DURREEN SHAHNAZ

Durreen Shahnaz, is a global leader in social impact and impact investing, and the founder of Impact Investment Exchange (IIX) and IIX Foundation. For more than three decades, she has worked to transform financial markets to build a more inclusive and sustainable world, bringing underserved women and communities to the forefront of capital markets. Her work has enabled thousands of entrepreneurs, investors, governments, and impact stakeholders worldwide to advance sustainable development and women’s empowerment.

Her career spans finance, media, academia, and entrepreneurship. She began in finance at Morgan Stanley in New York and Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, later moving to Hearst Magazines International before entering academia at the National University of Singapore (NUS). At the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, she founded and led the Program for Social Innovation and Change and developed a proprietary Impact Assessment methodology that has become one of the most widely used in Asia. She also advised on the development of the Impact Reporting and Investment Standards (IRIS) with the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN).

As a pioneer in social finance, Shahnaz led IIX to establish the world’s first social stock exchange, create a proprietary impact verification and measurement platform, launch one of the largest crowdfunding platforms for impact investing, and structure innovative financial instruments including the Women’s Livelihood Bond™ Series and Orange Bonds, mobilizing capital at scale for women-centered climate resilience and sustainable development.

Earlier in her career, she founded and later sold oneNest, a New York–based impact enterprise and online marketplace for handmade goods, which was acquired by Novica United in association with the National Geographic Society. Across sectors and continents, Shahnaz has consistently worked to bridge underserved communities with global capital markets.

Her work has earned global recognition, including the Joseph Wharton Social Impact Award, the Oslo Business for Peace Award, the Asia Game Changer Award, and the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment Market Builder of the Year Award. She was honored by UN Women with the Women’s Empowerment Principles Leadership Award for advancing gender equality through finance, recognized as a Bloomberg New Economy Catalyst for pioneering the Orange Movement and gender-responsive capital markets, and named to Forbes’ 50 Over 50 list. She was also honored at the Tatler Front & Female Awards Singapore 2025 and selected as a member of the 2026 cohort of the Rockefeller Bellagio Residency Program.

She has also served on advisory bodies including United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (United Nations ESCAP), the G20 Steering Committee for Impact Investing, and the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council. She is a TED Fellow and TED speaker, and a former program advisor to the Clinton Global Initiative.

Durreen Shahnaz is the author of The Defiant Optimist: Daring to Fight Global Inequality, Reinvent Finance, and Invest in Women, a call to action to reinvent finance for the 99% and build a more equitable global economy.