The Australian Capital Map
Half the charity sector can carry capital.
Almost none is offered any.
We classified every one of Australia’s 44,196 financially-reporting charities on two axes — can it service a scheduled claim, and does it earn market income? The result is the first entity-level map of who capital reaches and who it exiles.
- Charities mapped
- 44,196
- Bankable · non-commercial
- 50%
- Recoverable-grant heartland
- ~11.6k
- …worth
- $16.9B
Where does your charity sit?
Search any of the 44,196 classified charities to see its position on the map and open its full profile.
Where they actually sit
Each charity placed by its bankability (x) and commerciality (y). The mass is unmistakably in the bottom-right: organisations able to carry a claim, but funded by gifts rather than earned income.
Every ACNC charity that files financials (44,196), binned by bankability × commerciality. Darker = denser. The mass sits bottom-right: able to carry a claim, funded by gifts.
The four quadrants, by the numbers
Default 50/50 cutoff. Neutral, axis-derived labels; the share holds across 40/50/60 thresholds.
| Quadrant | % of charities | % of sector $ |
|---|---|---|
| Bankable · non-commercialbottom-right | 52.6% | 59.9% |
| Fragile · non-commercialbottom-left | 19.9% | 7.2% |
| Bankable · self-fundingtop-right | 19.6% | 29% |
| Fragile · tradingtop-left | 7.9% | 3.9% |
Not all “non-commercial” is donation-funded
The bankable, non-commercial cell is only half donation-dominant. The rest is government-contract-funded (universities, hospitals) — a separate story that carries most of the cell’s dollars. The recoverable-grant heartland is the donation-dominant subset only.
| Dominant funding source | Charities | Share of cell | Revenue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Donation-dominant | 11,561 | 49.7% | $16.9B |
| Government-dominant | 6,839 | 29.4% | $121B |
| Investment / other | 4,412 | 19% | $9.4B |
| Earned (minor) | 438 | 1.9% | $0.5B |
The commercial half the register can’t see
The map above is charity-only. Mission-driven ventures that trade — social enterprises, co-operatives, mission-locked companies — sit higher on the commerciality axis but outside the ACNC register, so the entity count is a lower bound, not a ceiling. Sized from published aggregates, not entity-level: mission-driven ventures that trade are usually structured as companies, co-operatives or mission-locked firms — outside the ACNC register — so no per-entity financials exist to place them as dots.
Social enterprises
~12,00086% of revenue from trade
≈$16B/yr contribution · 23% fully self-funded through trade · ~89,000 jobs · 5,795 individually identified
RISE Report 2024, Social Traders
Co-operatives & mutuals
~1,800top 100 ≈ $48B revenue
member-owned, non-charity structures; top-100 combined revenue, FY24
National Mutual Economy Report, BCCM
Australia, measured — all 44,196 AIS returns that carry financials
10.6k charities · $10.1B
can service a scheduled claim yet fund themselves through one-and-done gifts — the recoverable-grant heartland. Half of all charities (50%) sit in the bankable, non-commercial corner; barely a fifth are commercially self-funding.
That cell holds 11,561 donation-dominant organisations ($16.9B). 337 are endowed grant-makers and 855 report a one-off capital transfer rather than annual income — sources of philanthropy, or accounting artefacts, rather than candidates to receive it. The headline figure excludes both.
52.6%
Bankable · non-commercial
59.9% of sector $
19.9%
Fragile · non-commercial
7.2% of sector $
19.6%
Bankable · self-funding
29% of sector $
7.9%
Fragile · trading
3.9% of sector $
Entity-level classification of the ACNC register (2021–2024). Sector revenue reconciles within 2–4% of the ACNC's published figures in all four years. Commerciality is a proxy for extractability, which is ~zero for a non-distributing sector. Method & reconciliation: analysis/capital-map.
Frequently asked
How many Australian charities could use recoverable capital?
About 11,561 charities ($16.9B in annual revenue) are demonstrably able to service a scheduled claim yet are funded almost entirely by one-and-done donations — the donation-dominant subset of the bankable · non-commercial cell. This is the recoverable-grant heartland, sized here for the first time.
What share of Australian charities are financially self-sustaining?
Only about 22% earn enough market income to be commercially self-funding. Half (50%) are bankable but non-commercial, and a further 22% can neither service a claim nor earn market income.
How was this measured?
We classified all 44,196 ACNC-registered charities that file financials (2021–2024 Annual Information Statements) on bankability (surplus consistency, margin, asset backing, revenue stability) and commerciality (market-facing earned income). Sector revenue reconciles within 2–4% of the ACNC's published figures in all four years.
Why is commerciality a proxy for extractability?
Charities are legally non-distributing, so true extractability — a return a financier can capture — is near zero for all of them. Commerciality (whether a charity earns market income) is used as the closest measurable proxy, and is not a claim that charities yield a capturable return.
Methodology & citation
Every ACNC-registered charity that filed financials in 2021–2024 was scored on bankability (surplus consistency, surplus margin, asset backing, revenue stability) and commerciality (market-facing earned income, a proxy for extractability, which is structurally near zero for a non-distributing sector). Sector revenue reconciles within 2–4% of the ACNC's published figures in all four years. Basic Religious Charities (which file no financials) and implausible outliers are excluded and documented; ratios are winsorised before scoring; dollar weights use each charity’s latest year.
Full method, code and per-year reconciliation: analysis/capital-map. Companion working paper: Bankable and Extractable: A Two-Axis Map of Capital Exclusion (Ghadamian, IRSA Institute).
Cite as: Elevate / IRSA Institute, The Australian Capital Map, https://www.elevate.gift/capital-map/australia.
This is the gap Elevate is built to close
Half the sector could put capital to work and give it back — but the only capital on offer is grants, spent once. Recoverable grants recycle: a dollar at recovery R does 1/(1−R) of cumulative work. Play with the model, or see how it works.