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The Microfinance Business Model: Enduring Subsidy and Modest Profit
Microfinance institutions aim to serve customers ill-served by traditional commercial banks and thus the associated business model is challenging by definition. And yet the industry has achieved impressive scale reaching 211 million customers globally in 2013. Paradoxically, recent evidence suggests that the benefits of microcredit to borrowers may be modest. For example, six prominent randomized controlled trials found small impacts of access to microcredit on the incomes and consumption levels of marginal borrowers, though the studies found some “potentially important” (though modest) impacts on “occupational choice, business scale, consumption choice, female decision power, and improved risk management.” (Banerjee et al., 2015, p. 14).
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- Uncategorized
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Can Microfinance Still Make a Difference?
It's the Yangon entrepreneurial dream: a teashop in the suburbs to call your own. But for Ma Thandar, a 39-year-old mother of two, it is just a dream – and one she’s unlikely to be able to attain.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Rwanda Finalises Process to Interlink Financial Sector
The government of Rwanda is in final stages to interlink its financial sector, a move that will see the banking, microfinance, pension, insurance as well as capital market linked together.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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India’s Microfinance Sector Sees 29% Rise in Loan Disbursements in First Quarter
Microfinance industry has witnessed 29 per cent growth in loan disbursements during the first quarter of 2016-17, a report says.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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Ratan Tata, Nandan Nilekani to Start Microfinance Company
Mumbai: Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of Tata Sons, Vijay Kelkar, former finance secretary and chairman of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, and Nandan Nilekani, co-founder of Infosys Ltd and the architect of Aadhaar, are joining hands to start a microfinance institution (MFI).
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- Uncategorized
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- South Asia
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Maj Targets Andes Nations With $100 Million Micro Finance Fund
Maj Invest, a Danish asset manager with $8 billion in assets, is looking to boost acquisitions in the micro finance industry in the Andean region. The Copenhagen-based asset manager is in the process of raising capital to grow the size of its Maj Invest Financial Inclusion Fund II to $100 million by June from $75 million now, according to Kasper Svarrer, who oversees Maj’s private-equity business in emerging markets.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Europe & Eurasia
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Uganda Government to Close Errant SACCOs
State minister for micro-finance, Haruna Kyeyune has sent a stern warning to financial institutions that cheat clients. Kyeyune said that those SACCOs cheating clients will be closed down.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Microinsurance policies to be issued to half a million vulnerable people in India
The International Cooperative and Mutual Insurance Federation (ICMIF) will partner with Uplift India Association to enable over 200,000 microinsurance policies to be issued in India in the next five years, providing coverage to half a million low-income people in the country.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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