Washington, D.C. · Nonprofit
ACRONYM
ACRONYM (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $17,620,365 to it, the largest being HOPEWELL FUND ($8,694,240). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 64% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2020
- $18M
- Funders on record
- 20
- Grants received
- $18M
- Net assets
- $6.4M
What Acronym does
Mission
Acronym is a digital-first social welfare organization on a mission to advance progressive issues and causes at the local, state and national levels through the development of cutting-edge digital marketing campaigns and state-of-the-art nonpartisan (continued on schedule o) government accountability advocacy, voter registration and get-out-the-vote programs.
As stated on its FY2020 Form 990.
Program
Acronym ran a number of nonpartisan voter registration and get-out-the-vote programs. Acronym also conducted paid advertising, mobilization trainings on digital media, communications and organizing for progressive organizations. These programs reached audiences across over 15 states and helped to drive civic education, engagement and action.
The first program described on its most recent Form 990, which lists programs largest first by expense.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2019, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2019, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2019 to 2020, from $2.2M to $6.4M (+193%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 0 of the last 2 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2021: the base broadened from 2 funders to 3 funders, grant income rose $292k → $1.3M.
8 of 20 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 64% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of ACRONYM’s funders (the co-funder graph). Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
ACRONYM leans on a few funders — its largest provides 49% of grant income and the top three 69%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
97% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund ACRONYM.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 85% · 2018 48% · 2019 90% · 2020 63% · 2021 49% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
0% of ACRONYM's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 15% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2021, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
64% of ACRONYM's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $6.4M that is directly attributable, 88% of it comes from funders outside Washington, D.C., across 7 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $11M arriving through sponsors registered in 3 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Organizations like ACRONYM
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Washington, D.C.
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
97% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Footprint & structure
Part of a family of 4 related entities
- Pacronym · exempt
- Lockwood Strategy Inc · corp_trust
- Courier Newsroom Inc · corp_trust
- Shadow Inc · corp_trust
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for ACRONYM: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds ACRONYM?
- ACRONYM (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $17,620,365 to it, the largest being HOPEWELL FUND ($8,694,240). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 64% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does ACRONYM have?
- IRS filings report 20 organizations giving $17,620,365 in grants to ACRONYM, 3 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of ACRONYM?
- HOPEWELL FUND is the largest funder on record, with $8,694,240 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like ACRONYM find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Washington, D.C.. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2020 (financials across 2019–2020), and the filings of 20 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing