Scale economies and input price elasticities in microfinance institutions

We evaluate the efficiency of microfinance institutions (MFIs) using a structural approach which also captures these institutions’ outreach and sustainability objectives. We estimate economies of scale and input price elasticities for lending-only and deposit-mobilizing MFIs using a large sample of high-quality panel data. The results confirm conjectures that improvements in efficiency can come from the growth or consolidations of MFIs, as we find substantial increasing returns to scale for all but profitability-focused deposit-mobilizing MFIs. Our results support the existence of a trade-off between outreach and sustainability. All inputs are inelastic substitutes, but we find differences in own-price elasticities in lending-only and deposit-mobilizing MFIs.     

Performance and governance in microfinance institutions

We examine the relationship between firm performance and corporate governance in microfinance institutions (MFI) using a self-constructed global dataset on MFIs collected from third-party rating agencies. Using random effects panel data estimations, we study the effects of board and CEO characteristics, firm ownership type, customer-firm relationship, and competition and regulation on an MFI’s financial performance and outreach to poor clients. We find that financial performance improves with local rather than international directors, an internal board auditor, and a female CEO. The number of credit clients increase with CEO/chairman duality. Outreach is lower in the case of lending to individuals than in the case of group lending. We find no difference between non-profit organisations and shareholder firms in financial performance and outreach, and we find that bank regulation has no effect. The results underline the need for an industry specific approach to MFI governance.     

The size and growth of microfinance institutions

We investigate the relationship between size (measured by total assets and number of active borrowers) and growth for a worldwide sample of microfinance institutions with different ownership forms (micro-banks, NGOs, cooperatives/credit unions and non-bank financial institutions) and commercial orientation (profit and not-for-profit) drawn from 120 countries over the period 2000 to 2014. Using a dynamic panel data model, we find little evidence that size confers growth advantages to microfinance institutions. We find some evidence that growth rates for credit unions and microfinance institutions with a not-for-profit commercial orientation present negative persistence. The variability of growth rates differs across the size distribution of microfinance institutions, and this result is consistent across commercial orientation and ownership form. Other factors affecting the growth of microfinance institutions include age (new microfinance institutions grow faster than young and mature counterparts), levels of bad debt, efficiency and regulation.     

The determinants of MFIs’ social and financial performances in sub-Saharan Africa: has mission drift occurred?

This paper studies the determinants of microfinance institutions’ (MFIs) financial performance (FP: self-sustainability and profitability) and social performance (SP: depth of outreach), and examine the FP/SP tradeoffs they face. Based on a sample of 120 MFIs over the period 2000–2009, we use the random effects method to isolate the effect of fixed-time factors such as loan lending technique, legal status and location (sub-region) on MFIs’ behavior. We find that financial expenses, wages and portfolio quality, mainly influence MFIs’ financial performance whereas social performance is mostly influenced by lending methodology and institutional form, and to a lesser extent by location. The analysis of FP–SP shows that mission drift is a concern primarily for banks, mutual/cooperatives and individual lenders. The results question the trend toward microfinance commercialization since it weakens outreach without improving significantly self-sustainability and profitability.     

Does microfinance change informal lending in village economies? Evidence from Bangladesh

This paper examines how availability of microfinance influences households’ borrowing from informal sources in village economies. It uses a unique household level panel data set, which spans more than two decades (1987–2008), from rural Bangladesh. We find that households’ access to microfinance reduces the incidence of borrowing from informal sources, but not the amount of borrowing. We find that less poor households benefit more in terms of reducing their reliance on informal borrowing and that the benefit accrues over time. We also find that having access to microfinance increases women’s informal borrowing for small consumption usage, without facilitating access to new business opportunities.     

The Association between microfinance rating scores and corporate governance: a global survey

The global microfinance industry has experienced high growth rates over the past decades, and the World Bank foresees a future market with billions of customers. However, the industry's continued growth is contingent on its ability to create a governance structure that supports microfinance institutions' long-term performance. Because microfinance institutions' performance is multidimensional and difficult to measure, prior research has not been successful in establishing consistent associations between governance structures and microfinance institutions' performance. We apply microfinance rating scores – a unique innovation of the microfinance industry – as a summary performance metric and find that several governance metrics are related to microfinance performance. Specifically, we find that CEO/Chair duality has a negative relation to rating scores, whereas the number of international board directors, the presence of internal auditors and the level of competition intensity are positively associated with rating scores. These findings should prove useful in an industry in which there is no established ‘best set-up’ for governance mechanisms.     

Effect of Corporate Governance on Performance of Microfinance Institutions: A Case from Pakistan

ABSTRACT

We aim to assess the effect of corporate governance on the financial, economic, and social performance of microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Pakistan. The sample comprises twenty-five MFIs and covers their performance over five years, 2005–09. The results of the study indicate that governance variables do have an influence on the performance (economic and social) and productivity of the MFIs in Pakistan. Larger boards inversely affect the economic performance but have a positive effect on outreach and productivity. Presence of female directors does not play any role in improving economic performance but positively affects outreach. Duality of chair with CEO is a negative contributor to performance, outreach, and productivity. Firm size, experience, regulation of MFIs, and nonprofit activities in lending have positive effects on performance outreach and productivity.     

Religiosity,borrower gender and loan losses in microfinance institutions: a global evidence

We examine the impact of religious beliefs on loan repayments in 770 microfinance institutions (MFIs) across 65 countries over the period 2006–2018. We find robust evidence of a negative relationship between religiosity and loan losses in MFIs. We also find that the relationship between religiosity and loan losses is stronger for MFIs in Protestant-dominated countries than in Catholic-dominated countries. Moreover, religiosity improves the operational self-sufficiency of MFIs through a reduction in loan losses. We find that religiosity does not improve the loan repayment behaviour of women borrowers, but it reduces the loan size per borrower. Overall, our evidence suggests that although religiosity reduces loan losses through religiosity-induced lender-risk aversion, it does not improve the loan repayment behaviour of borrowers. We also use several approaches to evaluate our results to the effects of endogeneity.

     

Competition,Loan Rates,and Information Dispersion in Nonprofit and For‐Profit Microcredit Markets

We describe the competitive environment of microcredit markets globally and we study the effects of competition on loan rates of microfinance institutions (MFIs). We use a new database from rating agencies, covering 379 for‐profit and nonprofit MFIs in 67 countries over 2002–2008. Controlling for interest rate ceilings and other country‐specific factors, we first find that nonprofits are relatively insensitive to industry‐wide concentration changes, while for‐profits charge significantly lower rates in less concentrated markets. Second, we find spillover effects between the for‐profit and nonprofit segments. Third, we show that the effects of concentration are consistent with an information dispersion mechanism.     

Limitations of imitation: Lessons from another Bitcoin copycat

We find strong evidence that imitation to the leader in an uncertain environment provides short-term early success without enhancing long-term survival. Using a unique setting in cryptocurrencies where Bitcoin has been the centre focus, we define copycats as cryptocurrencies that have a name similar to Bitcoin. Our results show copycats earn higher returns in the first day and first week of trading but have a lower survival rate comparing to non-copycats and are robust to alternative definitions of copycat and an instrumental variable. Our results highlight that in an uncertain market created by a novel technology, the name of an organization may be a strong signal to investors when other signals are unclear.     

Delegated monitoring in crowdfunded microfinance: Evidence from Kiva

We study the role of delegated monitoring in crowdfunded microfinance. We use data from Kiva, a crowdfunding platform, where crowds lend to borrowers through microfinance institutions (MFIs) instead of lending directly. These MFIs monitor debt contracts on behalf of crowds. We find that borrowers who are more intensely monitored by MFIs are more likely to repay crowdfunded loans on time. Monitoring is particularly important in reducing repayment problems of individual loans rather than group-based loans. Monitoring has a stronger impact in less competitive lending markets. We also find that when lending to borrowers, crowds are attentive to the loan-administering MFI's ability to monitor loans.     

Board reforms and debt choice

In this study, we examine the impact of board reforms on the choice between bank and public debt. Using a large sample of firm-year observations from 29 countries and a difference-in-difference setting, we find that major board reforms lead to a decrease in bank debt ratio, particularly in companies where bank debt is used for monitoring purposes, suggesting that bank debt and board reforms are substitutes for monitoring managers' actions. We also find that board reforms' adoption is associated with a facilitated access to alternative financing sources with better terms than bank debt. In an additional analysis, we show that the decrease in bank debt ratio is stronger for firms with higher information opacity and those in countries with strong institutional environment. More importantly, we provide evidence that the decrease in bank debt post-reform increases firm value, indicating that the substitution between bank monitoring and board monitoring is a value-enhancing decision. Taken collectively, we conclude that the need for bank monitoring is endogenously determined by the strength of alternative governance mechanisms (i.e. board governance).     

A century of purchasing power parity confirmed: The role of nonlinearity

Taylor (2002) claims that Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) has held over the 20th century based on strong evidence of stationary for century-long real exchange rates for 20 countries. Lopez et al. (2005), however, found much weaker evidence of PPP with alternative lag selection methods. We reevaluate Taylor’s claim by implementing a recently developed nonlinear unit root test by Park and Shintani (2005). We find strong evidence of nonlinear mean-reversion in real exchange rates that confirms Taylor’s claim. We also find a possible misspecification problem in using the ESTAR model that may not be detected with Taylor-approximation based tests.     

International diversification and Microfinance

International commercial banks, institutional investors, and private investors have become increasingly interested in financing microfinance institutions (MFIs). This paper investigates whether adding microfinance funds to a portfolio of risky international assets yields diversification gains. By using mean-variance spanning tests with short-sale constraints, we find that investing in microfinance may be attractive for investors seeking a better risk-return profile. Specifically, the analysis suggests that investing in MFIs from Latin America, or microfinance and rural banks yields more efficient portfolios. In contrast, adding MFIs from Africa or microfinance NGOs to a portfolio of international assets is not beneficial for a mean-variance investor.     

Explaining the Diversification Discount

This paper argues that the documented discount on diversified firms is not per se evidence that diversification destroys value. Firms choose to diversify. We use three alternative econometric techniques to control for the endogeneity of the diversification decision, and find evidence supporting the self–selection of diversifying firms. We find a strong negative correlation between a firm's choice to diversify and firm value. The diversification discount always drops, and sometimes turns into a premium. There also exists evidence of self–selection by refocusing firms. These results point to the importance of explicitly modeling the endogeneity of the diversification status in analyzing its effect on firm value.     

Financial outreach and household financial constraint

This paper analyses how financial outreach affects the probability of households having financial constraint (i.e. being ‘discouraged’ and ‘rejected’ for loan applications). We show that households residing in communities with more bank branches are less likely to be financially constrained. Using the distance to the closest fruit and vegetable (open) market as an instrument for financial outreach, we address the potential endogeneity problem and find our results remain robust. We further provide evidence on the negative relationship between the number of bank branches nearby and the probability of loan rejection, in particular for middle‐income young households.     

Repayment behavior in peer‐to‐peer microfinancing: Empirical evidence from Kiva

Based on a sample of microloans (to individuals and to groups) that were refinanced through the peer-to-peer microfinancing platform Kiva, we study the determinants of the repayment behavior of micro-entrepreneurs whose loans are available to international charitable lenders. We perform binary regressions and account for influential factors such as the time required for funding or the type of entrepreneurial activity. The screening and monitoring quality of the microfinance institution which selects the borrowers is a main driver of credit default. We find evidence that the loan size, the loan term and the length of a possible grace period influence the probability of default. Moreover, women demonstrate better repayment behavior which is, however, not the case for groups of women.     

Which Governance Mechanisms Promote Efficiency in Reaching Poor Clients? Evidence from Rated Microfinance Institutions

This paper evaluates the effectiveness of several governance mechanisms on microfinance institutions' (MFI) performance. We first define performance as efficiency in reaching many poor clients. Following the literature on efficiency in banks, we estimate a stochastic cost frontier and measure output by the number of clients. Therefore, we capture the cost minimisation goal and the goal of serving many poor clients, both of which are pursued by MFIs. We next explore the impact of measurable governance mechanisms on the individual efficiency coefficients. The results show that efficiency increases with a board size of up to nine members and decreases after that. MFIs in which the CEO chairs the board and those with a larger proportion of insiders are less efficient. The evidence also suggests that donors' presence on the board is not beneficial. We do not find consistent evidence for the effect of competition, and we find weak evidence that MFIs in countries with mature regulatory environments reach fewer clients, while MFIs regulated by an independent banking authority are more efficient.     

Monitoring mechanisms,managerial incentives,investment distortion costs,and derivatives usage

We relate derivatives usage to the level of corporate governance/monitoring mechanisms, managerial incentives and investment decisions of UK firms. We find evidence to suggest that the monitoring environment, e.g., board size, influences both currency and interest rate derivatives usage. Managerial compensation plans also influence derivatives usage. Investment decisions are affected by the governance and managerial compensation plans of firms, which in turn impact on derivatives usage. We find a strong tendency for UK firms to reduce derivatives usage in situations where derivatives usage should be increased. There is limited evidence that firms use hedging substitutes to avoid monitoring from external capital markets.     

Finance,law and poverty: Evidence from India

Using state-level data from India over the period 1983–2005, this paper shows a strong negative relationship between financial depth (as measured by credit volume) and rural poverty. Instrumental variable regressions suggest that this relationship is robust to endogeneity biases. Furthermore, financial deepening has a bigger impact on rural poverty alleviation than outreach (as measured by branch penetration). We find suggestive evidence that financial deepening reduced poverty rates especially among self-employed in the rural areas and also supported an inter-state migration trend from rural areas into the tertiary sector in urban areas, consistent with financial deepening being driven by credit to the tertiary sector. Our findings suggest that financial deepening contributed to poverty alleviation in rural areas by fostering entrepreneurship and inducing geographic-sectoral migration.