Blog

Savings Mobilisation in SHGs: Opportunities and Challenges

Posted on by MSC

This focus note explains the reasons why the poor save in SHGs. As per the study conducted by GTZ in 1997; the important factors which the poor keep in mind before accessing savings facility of an institution are:

security,
convenience,
liquidity and
positive returns

The note further explores how financial institutions like banks and MFIs lend to SHGs based on their internal savings. The groups usually intend to access external funds, which are available at rates lower than market. But for reasons states above the organisations faces the challenge of ‘savings’ being just used to fulfil the minimum eligibility criteria to access loans from external sources. However, these challenges can be overcome through strategies like:

Offering customised and voluntary savings products to the SHG members, formation of a professionally run external fund from where SHGs can draw when cash flow needs are higher than usual etc.

Portfolios of the Poor: Introduction

Posted on by MSC

In this video Bob Christen, director of the Financial Services for the Poor initiative at Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, introduces the groundbreaking book, Portfolios of the Poor: How the World’s Poor Live on $2 a Day. He talks about the research behind the book and how complex transactions of poor were captured during the exercise. He adds that the authors of the book recorded and analysed the financial diaries of a group of households in Bangladesh, India and South Africa.

Portfolios of the Poor: Introduction

Posted on by MSC

In this video series-1, Stuart Rutherford co-author of “Portfolios of the Poor” and the founder of SafeSave Bangladesh shares his inspiration behind the research on financial diaries that was the foundation of the book. He discusses the importance of listening to clients and explains the research that went behind the book.

Compartamos Controversy Leadership and Responsibilities

Posted on by MSC

In this video Richard Rosenberg, consultant to CGAP, discusses how the Compartamos IPO affected investors and competitors, and whether the experience was a singular event or is likely to be repeated. He further explains the existence of social as well as commercial investors of Compartamos and their varied goals. He also discussed the relation between interest rate and profits of Compartamos.

Moving Towards Savings and Lessons From the IPO Story Part 4

Posted on by MSC

In this video series-4, Carlos Danel, Founder and Co-CEO of Compartamos Bank Mexico discusses the savings strategy of Compartamos and the lessons learnt from the IPO story. For savings, he says traditional model of brick and mortar branch didn’t work for the bank. So the bank focused on technology especially mobile banking to take advantage of the retail space. Still there are challenges ahead on road to branchless banking that the bank is working on not only on technology front but on regulatory front as well, adds Carlos.

Compartamos Leadership during Times of Crisis Part 3

Posted on by MSC

In this video series-3, Carlos Danel, Founder and Co-CEO of Compartamos Bank Mexico discusses the impact of financial crisis on microfinance clients and the strategy Compartamos adopted to counter the crisis and continue its strong growth. Talking about the lessons learnt from the financial crisis, he says during the crisis the main concern was to protect the quality of assets, keeping the funding regular for growth and find ways to deal with increased financial regulations.