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Islamic banking consistently expanding in Pakistan
Last week, the State Bank of Pakistan granted its first license to a micro-finance bank and brought it into the Islamic mode.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Mutual Funds in India Invest $157M in Secured Debentures of Microfinance Institutions
Several mutual funds based in India, including Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI) Prudential Mutual Fund, Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC) Mutual Fund, Kotak Mutual Fund, Reliance Mutual Fund and State Bank of India (SBI) Mutual Fund, recently invested in secured debentures issued by several Indian microfinance institutions (MFIs). The issuers include Equitas Microfinance (Equitas); Janalakshmi Financial Services (JFS); SKS Microfinance (SKS) and Ujjivan Financial Services (Ujjivan). Although the individual transaction amounts are not available, the investments by the mutual funds total approximately INR 10 billion (USD 157 million). The debentures bear coupon rates of 11.5 up to 13 percent, approximately 3 to 4 percent above than highly rated securities issued by other Indian companies. The securities are backed by receivables and fixed assets owned by the MFIs.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Grameen Koota Reaches Milestone With 1 Million Microfinance Customers
Bangalore-based NBFC –MFI, Grameen Koota Financial Services Pvt Ltd (Grameen Koota) has reached a new milestone of 1 million microfinance customers, in a testimony to its strong client-centric approach aimed at providing holistic financial and social services.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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- lending, microfinance
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June’s Most Popular Posts on NextBillion: From microfinance ‘haters’ to M-PESA challengers
Our most-read and most-shared posts for the month of June included an impassioned riposte in the microfinance debate, an analysis of changes in Kenya’s world-leading mobile money market, and appreciation for the value of health microinsurance.
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- Health Care
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Kiva Co-founder on the Future of Microfinance
Jessica Jackley has had her hands full since stepping away from Kiva, the peer-to-peer microlender she co-founded in 2005. Between investing in startups through the Collaborative Fund; launching ProFounder, a crowdfunding site for entrepreneurs and small businesses; and consulting with companies to improve their social impact, the popular TED talker has also managed to give birth to three children. And she has a new book, Clay Water Brick: Finding Inspiration From Entrepreneurs Who Do the Most with the Least.
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Zidisha Helps Connect Lenders With Entrepreneurs in Developing Countries
Zidisha is a non-profit startup that acts as an online microlending community connecting lenders with entrepreneurs no matter the distance or disparity. As of right now, Zidisha allows individuals worldwide to lend to tech-savvy entrepreneurs in the slums of Africa and Asia where even a few dollars can go a long way. Over 20,000 people are using Zidisha today. Recently, I spoke with Zidisha founder and CEO Julia Kurnia to learn more about the company.
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- Uncategorized
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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How Companies Should Respond As Social Business Goes Global
Social business has been known as a systemically defined business practice for tackling poverty and is blossoming in every corner of the globe including China, the world’s second largest economy.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Measuring Client Health Outcomes Using Simple Indicators: Data collection is the easy part; the next test is helping organizations analyze, interpret
The Microcredit Summit Campaign is hoping financial services providers and others will use the “health outcome performance indicators” (HOPI) to assess the health and well-being of clients and their families, and believes wide usage of the HOPI could create short- and long-term value for practitioners, social investors and donors, raters and other actors.
- Categories
- Health Care, Impact Assessment