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Money & Finance

The low productivity trap of collateralised lending for MSMEs

The share of bank credit extended to MSMEs increased dramatically during the pan-demic. In this post, Harsh Vardhan discusses the the government guarantee of bank loans as a possible driver of this gr...

  • Perspectives

The disruptive market power of foreign portfolio investors in the face of tax threat

Foreign portfolio investors in emerging markets are known to exit host capital markets promptly if any policy changes impose additional costs. Based on an analysis of daily trading data during a perio...

  • Articles

How NBFCs are reinventing MSME finance

Even though micro and small enterprises make up over 99% of MSMEs in India, they receive a relatively small proportion of bank credit. Chandra and Muthusamy look at how lending to MSMEs has evolved ov...

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Land and financial misallocation in India

Optimising the allocation of factors of production – land, capital and labour - improves productivity. In India, where evidence suggests land is severely misallocated to inefficient manufacturing fi...

  • Articles

Access to credit and female labour supply in India

While microfinance is believed to have the potential to increase female labour force participation, short-term experimental evaluations of microfinance have not found significant economic benefits for...

  • IGC Research on India

Are small and medium enterprises constrained by the inability to raise funds from the equity markets? Evidence from the creation of a new platform in

Small and medium enterprises employ 40% of India’s workforce, and account for 45% of the manufacturing output and 40% of the total exports of the country. However, productivity in the sector is very...

  • IGC Research on India

How do disclosures affect financial choices? The case of life insurance in India

Given the importance of insurance, and the regulatory push towards improved disclosures.

  • IGC Research on India

Socially disadvantaged groups and microfinance in India

The benefits of microfinance are in the details. This column takes a look at lending by commercial banks in India to self-help groups – smaller, informal community-based groups – as a new and succ...

  • Perspectives

The Indian banking system: A ticking time bomb

In response to RBI’s call to accelerate the recognition of stressed assets, publicly traded banks in India added nearly Rs. 1 trillion in bad loans in the quarter ending December 2015. In this arti...

  • Perspectives

Recapitalising public sector banks by disinvesting in RBI: Right and wrong

The Economic Survey 2015-16 put forth the argument that the Government of India could reduce its capital in the RBI from its current large level and use it to increase its capital in public sector ban...

  • Perspectives

Achieving financial inclusion: Going cashless

A World Bank survey reveals that while about half of all individuals in India had bank accounts in 2014, only 12% had made a cashless transaction in the past year. In this article, Bappaditya Mukhopa...

  • Perspectives

How doorstep banking increased savings and income in Sri Lanka

Recent findings in development economics indicate that microloans are likely to perform best when accompanied by financial education, insurance, and savings products. This column presents evidence fro...

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Increasing economic divide within backward castes

While the high level of socioeconomic inequality between the forward and backward caste groups in India is well documented, there is little research on inequalities within the backward caste groups. T...

  • Articles

Financial inclusion for the poor: Using RCTs for effective programme design

While the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana – the Indian government’s flagship financial inclusion scheme - is impressive in its mission, it does not seem to have achieved meaningful results so far....

  • Perspectives

When higher volatility is good news

Conventional wisdom suggests that access to financial services such as banks and bond markets, providing savings and borrowing instruments, allows smoothing consumption over lifetime, irrespective of...

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Recent Contributors

Rajeswari

Rajeswari Sengupta

Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research

Aeimit

Aeimit Lakdawala

Wake Forest University

Vaishali

Vaishali Garga

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston

Shamim

Shamim Ara

Ministry of External Affairs

Harsh

Harsh Vardhan

Management Consultant and Researcher

Viral

Viral Acharya

New York University

Raghuram

Raghuram Rajan

University of Chicago

Andrew

Andrew Marshall

University of Strathclyde

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Most Popular Money & Finance Posts

India’s insurance sector: Challenges and opportunities

While India’s insurance sector has been growing dynamically in recent years, its share in the global insurance market remains abysmally low. This article traces the journey of the Indian insurance s...

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Financial inclusion in India: Progress and prospects

Financial inclusion is globally considered as a critical indicator of development and well-being of society. In this post, Srinivasa Rao traces the financial inclusion journey in India so far, and dis...

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Thinking about financial sector reforms in India

A key element of the economy that needs to function well in order to facilitate India’s strong and sustained recovery from the pandemic is the financial system. In this post, Sengupta and Vardhan d...

  • Perspectives