Bolivia has the most advanced microfinance sector in Latin America and has been a model worldwide. Apex organizations--second-tier wholesaling mechanisms that lend and offer non- financial assistance to retailing microfinance organizations--have not been responsible for this success. Former and...

This report provides a preliminary quantitative analysis of the financial results of five organizations which are clients of FondoMicro. It also includes a qualitative assessment of the long-run vision held by these institutions' managers and of the organizations' ability to allow a...

Using a unique firm level data set -- the Enterprise Surveys -- this paper develops a new measure of credit-constrained status for firms using hard data instead of perceptions data. The paper classifies firms into four ordinal categories: Not Credit Constrained, Maybe Credit Constrained,...

This paper describes a new index of the quality of the business environment for microfinance institutions (the Global Microscope on the Microfinance Business Environment). Regressions are used to validate the index by linking it and its subcomponents to microfinance outcomes. The main findings...

Die Autoren beschreiben und diskutieren das Programm einer Nichtregierungsorganisation (NRO) in Gambia, das zum Ziel hat, die einheimischen informellen Spar- und Kreditvereinigungen mit der formalen Finanzinstitution zu verbinden. Die sorgfältige institutionelle Ausgestaltung durch die NRO...

In developing countries, microfinance has been the darling of the development community, and in developed countries, microfinance fits well with Third Ways ideas. What are the challenges and opportunities for the attempt to replicate microfinance in the United States? This paper attempts to...

Microfinance—both credit and savings—has potential to improve the well- being of poor women in developing countries. This paper explores practical ways to achieve that potential. Based on lessons from informal saving mechanisms that women already use, the paper proposes two savings services...

In the next ten years, advocates of microfinance organizations (MFOs) will seek more than $20 billion to provide small loans to 100 million of the poorest families worldwide. In the United States, the newest federal budget proposes a 159-percent increase in the about $200 million spent per year...

In rich countries, lenders often rely on credit scoring--formulae to predict risk based on the performance of past loans with characteristics similar to current loans--to inform decisions. Can credit scoring do the same for microfinance lenders in poor countries? This paper argues that scoring...