The Second Story: Wholesale Microfinance in Latin America

Date
Mar 2003
Drawing on project documents, evaluations, surveys and interviews with participating financial intermediaries and second-tier institutions, this paper tells the story of the IDB¿s microenterprise global credit program. The purpose of the paper is to garner lessons from this experience that can be applied to future efforts to promote microfinance, especially those that involve a wholesale mechanism. This paper explores how market conditions and program design and execution elements have determined the IDB programs' success in meeting their dual objectives: expanding microenterprise access to financial services and strengthening financial institutions' capacities to serve microenterprises. It identifies the key factors that can spell success or failure for wholesale microfinance programs.