Mississippi United Methodist Foundation

Mississippi United Methodist Foundation

Founded in 1967, the Mississippi United Methodist Foundation (MFM) was established to provide financial resources and expertise to Wesleyan congregations and missions. Executive Director John Branning oversees the Ridgeland-based entity, which serves as the primary investment agency for the Mississippi Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church and for the Great Lakes Annual Conference of the Global Methodist Church. MFM manages collective investment vehicles including a Short-Term Fund and a Long-Term Fund, deploying across early-stage, seed, startup, and expansion-stage venture exposures alongside general venture allocations. The foundation partners with the United Methodist Higher Education Foundation on scholarship programs for Methodist students. Its geographic focus spans the US Southeast and the broader regions served by its affiliated conferences. Total portfolio assets sit near $180 million (Altss estimate). The foundation operates from a commercial office in Ridgeland, with no additional physical offices disclosed. Governance rests with a board that included Jan Hitt as president for the 2023-2024 term and Ben Walton — also of Solidus Capital Solutions — as chairman of the investment and finance committee. Beyond pooled investments, MFM administers clergy health support and ministerial scholarship funds for the Great Lakes Annual Conference. The foundation's architecture is distinct: it functions as a shared treasury for Methodist conferences rather than a grantmaking philanthropical endowment. MFM directly originates deal flow through denominational networks and clergy relationships, structuring pooled funds that make venture and growth allocations accessible to individual churches — a model closer to a church-member investment cooperative than a traditional foundation.