Blog

Driving Fast on Indian Country Roads: Learning from the Crisis

Investors all the way up the value chain of microfinance funding can do a lot to support a safe road to financial inclusion.

Over-Indebtedness and Impact

We should not expect the over-indebtedness definition to solve the impact debate just in passing by.

Over-Indebtedness and “Unacceptable Sacrifices”

When we talk about “over-indebtedness,” we usually assume that it’s something that ought to happen pretty rarely if credit is being delivered responsibly.

Microfinance Over-Indebtedness

Whether to protect the social impact on customers or the institutional viability of MFIs, over-indebtedness is crucial to all parties involved.

Highlights and Headlines for January 2011

The news wires have been busy with the recent announcement of partnerships and joint ventures in the Indian branchless banking market. India’s largest public sector bank, the State Bank of India, announced a joint venture with the mobile operator Bharti Airtel to offer mobile banking. Meanwhile, India’s largest private sector bank, ICICI Bank Ltd, announced its tie-up with Vodafone Essar to bank the unbanked via the mobile phone.

The Lurking Challenge of Activating the Inactive Customer

In the past year, several high-profile branchless banking deployments have publicized the fact that they’ve reached more than one million users. Yet what is never publicized in press releases or speeches is the very low number of active users in most deployments. In a recent CGAP survey, 64% of mobile money managers indicated that less than 30% of their registered users are active, and active rates of less than 10% are not uncommon.

Flying Blind on Over-indebtedness?

The point is not to assert that we have a generalized problem with over-indebted microborrowers. The point is that for most markets we simply don’t know.

Are We Over-Indebting Poor Clients? A Challenge for Microcredit

How much do we really know about levels of over-indebtedness, or even what is a reasonable level of debt for a poor household to carry?

Best of the Microfinance Blog 2010

It’s inevitable that a review of the year would highlight the dramatic turn of events in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, as well as other fundamental issues about the provision of financial services for the poor that emerged in such stark light in 2010.

Tackling Fraud in Mobile Banking

CGAP recently surveyed 11 mobile operators to help them better understand how they can ensure that their mobile banking services are not used for money laundering or terrorism financing as well as preventing incidents of fraud against the company.

A Country with a Last Name: Haiti Cherie

The financial hit of losing fixed assets like buildings and equipment and writing-off loans, the difficulty of keeping strong credit discipline with the influx of not-always-so-smart subsidies, the offer of higher salaries to staff by relief organizations and NGOs, and the short attention span of funders for long-term institution building are all real challenges.

Haiti: Could Mobile Banking Be A Legacy of the Earthquake?

Tomorrow will mark the one year anniversary of the terrible earthquake that struck Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. While much of the global aid community was focused on disaster response and establishing humanitarian camps for the displaced, there was also a desire to start putting in place financial systems that could be used to help both the immediate aid efforts as well as to establish sustainable long-term financial services for all Haitians.

Legally, How Young Is Too Young to Open a Savings Account?

In most countries, youth under the age of 18 are typically prevented from independently opening a savings account because few banks are willing to offer any financial services without requiring a signed contract.

10 Highlighted Posts from the CGAP Technology Blog from 2010

With 2010 now behind us, we’ve done a quick review of our blog posts over the last year. There were a lot of interesting topics discussed both by CGAP and guest bloggers.

SHGs for the Poor; MFIs for the Non-Poor

The focus of concern in the recent past, and leading up to the Andhra Pradesh microfinance crisis, has been the risk to commercialized microfinance organizations or MFI-NBFCs.

Is Microfinance Research as Bad as Medical Research?

Microfinance research has its own set of concerns.

Shaking One’s Faith in RCTs?

Gold-standard” randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are not immune: 25 percent of published RCT results are subsequently convincingly refuted.

The Alternatives to Mobile Money

Mobile money often begins with a customer withdrawing cash in a store in his or her community, or sending money directly from their mobile money account to a relative living far away.

Highlights and Headlines: December 2010

In our last post for 2010, let’s recap what we’ve been discussing and share some headlines from around the globe.

Broadening the Financial Inclusion Cast of Characters

New technology-enabled models for financial inclusion seek to take transactions outside of bank branches and into retail shops that exist in every community where poor people live and work.