# The Christensen Fund

The Christensen Fund is an Endowment / Foundation based in San Francisco, United States.

## Overview

- **Organization type:** Endowment / Foundation
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, United States
- **Region:** North America
- **Address:** San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founded:** 1957
- **Assets under management:** Undisclosed
- **Website:** christensenfund.org
- **LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-christensen-fund

## Regulatory record

- **Reports private funds:** No

## About

The Christensen Fund was established in 1957 by Allen D. and Carmen M. Christensen. Allen Christensen co-founded and led Utah Mining and Construction Company; the foundation's corpus was built from that industrial enterprise. Today, daughter Diane Christensen serves as President and Board Chair, maintaining family governance while day-to-day leadership sits with CEO Carla Fredericks. Since 2003, the foundation has pursued a focused mandate: supporting Indigenous Peoples in advancing inherent rights, dignity, and self-determination through the lens of biocultural diversity. The strategy deploys program-related investment loans alongside traditional grantmaking. Geographic commitments span the African Rift Valley, Central Asia, Melanesia, the American Southwest, and the Andean-Amazonian corridor. Confirmed partnerships include the ICCA Consortium and the International Funders for Indigenous Peoples, where the foundation holds founding membership. The strategy blends venture-philanthropy approaches with patient capital, targeting landscape-level resilience in food systems, cultural knowledge transmission, and community conserved areas. Governance sits with a board that includes Lisa B. Hendrickson, also a director at Avidbank Holdings, and Vilas Dhar, President of the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation. The foundation maintains direct ownership of income-producing commercial property in Menlo Park, California, and historically held a mixed-use resort asset in Papua New Guinea. Investment activity includes program-related loans structured as recoverable grants, deployed across United States-based initiatives. The structural differentiator is the foundation's insistence on investing through the biocultural framework rather than a conventional asset-allocation model. The entire endowment functions as a mission-aligned portfolio, where financial returns from Menlo Park real estate and PRI loans directly underwrite grants to Indigenous-led organizations.

## Sectors

- Indigenous Communities
- Biocultural Diversity
- Conservation
- Food & Agriculture
- Arts & Culture

## People

- Carla Fredericks — Chief Executive Officer
- Diane Christensen — President and Board Chair
- Matt Aguiar — Chief Financial and Operating Officer
- Lisa B. Hendrickson — Trustee
- Vilas Dhar — Trustee

## Questions

### Who runs investment decisions at The Christensen Fund?

CEO Carla Fredericks and CFO/COO Matt Aguiar oversee the foundation's program-related investment loans and income-producing property portfolio. The board, chaired by Diane Christensen, sets the overall investment and grantmaking strategy within the biocultural diversity mandate.

### How does The Christensen Fund's investment strategy differ from a typical endowment?

The foundation does not pursue a conventional asset-allocation model of equities, fixed income, and alternatives. Instead, it aligns the entire corpus with its mission — using program-related investments, direct real estate holdings, and grants to advance Indigenous rights and biocultural resilience. The Menlo Park commercial property generates income that funds the grantmaking.

### What geographies does The Christensen Fund focus on?

Active programs cover the African Rift Valley, Central Asia, Melanesia, the American Southwest, and the Andean-Amazonian corridor. Partnerships with the ICCA Consortium and International Funders for Indigenous Peoples extend the reach within these regions.

### Is The Christensen Fund a grantmaker or does it also invest directly?

It is both. The foundation makes grants and extends program-related investment loans — often structured as recoverable grants — to Indigenous-led organizations. It also holds income-producing real estate in Menlo Park, California.

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- [The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia Master Trust](https://altss.com/profile/the-children-s-hospital-of-philadelphia-master-trust)
- [The Church of England Pensions Board](https://altss.com/profile/the-church-of-england-pensions-board-c-of-e-funded-pensions-scheme)

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Last updated: 2026-08-11T02:43:31.692Z

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