• East Asian Journal of Business Economics (EAJBE)
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.18-24
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• 2016

Delivery of microfinance services to operators of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) is increasingly being viewed as a strategic means of assisting growth and development. The purpose of this study was to assess the contribution of microfinance to entrepreneurship development in Mogadishu. Survey research design was adopted and Primary data was collected by using questionnaires. This research study used purposive sampling method to select 120 respondents; but 108 were found usable and analyzed. The data was analyzed using descriptive statistics. This study found the access of microfinance services to the SMEs is poor. This study also found due to the collateral, short term repayment challenges, small and medium businesses are difficult to access loan from microfinance institutions which hinder their entrepreneurship development. In addition to these, this study found that the Microfinance institutions play significance role to the growth and sustainable development of SMEs and also increases the productivity and profitability of small and medium enterprises. This study recommends the guidelines of microfinance institutions to finance SMEs needs to be flexible and microfinance institutions should give technical assistant to the SME to ensure success in the SME sector. The study also suggests access of microfinance services to the SMEs should be facilitated and awareness to microfinance purposes and activities should be created.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.821-832
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• 2021

Economic deprivation of households remains a significant economic issue in the world. Researchers have shown great concern in identifying crucial factors to enhance poor households' socio-economic performance. Therefore, this paper aims to develop a new conceptual framework to investigate the influence of different microfinance services on households' socioeconomic performance using moderated mediation analysis of various crucial factors. Focus-group interviews with managements of the microfinance institution, i.e. Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia (AIM), and a systematic literature review were conducted for this purpose, and a new framework for the future study has been developed. The result from focus-group interviews and systematic literature review propose microfinance financial services, training programs, and business coaching as independent factors, whereas household socioeconomic performance as a dependent factor in the proposed model. Specifically, this study provides the direction to scholars to empirically test the direct relationship between financial services and household socioeconomic performance and the indirect relationship between training programs, business coaching, and household socioeconomic performance. Further, microfinance institutions' service efficiency is also included as a moderator that can strengthen microfinance services' effectiveness. The study also provides useful implications for policymakers, financial institutions, households, micro-enterprises, and researchers to better understand microfinance interventions and household economic mechanisms.

• Asian Journal of Business Environment
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.13-22
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• 2020

Purpose: Vietnam's financial sector has grown substantially but microfinance institutions (MFIs) still face up many challenges in providing financial services to underserved customer segments, including small businesses, rural populations, and urban migrants. The recent worldwide explosion of fintech, including in Vietnam, promises to fill this gap. The purpose of this paper is to analyze fintech activities in microfinance sector and recommend for fintech adoption of MFIs in Vietnam. Research Design, Data and Methodology: The paper's data is mainly based on international organizations such as Asia Development Bank (ADB), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Vietnamese organizations such as Vietnam Microfinance Working Group. The authors suggest new directions for microfinance activities in Vietnam. Results: In recent years, the application of fintech in microfinance sector has brought many good results, such as improving the quality of products and services, easy access to many customer groups, and scaling up the operating model. Conclusion: MFIs in Vietnam have developed new products and services by applying fintech. The application of technology and digital solution has supported MFIs in Vietnam to gradually achieve targeted growth through expanding geographical inclusion/scale, enhancing product supply/provision, helping in-depth customer understanding as well as improving operational efficiency.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.807-815
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• 2021

Microfinance is seen as a tool for poverty elimination by providing various services characterized as financial and non-financial to minority groups in the society to be included in the mainstream financial system. This paper seeks to examine the effect of microfinance institutions' (MFIs) financial and non-financial services on women's entrepreneurship and empowerment in Jordan as a developing country. To gain a deeper understanding of the effectiveness of microfinance services, the study is undertaken to address the question of what kinds of services are available and whether the MFI services are in line with the actual needs of women entrepreneurs to improve their performance. Hence, a qualitative approach was adopted in this study using semi-structured interview questions to collect data from twenty-four women entrepreneurs in Jordan. The results showed that, as regards financial services, the most important needs of women entrepreneurs include providing adequate financing with necessary financial facilities such as reducing interest, reducing monthly installments, and extending the grace period, while non-financial services should include holding specialized courses, accessing a counseling center, providing incentives and psychological support, marketing support, and monitoring and evaluation. This study concluded that factors associated with MFI play a crucial role to uplift women entrepreneurs and eliminate gender inequality.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.21-31
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• 2016

Although the microfinance sector in Bangladesh is mainly driven by Non-Governmental-Organizations (NGOs), there are other types of Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) that also provide financial services to the poor. Despite the criticism of microfinance programs, the current poverty situation in Bangladesh still requires such programs for consistently battling poverty. Hence, the aim of this paper is to profile the microfinance sector based on their legal status and investigate any possible differences (if any) between them in various aspects. After a thorough investigation of the sector, it was found that around 33 million of the clients are being served by the mainstream MFIs (NGO and Grameen Bank) while another 10-15 million clients are served by other types of MFIs (financial cooperatives, credit unions, various ministries etc.), accounting for the one-third of the total population in Bangladesh. While the mainstream MFIs basically works with poor, other categories of MFIs are concerned with relatively wealthy clients. Looking into the financial performance and social intermediation of the MFIs, the NGO-MFIs performed better than other types of MFIs in the sector.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.12
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• pp.39-50
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• 2021

We investigate competition and its impact on borrowers' indebtedness (BI) in South Asian microfinance. Our empirical investigations are based on a comprehensive panel dataset of 355 MFIs located in seven countries in South Asia. The empirical results revealed that microfinance in South Asia is imperfectly competitive and the existing industry shows a monopolistic competition during the period under consideration. Also, the competition increased after the global financial crisis (GFC) in 2007-08 which implies that microfinance uses hostile lending behavior through the adverse selection that is highly risky and it can induce repayment crisis. The empirical findings also show that increased competition has significant negative effects on borrowers' indebtedness, particularly in large-scale and regulated microfinance organizations (MFIs). Instead of using equity financing, debt financing could be a better option. Finally, we find that while competition seems to have some positive effects in economic discourse by channeling technological improvements in products and services, its negative effects in microfinance outweigh the benefits over costs, particularly in poverty-stricken nations. The findings are helpful for the policymakers, microfinance industry, investors, borrowers, and Central Bank of South Asian markets.

• Asian Journal of Business Environment
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.11-14
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• 2016

Purpose - Microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Bangladesh have been providing savings services to their clients at least for the past 15 years. However, whether an MFI should have institutional requirement(s) to be a deposit-taker generates interest among academics and policy makers. Thus, this short note aims to provide a brief overview of institutional properties of MFIs. Research Design, Data, and Methodology - This study used the existing literature and reports by the Microcredit Regulatory Authority' to investigate institutional properties of MFIs. In doing so, we have used 'institutional theory of saving' as a theoretical ground. Although the 'institutional theory of saving' has several important properties, the existing literature mostly discusses seven features such as information, incentives, facilitation, expectation, access, restrictions and security. Results - It is found that MFIs- in general- should have all the seven important institutional properties to be considered as an ideal savings institution. With regards to the microfinance sector in Bangladesh, this study supports that all the NGO-MFIs have these properties to be considered as an ideal deposit taker. Conclusions - The microfinance sector in Bangladesh needs to design and develop comprehensive and customer friendly savings products to further motivate the poor to save in MFIs.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.65-73
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• 2012

Microfinance has been an important tool for the economic growth and poverty alleviation. But the success factors and risk factors have not been synthesized in academic literature. This article has paid attention to success factors and potential risk of the Grameen Bank. Grameen Bank methodology is almost the reverse of the conventional banking methodology. Conventional banking is based on the principle that the more you have, the more you can get. Founder of Grameen Bank, Professor Yunus pointed out that, "The least you have the highest you have the priority to receive a loan". On the basis of theoretical literature, there have been different kinds of success factors of microfinance observed in this paper. Key success factors of Grameen Bank are like these: innovation, strict administrative structure, adaptation and learning practice, incentive system. Complementary services such as business consulting and brokerage will contribute to borrowers' economic performance development.

• The Journal of Society for e-Business Studies
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.285-301
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• 2010

Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending is an open marketplace for loans not from bank but from individuals online. Financial transactions are facilitated directly between individuals ("peers") without any intermediation of a traditional financial institution. A market study by renowned research company forecasts that P2P lending will grow very fast and a couple of P2P lending sites in Korea also are getting attentions by providing the alternative financial services. In P2P lending market, Lender will enjoy higher income generated from the loans in the form of interest than interest that can be earned by financial products provided by official financial institutions. Furthermore, lenders are able to decide who they would lend the money for themselves. Meanwhile, borrowers with low credit scores are able to finance their liquidity requirement with low cost and convenient access to the Internet. The objective of this paper is to introduce P2P lending and its issues of information asymmetry. We provide the insights from the case study of one of P2P lending sites in Korea and review the issues in P2P lending market as research topics. Specifically, information asymmetry issues in both traditional financial institutions and P2P lending are discussed.