Microfinance Horizon

31 December 2010 [IFMR] IFMR Capital recently structured and arranged an INR 165.5 million securitisation transaction. The transaction is backed by 25,768 microloans originated by well-known Bangalore based MFI, Grameen Financial Services Pvt. Ltd., popularly known as Grameen Koota. This is the third rated transaction with Grameen Koota as originator. Closing the transaction at this [...]

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29 December 2010 [VCCircle] The fund, which has started its ops from Gujarat, is backed by UK and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. Shanti Microfinance, a not-for-profit organization, is raising a $772,000 (£500,000) fund backed by UK and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. The firm has already disbursed £10k ($15.4k) and plans to start its operations [...]

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28 December 2010 [PressRelease] IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is providing a €58 million loan to Bancpost S.A. that will enable the bank to extend more loans to micro, small, and medium enterprises in Romania and help speed economic recovery. Bancopost S.A. is a subsidiary of EFG Eurobank Ergasias S.A. in Greece. [...]

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27 December 2010 [PressRelease] The Government of Sweden is extending an additional SEK35,000,000 (about $5 million equivalent) to an Asian Development Bank (ADB)-administered trust fund which is helping combat the spread of HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific. The new assistance, which will be released in three installments from 2010 to 2012, follows Sweden’s initial [...]

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26 December 2010 [Syminvest] Financiera Independencia, S.A.B. de C.V., SOFOM, E.N.R. (BMV: FINDEP; Pink Sheets: FNCRF) (“Independencia” or the “Company”) a leading Mexican microfinance lender of personal loans to lower income segment individuals and working capital loans through group lending microfinance, announced today that it has signed a purchase agreement to acquire in all cash [...]

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25 December 2010 [Zawya] The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. It said, however, that the industry remains underdeveloped and suffers from a lack of regulation, measurement problems and a lack of reliable data, [...]

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By Bijou George and John Satish Kumar 24 December 2010 [WSJ] The chief executive of the Indian Banks Association indicated Wednesday that banks will ensure microlenders remain fully funded in the short term to help them overcome temporary hiccups in repayments and maintain business as usual. Microlenders typically fund their loans to their consumers though [...]

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23 December 2010 [PressRelease] Freedom from Hunger is pleased to have won InterAction’s Best Practices and Innovations (BPI) award for Health and Microfinance: Leveraging the Strengths of Two Sectors to Improve Food Security. InterAction, an alliance of U.S.-based international nongovernmental organizations, honors those that promote information-sharing on effective program approaches and improve practice standards by boosting [...]

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23 December 2010 [VCCircle] Hope Microcredit, which started as an NGO in 2005 and then registered as NBFC, started MFI ops this year. Kerala-based Hope Microcredit Finance Ltd. has raised Rs 10 crore from  in what will be the first (disclosed) private equity investment in the Indian  microfinance sector after the crisis started in Andhra [...]

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22 December 2010 [PressRelease] Grameen Foundation and its affiliates, Grameen Capital India and Grameen-Jameel Microfinance Ltd., today announced a new initiative to address the liquidity needs of Indian microfinance institutions (MFIs) that demonstrate a double-bottom-line focus on social and financial returns. Local bank financing has shrunk throughout India in the wake of events in Andhra [...]

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22 December 2010 [PressRelease] A $2.5 million grant from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) will help Mongolia overhaul its savings and credit cooperative market and provide basic financial education nationwide, particularly for poor households. The grant is from Japan’s Special Fund, financed by the Government of Japan and administered by ADB. The Financial Regulatory Commission [...]

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21 December 2010 [Rediff] Nobel Laureate and founder of Bangladesh’s Grameen Bank Muhammad Yunus suggest setting up of a regulatory authority for Micro Credit Institutions (MCIs) in India. “They (MCI) were created to fight the loan sharks and not to create one. There should be some regulatory authority when you have so many micro credit [...]

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21 December 2010 [ColomboPage] Sri Lanka government sources say that it is considering to establish a mechanism to monitor the microfinance companies operating in the island. At present, there is no such mechanism to monitor these institutes. The government’s plans to monitor the micro finance sector are yet to be revealed. A number of organizations [...]

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20 December 2010 [PressRelease] Symbiotics, a leading microfinance investment services company, launched on Thursday December 16th Micro, Small & Medium Enterprise Bonds SA (MSME Bonds), an issuance platform based in Luxembourg dedicated to impact investing for institutional investors. Its two first bonds include a USD 10 million refinancing of MUCAP and a USD 11.5 million [...]

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18 December 2010 [PressRelease] Grameen Foundation Reaches Next Level in Social Transparency, Client Connection and Mobile Transactions Grameen Foundation today announced the release of Mifos® 2.0, an innovative new version of its award-winning management information software (MIS) for microfinance.  It will be available to microfinance institutions (MFIs) as a cloud service or on-premise system starting [...]

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18 December 2010 [Brecorder] The apex regulator of the insurance industry in Pakistan, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has set-up a task force with three subgroups to develop microinsurance in Pakistan. Three sub-groups will focus on their respective areas including the development of regulatory framework for microinsurance, discussing the feasibility of a [...]

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16 December 2010 [VCCircle] Shares in SKS Microfinance have fallen by more than half since a late September peak. Shares of SKS Microfinance, India’s largest and only publicly listed lender to the poor, fell by as much as 5 percent after lawmakers in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh approved legislation to regulate the fast-growing [...]

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15 December 2010 [ArtemisBlog] China Life has received the regulatory approval to expand its microinsurance pilot to five more Chinese provinces. They say they want to achieve US$38m in microinsurance premium income in 2010. The microinsurance pilot can now be operated in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Hunan, Xinjiang and Tibet, according to the China Insurance Regulatory Commission. [...]

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14 December 2010 [MediaRelease] The Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) Board of Directors today approved a Microfinance Risk Participation Program, marking ADB’s first large scale private sector microfinance initiative. The program will allow ADB to partner with financial institutions that actively lend to microfinance institutions (MFIs) in ADB’s developing member countries, and to share the default [...]

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13 December 2010 [BangkokPost] Bangladeshi microfinance pioneer Muhammad Yunus on Sunday attacked companies for “misusing and abusing” his original concept of helping poor people via small loans, after a backlash against profit-making lenders. Yunus admitted the reputation of micro-credit had been tarnished due to Indian commercial companies that charge high interest rates and use allegedly [...]

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