What factors affect a microfinance institution's outreach and profitability? This document studies the state of microfinance, drawing from a database of 2600 microfinance institutions (MFIs), and focuses on outreach, profitability and poverty.The paper presents the following sources of its data:...

This Brief is a summary of: Rosenberg, Richard, Gonzalez, Adrian and Narain, Sushma, The New Moneylenders: Are the Poor Being Exploited by High Microcredit Interest Rates? (Feb 2009). CGAP Ocassional Paper No. 15. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1400291

This paper explores whether microcredit borrowers are charged unreasonably high interest rates. It draws on data from Microfinance Information Exchange and the MicroBanking Bulletin. The paper does not find evidence suggesting any widespread pattern of borrower exploitation by MFIs charging high...