The Green for Growth Fund (GGF), a Luxembourg-based investment vehicle that supports energy-efficiency (EE) initiatives in Southeast Europe, recently announced that it will invest EUR 2 million (USD 2.2 million) in debt in Alter Modus, a Montenegro-based microfinance institution (MFI).
Category: Eastern Europe and Central Asia
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: SBP Increases Transaction Limits, Bolsters Alternate Channels to Boost Branchless Banking in Pakistan
The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) recently announced reforms to the country’s branchless banking regulations in an effort to further the bank’s National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS), launched in May 2015 seeking to deliver financial services to 50 percent of the adult population in Pakistan by 2020.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Symbiotics Issues Bonds Supporting SME, Rural Finance: $12m for Costa Rica’s Banco Improsa, $10m for Indonesia’s Mitra Bisnis Keluarga (MBK) Ventura, $6m for Armenia’s Armeconombank
Symbiotics Group, a Switzerland-based for-profit investment intermediary, recently informed MicroCapital that it has issued local-currency bonds
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Asian Development Bank Bond Sale Raises $30m to Boost Local Microenterprises Served by Credo Microfinance, FINCA Georgia
The Asian Development Bank (ADB), a multilateral development banking institution based in the Philippines, recently announced it has raised GEL 64 million (approximately USD 30 million) through a sale of bonds denominated in Georgian lari.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: WorldRemit Launches Money Transfer Service in Albania
WorldRemit, a UK-based online money transfer service, recently announced that it has launched its mobile money transfer service in Albania.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: IFU; Private Investors in Denmark, Norway Launch Nordic Micro-financing Initiative
The Nordic Micro-financing Initiative, whose organizers intend it to “provide the less fortunate in the world access to micro-financing” was recently launched in Oslo, Norway. Funded by the Danish government’s Investment Fund for Developing Countries, the Norwegian government’s Norfund and unspecified private investors in Norway, the initiative targets women in 14 nations in Africa and Asia, giving them “an opportunity to invest their way out of poverty, inequality and bleak future prospects.”
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Grameen Credit Agricole Microfinance Foundation Loans $2.2m to Kreditimi Rural I Kosoves of Kosovo, $500k to First MicroCredit Company of Kyrgyz Republic
The Grameen Credit Agricole Microfinance Foundation (GCAMF), a Luxembourg-based provider of financial services to microfinance institutions, recently informed MicroCapital that it has loaned
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: EBRD Loans $5.7m to United Bulgarian Bank for Residential Energy Efficiency
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), a UK-based multilateral institution, recently loaned USD 5.7 million to the United Bulgarian Bank (UBB), a unit of the National Bank of Greece, for investments to improve the energy efficiency of residential buildings in Bulgaria. The loan is provided as part of EBRD’s Residential Energy Efficiency Credit Line (REECL), a facility serving Bulgaria that was “established by the EBRD in 2005 and extended twice due to strong market demand.”
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: EBRD Syndicates $21m Loan for Belarusky Narodny Bank for MSMEs in Belarus
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, a UK-based multilateral institution, recently announced its intent to arrange a “senior unsecured syndicated A/B loan” of USD 21 million to be lent to micro-, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) via Belarus’s Belarusky Narodny Bank. The loan is divided into a senior tranche of USD 5 million funded by EBRD and a junior tranche of USD 16 million, which will be “syndicated to financial institutions” other than EBRD.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: IFC Lends Burgan Bank of Turkey $60m to Boost Local SMEs’ Access to Finance
The International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, recently announced it has loaned USD 60 million to Burgan Bank A.S., the Turkish subsidiary of Kuwait’s Burgan Bank Group.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Incofin’s AgRIF, DWM’s Inclusive Finance Equity Fund II Invest $4m in Crystal, a Georgian Microfinance Institution Focusing on Rural Areas
The Agricultural Rural Impulse Fund (agRIF) together with the Inclusive Finance Equity Fund II recently acquired share capital valued at GEL 9 million (approximately USD 4 million) in Joint Stock Company Microfinance Organization Crystal (Crystal), a Georgian microfinance institution.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE) Loans $22m to Fibabanka of Turkey to Support Micro-, Small-scale Agriculture
The European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE), a Luxembourg-based microfinance investment vehicle (MIV), recently announced it has loaned Fibabanka, a Turkish commercial bank, EUR 20 million (approximately USD 22 million) to finance micro- and small enterprises (MSEs) working in the Turkish agricultural sector.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Switzerland’s SECO Donates $5m to EBRD for Small Businesses in Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan
The Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) recently contributed USD 5.1 million to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD’s) Small Business Initiative to support “infrastructure, enterprise and financial sector development, climate change mitigation through energy efficiency and renewable energy initiatives, and the sustainable use of natural resources” in the Kyrgyz Republic and Tajikistan. EBRD provides loans, debt securities, equity investments, guarantees and technical assistance to micro- and small businesses primary via commercial banks and microfinance institutions (MFIs). SECO has donated a total of USD 189 million to EBRD from 1992 through 2016.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: PPAF, Karandaaz, Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) Establish Pakistan Microfinance Investment Company (PMIC)
The Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund (PPAF), a government-backed entity that supports the Pakistani microfinance industry; Karandaaz Pakistan, a Pakistan-based private sector company funded by the UK government; and Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), a German development bank, recently signed a shareholders’ agreement to set up the Pakistan Microfinance Investment Company (PMIC).
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE) to Provide Technical Assistance, $2.8m Loan to Microcredit Foundation MI-BOSPO of Bosnia and Herzegovina
The European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE), a Luxembourg-based microfinance investment vehicle (MIV), recently announced it has loaned Microcredit Foundation MI-BOSPO, a nonprofit microfinance institution in Bosnia and Herzegovina, EUR 2.5 million (approximately USD 2.8 million).
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: C-Quadrat’s Dual Return Funds Loan $1.5m to Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) in Costa Rica, Moldova
During March 2016, Austria’s C-Quadrat Asset Management GmbH issued loans worth the equivalent of USD 1.5 million via its two Dual Return Funds to unspecified microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Costa Rica and Moldova.
MICROFINANCE PUBLICATION ROUND-UP: Mobile Money in Africa; Doing Business in Kyrgyzstan; Digitalization of Kenya’s Premier Credit
“Mobile Money Momentum in Four African Countries;” published by CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor); December 2015; 101 pages; available at: http://www.cgap.org/news/new-data-cgap-sets-benchmark-use-mobile-financial-services
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Green for Growth Fund Southeast Europe (GGF) Signs $2.2m Senior Loan Facility with ICS Total Leasing & Finance of Moldova
The Green for Growth Fund Southeast Europe (GGF), a Germany-based fund that invests in energy efficiency and renewable energy, recently announced that it has agreed to disburse a senior loan of EUR 2 million (USD 2.2 million) to ICS Total Leasing & Finance S.A. (TLF), a Moldova-based non-banking financial institution.