-
Financial Inclusion Takes the Next Step: An Interview with MetLife Foundation President Dennis White
As NextBillion launches our new Financial Health site under the sponsorship of MetLife Foundation, we touched base with its president and CEO, Dennis White. In this wide-ranging interview, White discusses the evolution of the financial inclusion movement, and the work the foundation is doing to advance it – including its grant-making and investing approach, its ongoing challenges, and what it has learned from both success and failure, among other issues.
- Categories
- Finance
-
New Job Board Feature – FREE Access to NextBillion’s 100,000 Twitter Audience
NextBillion's job board is one of the most active career resources in the social business and global development space – and it's one of the most popular features on the site. We're making it better by tweeting out all new job posts to our fast-growing Twitter audience of approximately 100,000 – for free. To post a job ad, or find a career with impact, visit the job board today.
-
Climbing India’s Technology Stack: As the Fintech Revolution Extends to Health Care, Will Emerging Markets Be Ready?
The use of technology stacks has been a profoundly important breakthrough for social and financial inclusion in India, and it also opens up many opportunities to transform health care for the poorest residents there. But as these tech-based solutions proliferate in other low and middle-income countries, writes David Butz, the health care industry must be prepared for the massive disruptions they're likely to bring.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Women’s Economic Empowerment: SEEP Forum to Tackle a Vital Issue of our Time
Women play multifaceted roles in market systems, as smallholder farmers, employees and owners of business enterprises, clients of financial institutions, and unpaid care workers, among many others. That's why the SEEP Network is hosting an international convening on women’s economic empowerment in May that aims to narrow the divide between best practices and informed policy decisions, exploring topics that are emerging as critical constraints to women’s economic empowerment across the globe.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Impact Investing Contemplates the Path Ahead: A Q&A with Big Path Capital’s Co-Founders
With Big Path Capital's Impact Capitalism Summit happening this week (right now, in fact), we caught up with Big Path co-founders Michael Whelchel and Shawn Lesser to discuss the event and impact investing's evolution. They shared their insights in this email interview.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
- Tags
- impact investing
-
Dear Diary: New Financial Diaries Research Explains Why Many Americans are So Angry
Would you rather have more money or a more stable financial life? A striking 92% of Americans in a recent survey chose stability - a sign of the deep undercurrent of financial insecurity running through the world's richest country. A new book called "The Financial Diaries, How American Families Cope in a World of Uncertainty" explores this insecurity in remarkable detail. Its co-author, Rachel Schneider of the Center for Financial Services Innovation, discusses the research and its far-reaching implications in NextBillion's latest podcast.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Don’t Fear the Rate Cap: Why Cambodia’s Microcredit Regulations Aren’t Such a Bad Thing
The Cambodian government recently shocked its microcredit industry by capping interest rates at 18 percent – about half the current rate of most loans. Many analysts sympathetic to the industry have strongly criticized the move, but Milford Bateman argues it's actually an important step in protecting the poor – and resolving an "existential crisis" in a sector plagued by unsustainable growth and high over-indebtedness.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Why Fossil Fuel Companies Must Evolve or Die: An Interview with Carbon Tracker Founder Mark Campanale
To keep global warming under 2 degrees Celsius and (hopefully) avoid the harshest consequences of climate change, up to three-quarters of known fossil fuels will have to stay in the ground. That's the thesis of the Carbon Tracker Initiative and its founder, Mark Campanale. If that sounds like a heavy lift for an oil-dependent world, he raises a compelling point: With collapsing margins and emerging competition from renewables, the fossil fuel industry has no choice but to evolve. Campanale elaborates on these views in this video interview.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Investing, Technology