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Feb 2013
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The MasterCard Foundation Announces $4.3 Million Partnership with The Smart Campaign to Strengthen Client Protection in Microfinance
February, 28 2013
Global - The collaboration will support both the Smart Campaign's work on the recently launched Client Protection Certification Program as well as a host of other valuable activities to support a healthier, more client-focused microfinance industry ...
Philippines: Microfinance Institutions Told to Tap OFW Remittances
February, 28 2013
Philippines - The Microfinance institutions (MFIs) including the rural banks engaged in micro financing are encouraged to tap the remittances of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) and Filipino migrants as source of microfinance funds ...
Haiti: $17 Million for Microfinance Loans and Micro-Mortgages
February, 28 2013
Haiti - Tuesday, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) and the Development Innovations Group (DIG), signed an agreement establishing a financing facility for low-income housing in Haiti ...
Report by CGAP and PIIF: Investors in Inclusive Finance Demonstrate a Strong Commitment to Responsible Investment
February, 27 2013
Global - New insights into fund managers’ commitments to responsible investment in inclusive finance are available in a new report released by CGAP and the UN-backed PRI Initiative’s Principles for Investors in Inclusive Finance (PIIF) ...
Made to Measure? Understanding Investor Challenges with Social Impact Measurement: Two New Publications Explore the Upsides and Downsides of Metrics Platforms
February, 27 2013
Canada - Never before have impact investors had so many social measurement approaches and tools at their fingertips to evaluate the effectiveness of their investments. ...
India: MFIs Struggle to Stay Afloat as Capital Erodes, Losses Mount
February, 26 2013
India - Microfinance institutions with significant exposure to Andhra Pradesh, once their biggest market, will have their net worth eroded in the year ending March and many of them will not be able to maintain the required minimum capital adequacy ratio from the next fiscal. ...
New Report Finds Women are an Underserved Market for Mobile Financial Services
February, 26 2013
Global - A study released today by the GSMA mWomen Programme and Visa Inc. entitled, "Unlocking the Potential: Women and Mobile Financial Services in Emerging Markets", shows that women in developing countries represent a significant underserved market and commercial opportunity for mobile financial service providers. ...
Designing Financial Services for China’s Marginalized
February, 25 2013
China - Citizens at the bottom of the economic pyramid in China lack even the most basic means to save for their children’s education, make purchases on credit, protect their homes through insurance, and send and receive money. Financial exclusion prevents many of them from realizing their potential and improving their livelihoods ...
Martin Kanz, The World Bank: Exits From The Debt Trap? India’s Bailout for Highly-Indebted Rural Households
February, 25 2013
India - While the benefit of debt relief programs to individual households can be substantial, their merit as a tool to improve household welfare in the long run remains highly controversial. ...
Olga Tomilova & Timothy Lyman, CGAP: Microfinance in The ECA Region - Need to Sharpen Definitions?
February, 25 2013
ECA - We hope that 2013 will see a rethinking of the term ‘microfinance’ as it is currently legally defined in many countries in ECA, and the emergence of more nuanced regulatory approaches capable of differentiating among different types of small-value retail lender. ...
A Few Bad Apples Give Microfinance a Bad Name
February, 21 2013
Global - Microlending is one of the most effective ways to help the world’s very poorest out of poverty. Tiny loans of $10 or $20 can help struggling families start small businesses that are the difference between chronic hunger and financial success. ...
Asia's Microfinance Demand Underserved
February, 20 2013
Asia - The total demand for microfinance in Asia is about 1 billion borrowers, but only 74 million borrowers are being served, creating investment opportunity for private equity, according to Jean-Philippe de Schrevel, chief executive of Switzerland-based Bamboo Finance, a private equity firm focused on the microfinance sector. ...
India: Microlenders May Move Supreme Court
February, 19 2013
India - After having been rebuffed by the Andhra Pradesh high court, microfinance institutions (MFIs) may approach the Supreme Court in their bid to quash a 2010 state law that nearly brought their businesses to a halt ...
EBRD Supports Financing to Micro and Small Enterprises in Kazakhstan
February, 18 2013
Kazakhstan - The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is providing a local currency loan in the equivalent of US$ 3 million to MCO Arnur Credit for on-lending to micro and small enterprises (MSEs) and individual entrepreneurs in Kazakhstan. ...
Kenya: Bit Loans
February, 18 2013
Kenya - Cashless transactions are more secure: they are traceable and hard to redirect. Yet combining mobile money with brick-and-mortar banks adds costs ...
Daniel Rozas: What’s Next - Another Repayment Crisis?
February, 15 2013
Global - Despite these positive signs, there are good reasons to think that what’s next for the microfinance sector is potentially another repayment crisis ...
Microfinance for Housing in Africa’s Cities
February, 15 2013
Africa - As the area of housing microfinance is relatively young, the need for capacity building for MFIs and other organizations providing these services is huge ...
Carly Fiorina's New Gig: Changing The World One Microloan (and Woman) at a Time
February, 14 2013
Global - “Impact measurement is not something that happens over night. But we’re beginning to track it… And we’re getting there. ...
Nigeria: Should State Governments Operate Microfinance Banks?
February, 11 2013
Nigeria - Microfinance in Nigeria has struggled to achieve the objective of providing affordable loans to micro enterprises and entrepreneurs. ...
How Tech Can Help Financial Firms Reach The Underbanked
February, 11 2013
Global - While there’s no question technology is transforming the way everyone accesses financial services, it has the potential to be particularly revolutionary to a formerly excluded group – the underbanked ...
The New Vulnerable Class in Latin America
February, 08 2013
Latin America - As we think about knowing our customers, we need to understand the motivations, choices, and challenges facing the growing number of not-quite poor, not-quite middle class populations in Latin America and beyond ...
Cambodia: Informal Lending Still Thriving
February, 07 2013
Cambodia - The expanding banking sector and the spread of microfinance institutions (MFIs) in rural areas have failed to elbow informal, unlicensed money lending out of the market, industry experts say ...
India: SKS Microfinance - The Inside Story
February, 07 2013
India - In a rare interview, the company’s CEO and managing director M.R. Rao and chief financial officer S. Dilli Raj said on Thursday that the worst is over for SKS and things can only get better. ...
Can Self-Regulation Protect Microfinance Clients?
February, 06 2013
Global - Last month the Smart Campaign launched its certification program. For those who care about client protection, this is an important and welcome milestone in what has been an impressive journey, which has included a broad spectrum of activities by funders to promote client protection. ...
Kyrgyz Microfinance Sector Faces Pressure From The State
February, 05 2013
Kyrgyzstan - Today Kyrgyzstan is discussing the government's attempt to interfere with the activities of microfinance institutions (MFIs) by the proposed legislative limit on the interest rates on MFI loans ...
Sanad Supports SMEs in Lebanon Through Partnership with Bank Audi
February, 05 2013
Lebanon - The Sanad Fund for MSME signed a loan facility of up to $20m with Bank Audi sal - Audi Saradar Group to support the expansion of its lending activities to small and medium enterprises (SME) in Lebanon - a priority growth area for Bank Audi ...
Microloan Recipients Decline for First Time: Study
February, 05 2013
Global - The number of the world's poor people who benefited from small loans has declined for the first time as purported abuses in India cast a shadow over the "microfinance" industry, a study said ...
Cambodia: Loans and Deposits Climb
February, 04 2013
Cambodia - Loans and deposits at Cambodia’s 32 micro-finance institutions and four NGOs, as well as small loans from Acleda Bank, rose sharply last year compared with a year earlier ...
Russia: Access to Russian Microfinance Boosted by $20M Loan
February, 01 2013
Russia - The Russian banking sector is shallow, fragmented, concentrated in Moscow, and cannot serve small rural micro enterprises. The World Bank has approved a loan of $20m to help scale-up microfinance ...

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