Christoph Kneiding

Branchless and Mobile Banking Solutions for the Poor: A Survey of the Literature

About 2.6 billion people in the world do not have access to formal financial services, and yet one billion of them have a mobile phone. Branchless banking systems take advantage of increasingly ubiquitous real-time mobile communications networks to bring banking services into everyday retail stores, thereby alleviating the lack of banking infrastructure in the communities where poor people live and work. Most of these deployments are quite recent, hence there is a shortage of hard empirical evidence relating to them. However, one mobile banking scheme, MPESA in Kenya, has been phenomenally successful and has been a catalyst for much of the research done to date. In this article, we review the emerging literature on the definitions and model taxonomies employed in mobile banking; the status and drivers of global adoption of these schemes; the take-up and usage patterns of customers and their socioeconomic impact; and, finally, regulatory issues. Our objective is to help policymakers and practitioners in their continued efforts to create an enabling environment for branchless banking.

Branchless and Mobile Banking Solutions for the Poor: A Survey

This paper reviews the growing literature that has spawned around branchless and mobile banking in developing countries over the last five years. Around 2.6 billion people in the world do not have access to formal financial services, and yet 1 billion of them have a mobile phone. Branchless banking systems take advantage of increasingly ubiquitous real-time mobile communications networks to bring banking services into everyday retail stores, thereby alleviating the lack of banking infrastructure in the communities where poor people live and work. Most deployments are quite recent, and hence there is a shortage of hard empirical evidence relating to them. One mobile banking scheme in particular, M-PESA in Kenya, has shown phenomenal success, and has been a catalyst for much of the research. Here we review the emerging literature in terms of the definitions and model taxonomies employed; the status and drivers of global adoption of these schemes; the take-up and usage patterns of customers, and their socio-economic impacts; and the regulatory issues. Our twin objectives with this paper are to stimulate further research on these questions and to help policymakers and practitioners focus their continued efforts in creating an enabling environment for branchless banking.

All Eyes on Asset Quality: Microfinance Global Valuation Survey 2010

The past year held many challenges for microfinance: not since the Asian crisis of the late 1990s has the sector faced a more difficult economic environment. Yet despite these conditions, most micro-finance institutions (MFIs) proved to be up to the challenge. Beginning in January 2009, MFI portfolio delinquency levels began to deteriorate rapidly, with loans past due over 30 days (portfolio at risk [PAR30]) jumping from a median of 2.2 percent to 4.7 percent during the first five months of 2009, while profitability dropped from a median return on equity (ROE) of nearly 18 percent at year-end 2008 to 6 percent by May 2009. However, since June 2009 delinquency has moderated and profitability levels have come back to stabilize at 4 percent for PAR30 and 10 percent for ROE, respectively. Most MFIs continue to maintain solid reserve and capitalization levels, with equity ratios unchanged from the 18-20 percent range established over the past two years. This occasional paper aims to shed new light on equity valuation trends in microfinance, which must necessarily begin with a detailed examination of how MFIs have coped during the recent economic crisis. Accordingly, the first part of the paper is devoted to MFI asset quality and its impact on microfinance profitability. Next, the authors examine trends in valuation benchmarks for microfinance private equity transactions and analyze the key drivers behind these valuations. This section also delves into the recent growth in transaction volume and valuation multiples in India, which had a particularly active market in 2009. Finally, the authors seek to place the microfinance equity market within the context of the broader equity market, using comparisons with publicly listed low-income financial Institutions (LIFIs) in developing countries.

Funding Self-Employment: The Role of Consumer Credit

This paper investigates whether self-employed households use consumer loans in particular installment loans and overdrafts to finance business activities. Controlling for financial and non-financial household variables the authors show that self-employed households particularly use personal overdrafts significantly more often than employee households. When analyzing the correlation between consumer loan take-ups and consumption of self-employed in comparison to employee households, the authors find first evidence that overdrafts are used by self-employed to finance their business as well. This indicates that intermingling constitutes a financing strategy when regular business loans may not be accessible. This paper is structured as follows: section one gives introduction. Section two reviews previous empirical research results and outlines research agenda. Section three details the methodology. Section four presents the results of the empirical analysis. Section five reviews the limits of the study and makes recommendations for future research. Finally, conclusions are provided in section six.

Demand Side Analysis of Microlending Markets in Germany

In developing and transition economies, microlending has become an effective instrument for providing micro businesses with the necessary financial resources to launch operations. In the industrialized countries, with their highly developed banking systems, however, there has been ongoing debate on the question of whether an uncovered demand for microlending services exists. The present pilot study explores customer preferences for microlending products in Germany. Among the interviewed business owners, 15% reported revolving funding needs and an interest in microloans. We find that potential recipients of microloan products are retail business owners, foreign business owners, and persons who had previously received private loans. Furthermore, financial products should feature rapid access to short-term loans.