Viewpoint: Nipsey Hussle’s Lessons For Investors

Friday, April 12, 2019

By Morgan Simon

Nipsey Hussle, born Ermias Davidon Asghedom, was an artist, entrepreneur, and community leader taken from the world too soon. Today his family and community are honoring “Neighborhood Nip” with a Celebration of Life memorial service in downtown Los Angeles, to reflect on an individual who, as so many in the media have noted, was more than a rapper. As a hip-hop head from LA myself, I had been following Hussle’s journey with excitement as he increasingly showed up as an activist — while I don’t believe you can say f*ck Donald Trump in Forbes, Nipsey and YG proved you could on the radio —  and investor — with a keen interest in supporting his South LA community.

It’s all too easy for people to speak for others posthumously and “claim” them for a particular social cause or action — we’ll never really know, for instance, if Martin Luther King would’ve organized on Twitter, or if Tupac would support gun control today. It’s incredibly tempting to claim Hussle as an impact investor, given the way he spoke so clearly about the critical importance of recycling money into communities for systemic change. “At the core, one of my original goals is to redefine what the streets expect,” he said in regards to his investments and dedication to uplifting his neighborhood.

Whether or not Hussle would’ve wanted to adopt the impact investor label, I do believe he wanted us to learn from his positive example.

Photo courtesy of joey zanotti.

Source: Forbes (link opens in a new window)

Categories
Investing
Tags
impact investing, urban development