Summary This paper applies the financing constraints approach to study whether microfinance institutions improved access to credit for microenterprises in Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to this approach, microenterprises with improved access to credit rely less on internal funds for their...

Summary This paper uses a global data set of 350 microfinance institutions (MFIs) in 70 countries to study the common belief that women are generally better credit risks in microfinance than men. The results confirm that a higher percentage of female clients in MFIs is associated with lower...

This study responds to the need for more empirical knowledge pertaining to the effect of religion on development efforts. We use data from the microfinance industry to study performance differences between Christian and secular Microfinance Institutions (MFIs). We find that Christian MFIs have...

Summary Claims have been made that microfinance institutions (MFIs) experience mission drift as they increasingly cater to customers who are better off than their original customers. We investigate mission drift using average loan size as a main proxy and the MFIs lending methodology, main...

Summary We compare the ownership-cost of shareholders firms (SHFs), non-profit organizations (NPOs), and cooperatives (COOPs) involved in microfinance. A paradoxical situation motivates us: most providers, both historically and today, are NPOs or COOPs, while policy papers advocate SHFs. We lay...