MIX Microfinance World

The Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX) released its annual report Microfinance Market Report for Latin America and the Caribbean 2010.  The report is a comprehensive analysis on the state of the microfinance industry in the Latin America and Caribbean region, one of the most mature and competitive markets in the microfinance industry.

The rapid growth of Indian microfinance has been at the center of the recent crisis - industry watchers focus on whether microfinance loan portfolios have grown too aggressively and if the debt burden on clients has become unmanageable. Microfinance institutions cannot lend money out of thin air though - this growth has to have been financed somehow. In this piece, we look at the other side of the balance sheet for Indian MFIs and the basics of how funding has evolved for the sector. We then dig into detailed transaction data on over 1000 MFI borrowings from the MIX Funding Structure Database to see what we can learn about the future.

Las Microfinanzas en Nicaragua, las cuales destacaban años atrás en el istmo centroamericano y que fueron un referente internacional debido a su constante crecimiento, gran afluencia de inversionistas extranjeros, rentabilidad estable y riesgo controlado, dieron un vuelco en el 2009. Si bien existieron factores externos que afectaron a Nicaragua, también se evidenciaron debilidades en los procesos y gobernabilidad de las IMF que influenciaron el rápido deterioro de sus indicadores de desempeño.

After a difficult year in 2008, in combination with continual after-effects of the international financial crisis impacted the first semester of 2009, the Central American macroeconomic situation gave signs of recovery during the year’s second semester. The behavior of the main variables formed a “V” shape, showing a decreasing trend from 2008 until the middle of 2009, followed by a recovery during the remaining part of the year.