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Impact Investing Goes Mainstream
The idea of doing good while making a healthy profit is rapidly gaining ground, particularly among wealthy Silicon Valley entrepreneurs but also among foundations and pension funds. Social impact investing — for-profit investing for social good — has crossed into the mainstream and is driving investment decisions.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Global Health Looks To BRAC and Gates Foundation for Mobile Money
Bangladesh is going digital. Not in smart watches, sensor-based clothing or electronic health records, but in money. Mobile money. Money, that according to BRAC and the Gates Foundation could improve the economic and health outcomes of the country, especially of women and children. With a healthy appreciation of the complexities in scaling digitally, faith in innovation at the grassroots level and years of planning, these organizations just might make mobile money the future of finance.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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World Bank Pledges $1.6b for Infrastructure Projects in East Africa
The World Bank said on Saturday it will loan East African nations $1.2 billion (S$1.56 billion) to improve inland waterways and ports in Kenya and Tanzania, as part of efforts to boost integration in the region.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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India’s New “Payment Banks” Expected to Spur Innovation
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday released the final guidelines for licensing of payments and small banks. These banks are intended to cover the unbanked and underbanked areas and increase banking penetration in the country, stated the circular. Let’s take a look at the changes that these banks are likely to bring in financial services.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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Vodacom Looking to Expand Use of M-pesa
Vodacom is in talks with small and big companies with the aim of getting them to use its mobile payment platform, m-pesa, to pay salaries to employees and allow customers to pay for goods using the system.
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- Uncategorized
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Microloans Help Latinas Become Entrepreneurs In Los Angeles
As if it were a sacred ritual, every week Gloria Sánchez meets to talk business with four other Hispanic women who are on their way to entrepreneurship thanks to the system of microloans.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Tags
- microfinance
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Banks Get Better Access To Tap Micro Segment
The newly launched branchless banking regulation will enable banks to expand their financial services to disadvantaged and low-income segments at affordable costs, a senior official of the Financial Services Authority (OJK) has said.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Roadmap: Microfinance Industry Eyes 10m Customers By 2018
Perhaps this is the reason why Pakistan Microfinance Network (PMN) Chairman Nadeem Hussain believes that an impressive growth of 20-25% per annum for the past many years has still not made the country’s microfinance industry ‘relevant’ in the fight against poverty.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- North Africa & Near East