The MasterCard Foundation, a private Canadian foundation that seeks to alleviate poverty through microfinance and education, and the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), the investment agency of the UN, recently announced that they have partnered to launch YouthStart, a competition-based program aimed at increasing access to financial services for low-income youth in Sub-Saharan Africa. Continue Reading »

World-renowned primatologist Jane Goodall and her TaCare Program, a microcredit program focusing on rural populations surrounding Gombe National Park in Tanzania, report success in preserving wildlife and forests and improving living conditions for poor Tanzanian communities through microfinance. Continue Reading »

By Hugh Allen and David Panetta, Published by The SEEP Network, June 2010, 64 pages, available at: http://seepnetwork.org/PDFfiles/Savings_FINAL_web.pdf

Even as microlenders become a popular channel through which to reach the poor, many of those in rural areas and urban slums remain without access to formal financial services. Continue Reading »

The Daily Finance newspaper of the US reports that Peru’s highly competitive microlending market has helped drop interest rates while increasing average loan size, which stands at USD 1,300 as of 2009, an increase from approximately USD 1,000 in 2006, according to the Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX), the microfinance information clearinghouse. Continue Reading »

The Regional MSME Investment Fund for Sub-Saharan Africa SA, SICAV-SIF (REGMIFA), a Luxembourg-based fund that seeks to invest in micro-, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs) in Africa, has announced investments totaling USD 13.5 million in microfinance institutions (MFIs) Sinapi Aba Trust and First Allied Savings and Loans of Ghana; Kenya Women Finance Trust; Faulu Kenya; FINCA Tanzania, an affiliate of FINCA International, a microfinance network serving 700,000 people through subsidiaries in 21 countries; and Programme d’Appui aux Mutuelles d’Epargne et de Credit au Senegal (PAMECAS). Continue Reading »

The Postal Savings Bank of China (PSBC), a commercial bank in China aiming to serve low-income entrepreneurs, has reportedly increased its impact in rural areas through the provision of microloans funded by the Chinese government. Continue Reading »

Gina Harman, President and CEO of ACCION USA, an affiliate of ACCION International, a private, US-based nonprofit organization with a global network of microfinance institutions (MFIs), recently argued on the Huffington Post website that microfinance now offers an unprecedented opportunity for job creation in the US. Continue Reading »

A paper recently published by CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor) discusses how initial public offerings (IPOs) can shape the microfinance industry. Continue Reading »

Despite the political unrest and ethnic violence in Kyrgyzstan earlier this year, the Association of Microfinance Institutions (AMFI) of Kyrgyzstan, a network of 19 microfinance institutions (MFIs) launched in 2005, reports that the Kyrgyz microfinance sector continues to steadily grow. Continue Reading »

Avendus Capital, a wealth management company in India, recently announced that it has invested INR 369 million (approximately USD 8.25 million) in securities backed by microfinance loans. Continue Reading »

An article written by Dr Bhagwan Chowdhry, professor of finance and faculty director of the UCLA Anderson School [2], appeared on the Huffington Post on September 8, 2010 making the case that microcredit and microinsurance are effective ways of spreading risks in the developing world. Continue Reading »

This month, the number of microfinance organizations endorsing the SMART Campaign, an initiative housed at the Center for Financial Inclusion reached 528, with the latest endorser being Finance in Motion, a Frankfurt-based asset management firm focused on development finance. Continue Reading »

Daniel Rozas, a microfinance consultant based in Brussels, and Vinod Kothari, a microfinance practitioner based in Kolkata, India, recently wrote an article published on the Microfinance Focus website [1] describing the risks and proposing solutions to the risks behind microfinance securitization, a process that involves aggregating assets in a pool and issuing securities backed by the pool’s assets and cash flows [2]. Continue Reading »

In a recent editorial published in CFOZone, Denise Bedell-Bleeker, a financial writer and author of Effective Exit Strategies for the Insurance Industry, posited that recent developments in the industry indicate that microfinance is turning into an asset class of its own. Continue Reading »

By John D. Conroy, published by the Foundation for Development Cooperation (FDC), May 2010, 4 pages, available at: http://www.fdc.org.au/files/Resources/briefing-note/Briefing%20Note%20No%2010%20-%20Final%20%28e-version%29.pdf

In this FDC Briefing Note, the author draws parallels between the worldwide development of subprime lending and microcredit over the last decade. The theme of inadequate capacity for deposits and other forms of saving through microfinance institutions (MFIs) also runs through the author’s arguments. Continue Reading »

CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor), an independent policy and research center housed at the World Bank Group, recently published a technical guide entitled “Performance-Based Agreements: Incorporating Performance-Based Elements into Standard Loan and Grant Agreements”. Continue Reading »

“Raising Capital: Evaluating the Current Mindset of Investors Globally and Their Attitude to Microfinance as an Asset Class” was a panel discussion topic at the recent Global Microfinance Investment Conference which was held in New York. The conference was attended by a variety of participants in the microfinance sector: microfinance investors, representatives of microfinance institutions (MFIs), bankers, lawyers and researchers. Continue Reading »

LeapFrog Investments, an international for-profit microinsurance fund, recently announced its final close raising USD 25 million for a total fund size of USD 137 million for investments in Africa and Asia. Continue Reading »