Collateral can increase access to finance, especially for small firms, and lead to better terms for loan contracts. Many argue that firms are excluded from formal credit markets because they lack assets that can serve as collateral. In fact, firms generally have a wide array of productive assets...

Many laws and regulations in developing countries drive small businesspeople out of the formal banking sector and into the hands of high-cost and sometimes unscrupulous moneylenders in the informal sector. The author looks at these barriers to credit for small farmers and firms and suggests...

In many developing countries, faulty laws and regulations make it hard to use livestock, machines, equipment, standing crops, and other movable property as collateral. The resulting constraints on access to credit hurt economies. In Bolivia, for example, a faulty legal and regulatory framework...

Most readers, especially those with car loans or home mortgages, know about collateral--property that the lender can take away from the borrower in the event that the borrower defaults. In low/middle income countries, it is understood that conservative lenders exclude firms from credit markets...

Most readers, especially those with car loans or home mortgages, know about "collateral"--property that the lender can take away from the borrower in the event that the borrower defaults. In low/middle income countries, it is understood that conservative lenders exclude firms from credit markets...

Most readers, especially those with car loans or home mortgages, know about collateral--property that the lender can take away from the borrower in the event that the borrower defaults. In low/middle income countries, it is understood that conservative lenders exclude firms from credit markets...