Since 1976 Grameen Bank has provided micro-loans to low-income individuals – mostly women – in its home country of Bangladesh, and the repayment rate for those loans has been substantially higher than traditional loans in that country. Grameen Bank and its founder, Muhammad Yunus, split the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. Now the institution is offering such loans in the United States, with two branches in New York, one in Omaha and others planned for Washington, D.C. and San Francisco. (US Banker, 4/10)
Grameen America focuses only on borrowers who are below the poverty line, and commercial banks that provide funds to the microlender are granted credits under the Community Reinvestment Act. How curious that a Third World financial institution is finding an attractive market in the U.S.
Ken Hey
Tags: Micro-loans
