Replicating Microfinance in the United States
Replicating Microfinance in the United States

Author: James H. Carr

Publisher: Woodrow Wilson Center Press

Published: 2002-06-28

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 1930365101

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Microfinance was pioneered in the developing world as the lending of small amounts of money to entrepreneurs who lacked the kinds of credentials and collateral demanded by banks. Similar practices spread from the developing to the developed world, reversing the usual direction of innovation, and today several hundred microfinance institutions are operating in the United States. Replicating Microfinace in the United States reviews experiences in both developing and industrialized countries and extends the applications of microlending beyond enterprise to consumer finance, housing finance, and community development finance, concentrating especially on previously underserved households and their communities.

Microfinance Handbook
Microfinance Handbook

Author: Joanna Ledgerwood

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 1998-12-01

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0821384317

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The purpose of the 'Microfinance Handbook' is to bring together in a single source guiding principles and tools that will promote sustainable microfinance and create viable institutions.

The Future of Microfinance
The Future of Microfinance

Author: Ira W. Lieberman

Publisher: Brookings Institution Press

Published: 2020-06-30

Total Pages: 493

ISBN-13: 0815737645

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A major source of financing for the poor and no longer a niche industry Over the past four decades, microfinance—the provision of loans, savings, and insurance to small businesses and entrepreneurs shut out of traditional capital markets—has grown from a niche service in Bangladesh and a few other countries to a significant global source of financing. Some 200 million people globally now receive support from microfinance institutions, with most of the recipients in the developing world. In the beginning, much of the microfinance industry was managed by non-governmental organizations, but today the majority of these institutions are commercial and regulated by governments, and they provide safe places for the poor to save, as well as offering much-needed capital and other financial services. Now out of infancy, the microfinance industry faces major challenges, including its ability to deal with mobile banking and other technology and concerns that some markets are now over-saturated with microfinance. How the industry deals with these and other challenges will determine whether it will continue to grow or will be subsumed within the larger global financial sector. This book is based on the results of a workshop at Lehigh University among thirty-four leaders in the industry. The editors, working with contributions from more than a dozen leading authorities in the field, tell the important story of how microfinance developed, how it has met the needs of hundreds of millions of people, and they address key questions about how it can continue to meet those needs in the future.

Why Doesn't Microfinance Work?
Why Doesn't Microfinance Work?

Author: Milford Bateman

Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.

Published: 2010-06-10

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 1848138954

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Since its emergence in the 1970s, microfinance has risen to become one of the most high-profile policies to address poverty in developing and transition countries. It is beloved of rock stars, movie stars, royalty, high-profile politicians and ‘troubleshooting’ economists. In this provocative and controversial analysis, Milford Bateman reveals that microfinance doesn’t actually work. In fact, the case for it has been largely built on hype, on egregious half-truths and – latterly – on the Wall Street-style greed of those promoting and working in microfinance. Using a multitude of case studies, from India to Cambodia, Bolivia to Uganda, Serbia to Mexico, Bateman demonstrates that microfi nance actually constitutes a major barrier to sustainable economic and social development, and thus also to sustainable poverty reduction. As developing and transition countries attempt to repair the devastation wrought by the global financial crisis, Why Doesn’t Microfinance Work? argues forcefully that the role of microfinance in development policy urgently needs to be reconsidered.

Microfinance
Microfinance

Author: Suresh Sundaresan

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

Published: 2009-01-01

Total Pages: 143

ISBN-13: 1848445172

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. . . a valuable resource that traces the changes in the microfinance sector from its origin until now. . . The book will serve as a good reference point for future debate in these areas. Microfinance Insights In 2006 the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Muhammad Yunus for his work on microfinance, dramatically changing attitudes towards capital markets. Suresh Sundaresan has assembled an impressive set of scholars and practitioners in this book to bring together recent practical innovations and policy questions in the realm of microfinance. The contributions emphasize practical solutions to problems facing the field by examining capital markets, providing a framework for thinking about regulation, and raising questions about gender empowerment. They examine recent developments in the field, research findings, and the challenges that lie ahead. This book takes a solid step toward a systematic analysis of the implications of microfinance for the role and regulation of capital markets. The authors address integration of capital markets with microfinance, technological innovations such as the use of mobile phone technology, the consequences of women s access to micro-loan borrowings, and the regulatory challenges and opportunities emerging as the landscape of microfinance dramatically evolves. Practitioners, policy makers, and academics in the fields of developmental economics, finance, gender studies and public and development policy will enjoy this analytically rigorous work.

Due Diligence
Due Diligence

Author: David Roodman

Publisher: CGD Books

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 1933286539

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The idea that small loans can help poor families build businesses and exit poverty has blossomed into a global movement. The concept has captured the public imagination, drawn in billions of dollars, reached millions of customers, and garnered a Nobel Prize. Radical in its suggestion that the poor are creditworthy and conservative in its insistence on individual accountability, the idea has expanded beyond credit into savings, insurance, and money transfers, earning the name microfinance. But is it the boon so many think it is? Readers of David Roodman's openbook blog will immediately recognize his thorough, straightforward, and trenchant analysis. Due Diligence, written entirely in public with input from readers, probes the truth about microfinance to guide governments, foundations, investors, and private citizens who support financial services for poor people. In particular, it explains the need to deemphasize microcredit in favor of other financial services for the poor.

Microfinance for Bankers and Investors: Understanding the Opportunities and Challenges of the Market at the Bottom of the Pyramid
Microfinance for Bankers and Investors: Understanding the Opportunities and Challenges of the Market at the Bottom of the Pyramid

Author: Elizabeth Rhyne

Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional

Published: 2009-08-21

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 0071713654

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What promise did Sequoia Capital recognize in SKS microfinance (India) that it had also seen in Apple, Oracle, and Google? Why would Vodafone help distribute money via cell phones for millions of Kenyans? How did a Mexican retailer create a financial-services empire, Banco Azteca, that would serve eight million borrowers in five years? From its origins as a nonprofit poverty alleviation strategy, microfinance has become a viable business model for providing financial services to the poor in ways that allow for both social responsibility and profit, even in the midst of economic turmoil. Longtime microfinance expert Elisabeth Rhyne and her team guide readers through the landscape of financial-inclusion opportunities, providing lessons from companies around the world that are leading the way in earning profits while addressing global poverty. Microfinance for Bankers and Investors reveals: Changes in the market allowing for increased private investment in microfinance New technologies and delivery channels that reduce costs for small transactions Proven ways to overcome the unique challenges of serving customers at the bottom of the pyramid Innovative products for grassroots finance, such as mobile phone banking and microinsurance The extraordinary social value and business sustainability of microfinance Microfinance for Bankers and Investors breaks new ground by showing how microfinance attracts top organizations to engage in double and triple bottom-line business activities. With deep insight and clear vision, it examines the unique opportunities and challenges of providing financial services for low-income people. Inclusive finance gives companies the prospect of aligning social values with long-term business strategies. Microfinance for Bankers and Investors offers the facts and insights you need to enter this fast-growing market with confidence.

Confessions of a Microfinance Heretic
Confessions of a Microfinance Heretic

Author: Hugh Sinclair

Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers

Published: 2012-07-09

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 1609945182

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Microfinance insider Hugh Sinclair weaves a shocking tale of an industry focused on maximizing profits and plagued by predatory lending practices, scandals, cover-ups and corruption.

The Economics of Microfinance, second edition
The Economics of Microfinance, second edition

Author: Beatriz Armendariz

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2010-04-23

Total Pages: 361

ISBN-13: 0262513986

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An accessible analysis of the global expansion of financial markets in poor communities, incorporating the latest thinking and evidence. The microfinance revolution has allowed more than 150 million poor people around the world to receive small loans without collateral, build up assets, and buy insurance. The idea that providing access to reliable and affordable financial services can have powerful economic and social effects has captured the imagination of policymakers, activists, bankers, and researchers around the world; the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize went to microfinance pioneer Muhammed Yunis and Grameen Bank of Bangladesh. This book offers an accessible and engaging analysis of the global expansion of financial markets in poor communities. It introduces readers to the key ideas driving microfinance, integrating theory with empirical data and addressing a range of issues, including savings and insurance, the role of women, impact measurement, and management incentives. This second edition has been updated throughout to reflect the latest data. A new chapter on commercialization describes the rapid growth in investment in microfinance institutions and the tensions inherent in the efforts to meet both social and financial objectives. The chapters on credit contracts, savings and insurance, and gender have been expanded substantially; a new section in the chapter on impact measurement describes the growing importance of randomized controlled trials; and the chapter on managing microfinance offers a new perspective on governance issues in transforming institutions. Appendixes and problem sets cover technical material.

The Microfinance Revolution
The Microfinance Revolution

Author: Marguerite Robinson

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 2001-06-01

Total Pages: 358

ISBN-13: 0821383388

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Around the world, a revolution is occurring in finance for low-income people. The microfinance revolution is delivering financial services to the economically active poor on a large scale through competing, financially self-sufficient institutions. In a few countries this has already happened; in others it is under way. The emerging microfinance industry has profound implications for social and economic development. For the first time in history, capital is well on its way to being democratized. 'The Microfinance Revolution', in three volumes, is aimed at a diverse readership - economists, bankers, policymakers, donors, and social scientists; microfinance practitioners and specialists in local finance and rural and urban development; and members of the general public interested in development. This first volume, 'Sustainable Finance for the Poor', focuses on the shift from government- and donor-subsidized credit systems to self-sufficient microfinance institutions providing voluntary savings and credit services.