?
A small group at the top of the market does. The Wellcome Trust, the largest UK charity in Dakota Marketplace at $53.3 billion, has 18 contacts on its account and almost all of them are investment staff: a co-chief investment officer, investment managers covering venture capital, buyouts and direct investments, and a principal for absolute return. Its investment consultant is recorded as Albourne.
Other accounts with a chief investment officer title include Oxford University Endowment Management, LifeArc, The Health Foundation, the Canal & River Trust, Imperial College London Endowment, Guy's and St Thomas' Foundation and Better Society Capital. These are the charities where a direct, institutional-style approach to an investment professional is possible.
Across the whole dataset, 444 contacts carry an investment title of any kind, including committee roles, and they sit at 201 charities. That is roughly one charity in nine. Everywhere else, the route runs through trustees, finance and the appointed manager.
Where does the investment committee fit?
The investment committee is a sub-group of trustees, sometimes joined by outside advisers, that does the detailed work between board meetings. It reviews performance, meets the managers and recommends changes to the full board.
Marketplace holds 300 contacts with an investment committee title across 161 charities, and 105 of them chair their committee. Where a committee chair is named, that person is the closest thing a mid-sized charity has to a head of investments.
Two accounts show how this looks in practice. The Masonic Charitable Foundation ($237 million) has 11 contacts: eight trustees, a chair of the investment committee, a treasurer and a finance director. Its consultant is Asset Risk Consultants, and its overview names a panel of five managers including CCLA Investment Management and Sarasin & Partners.
The Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 ($215 million) has 13 contacts, including an investment committee chair and a finance director, with Stanhope Capital as consultant and six named managers, among them Baillie Gifford, BlackRock and J.P. Morgan Asset Management.
Building a UK charity contact list? Dakota Marketplace holds 10,900 contacts with email across more than 1,700 UK charities, endowments and foundations: trustees, investment committee chairs, finance directors and CIOs, alongside each charity's named managers and consultant. Book a demo.
What do the finance director, treasurer and bursar do?
They run the process the trustees decide. The finance director prepares the investment papers, manages the relationship with the investment manager day to day and organises any review. At a charity without investment staff, the finance director is usually the right first conversation.
Finance leads are the most widely held executive contact in the dataset: 400 across 321 charities. A further 98 contacts are treasurers, an honorary trustee role that often chairs or sits on the investment committee. At colleges and schools the equivalent is the bursar, with 21 named across 19 accounts.
When is the decision-maker outside the charity?
Often. Roughly 1,200 of the 1,746 UK charity accounts in Marketplace name the firm or firms that manage their investments, and 156 name an investment consultant. In both cases, part of the decision has moved outside the charity.
Where a single wealth manager runs the whole portfolio, that firm chooses the underlying funds. A fund manager who wants exposure to that charity's capital is better served by a conversation with the wealth manager about how it invests for charities than by an email to a volunteer trustee. Our manager league table shows which firms hold the most charity relationships.
Where a consultant is named, a formal manager search is likely to run through that firm. The account tells you which situation you are in before you make the first call.
How should a fund manager sequence the outreach?
Work from the account outwards, in four steps.
-
Check who manages the money today. If the overview names a single discretionary manager, start there. If it names a panel of managers or none, the charity selects managers itself.
-
Go to investment and finance staff first. A CIO, an investment director or a finance director is paid to take the meeting. Use them where they exist.
-
Then the investment committee. The chair and members are the trustees who will hear the recommendation. They are the audience for anything that changes the portfolio.
-
Use the wider trustee list last, and selectively. Trustees are volunteers. Some hold senior roles at banks, investment firms and other allocators, and those are the ones who will engage with an investment idea.
Size sets expectations on ticket. Smaller charities in this group can still write commitments of $250,000 to $500,000, and the trustees can decide at a single quarterly meeting.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is responsible for investment decisions at a UK charity?
The trustees. A UK charity's board of trustees is responsible for how its assets are invested, and it usually delegates the detailed work to an investment committee and day-to-day management to an external investment manager. In Dakota Marketplace, about 8,600 of the 10,900 UK charity contacts are trustees.
Do UK charities have chief investment officers?
Very few do. Dakota Marketplace records a chief investment officer title at 21 UK charities, endowments and foundations out of more than 1,700, and nine of those hold more than $1 billion. The Wellcome Trust and Oxford University Endowment Management are among them.
Who should a fund manager contact first at a UK charity?
Start with investment staff or the finance director where they exist, then the investment committee chair. If the charity's account names a single wealth manager running the portfolio, approach that firm about its charity business as well, because it selects the underlying funds.
What does a charity investment committee do?
It is a group of trustees, sometimes with external advisers, that reviews performance, meets managers and recommends appointments to the full board. Dakota Marketplace holds 300 contacts with an investment committee title across 161 UK charities, including 105 committee chairs.
Are UK charity trustees paid investment professionals?
No. Trustees are volunteers and are not employed by the charity. Some work in banking, investment management or at other allocators in their main careers, which is why a charity board can make investment decisions without full-time investment staff.
How many UK charity contacts are in Dakota Marketplace?
Dakota Marketplace holds 10,909 contacts at UK charities, endowments and foundations, 10,894 of them with an email address, as of October 2026. They cover trustees, board chairs, investment committee members, finance directors, chief executives and investment staff.
Ready to find the people behind UK charity capital?
Dakota Marketplace maps more than 1,700 UK charities, endowments and foundations holding over $230 billion, with 10,900 contacts with email. Filter accounts by type (Foundation or Endowment) and country, narrow by AUM, filter by consultant, then open any account to see its trustees, investment committee, finance lead and named managers. Records are checked against new filings every week, so the board you see is the current one.
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Related reading: Top 10 UK Charities by Investment Assets · Who Manages UK Charity Money? The 2026 Manager League Table · The UK & Europe Allocator Map Just Got a Lot More Complete
