Word: banking
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...according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The West last year donated $1.2 billion to help Africa's 400 million small farmers. Adjusted for inflation, that is about the same amount donated annually more than 30 years ago, according to World Bank figures...
...organization Llosa runs, now called Mibanco, converted from a nonprofit into a bank, demonstrating what other microfinance institutions around the world knew too: that the poor are good risks who repay loans on time; get enough of them together, you can not only chip away at poverty but also turn a profit...
...money floods in, Akula has tales of brewing conflict. Consider the time a bank chairman asked if SKS could raise its interest rates. Akula said yes (in most markets it has a monopoly) but that SKS wouldn't do so because it would be exploitative. The banker scoffed that Akula didn't understand economics. Akula shot back that the banker didn't understand customers, who would turn on SKS if they felt abused. "We're maintaining a loyal customer base that will stay with us as they get out of poverty," says Akula...
...long as investors have a long-term view, Akula argues, the social and financial missions of microfinance intertwine. "We're not giving away money here; we expect a return," says Gary Hattem, a managing director of Deutsche Bank, which runs four microfinance funds. "But we do keep our eye on the social-impact side of this. It's very humbling when you go to places where the people coming in to borrow smell like the cows they're raising...
Thanks to the band's ubiquity and decency about rock stardom, Coldplay has nudged its way into a place alongside U2 and Radiohead in the holy trinity of bands that affluent adults consider good, good-hearted and worth breaking the bank to see in concert. But a small cult devoted to hating Coldplay has also arisen--which wouldn't be worth mentioning except that most of its members are music critics and their fury has a Lou Dobbs--on--immigration edge to it. To mark the release of 2005's X&Y, the New York Times' Jon Pareles declared, "Coldplay...