Tuesday, May 24th

Non-profit organizations in the United States have a long history of receiving volunteer support. Today, the volunteer workforce is at a 30 year high. How are microfinance organizations building capacity and growing awareness through the new volunteer workforce? Students, skilled professionals, and mid-to-late career-changing professionals are adding enormous value and advancing the mission of microfinance. Learn from microfinance and volunteer management professionals about their strategic and innovative programs and gain a new perspective about what your organization can accomplish by harnessing the enthusiasm, talent, and skill of volunteers. 

Level: Open

In recent years cities have taken bold steps to re-invent their approach to poverty reduction to include an explicit focus on helping low-income families connect to the financial mainstream and build assets.   Participants in this session will hear from members of the Cities for Financial Empowerment Coalition and CFED about the range of creative value-added roles that local government leaders can play in helping to educate, empower and protect residents in the financial marketplace. City leaders will also discuss the innovative policies and programs that are being used to enhance the financial security of low-income families during a time of deep recession. 

Level: Open

For-profit investors utilize a variety of microfinance investment vehicles, best practices and strategy to drive both social and commercial returns. What are the challenges in investing in microfinance, post-financial meltdown? What are the latest and most innovative products that are attracting investors? Is microfinance a commercially viable asset class to investors, and will microfinance appeal to a wider array of investors as it becomes conducive to portfolio diversification? Join the industry’s leading investors as they discuss these questions and more!  Sponsored by Morgan Stanley

Level: Moderate

Technology has been fundamental in the success of branchless banking in both the U.S. and abroad. Join microfinance technology leaders in this session that will examine how technology is transforming the lives of the rural poor, which lessons can be applied to the growing U.S. microfinance market, and what the landscape of mobile banking (worldwide) will look like in 2020. 

Level: Open

Microlending in the US has to compete for funder attention with many other strategies designed to alleviate poverty: educating poor youth, creating jobs, building assets, and other pathways to greater economic opportunity. To do that, it has to be clear about what returns funders and investors might see for their participation/investment. This session will explore several efforts at documenting return on investment—from microenterprise practitioner-focused efforts to a funder’s approach to evidence-based assessment of value. What are we learning about what microlending produces, and what else do we need to learn? 

Level: Open

Across the country, financial institutions are involved in voluntary efforts to serve un(der)banked consumers through initiatives such as Bank On. While these approaches have shown strong initial promise, it remains to be seen if they will last beyond a few political or business cycles. Several innovative financial institutions are showing that by integrating access into their ongoing operations, serving the unbanked can become business as usual. 

Level: Open

Across the campuses of America’s most recognized universities, students are launching their own MFIs which have lent over $150,000 to date. In addition to providing loans, they mobilize student engagement, deliver technical assistance, and breed future industry leaders. One must ask: how sustainable are these organizations? Are they scalable? What is this movement contributing to the industry? And, should current industry leaders examine what can be done to facilitate this student movement? Join these student leaders as we discuss these questions and more.

Level: Open

The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) connects private and public institutions to meet the credit needs of under-served communities, and is the central element in the legislative architecture that helped give rise to microlending in the United States over the past thirty years. Several bills are pending before the U.S. House of Representatives which would amend the Community Reinvestment Act to address the changing economic needs of our nation’s under-served communities. There is no more significant policy framework to support microlending in the United States than the CRA. In this panel, experts will present the key changes proposed by the bills and discuss why the law needs to be modernized, particularly in light of the subprime financial crisis. Learn what CRA means to microfinance and hear federal banking regulators’ views on the CRA’s role in community economic development. Presented by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. 

Level: Moderate

More dollars are remitted by immigrants than all microloans made to small business owners in the U.S. each year. Unbanked and under-banked immigrants in the U.S. seek and interact with both traditional and alternative financial institutions in the process of sending money home. Remittances represent an enormous opportunity to expand fair and empowering financial services to underserved communities. Through partnerships with microfinance institutions, both the senders and recipients of remittances can enhance their access to finance. In the U.S., remittance service providers have been developing unique payment systems and relationships to facilitate these financial flows. This panel will explain the connection between microfinance and remittances, and discuss some of the challenges service providers confront in today's economic and regulatory environment. Presented by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. 

Level: Moderate

Funding poor students to attend school through microloans is booming in the microfinance industry. Industry leaders are leveraging debt and equity-like investments as well as P2P lending models to provide youth (both in the US and abroad) with the tools necessary to pursue higher education. Yet, it is riskier to invest in students than entrepreneurs since students often have no credit history, the loans are longer-term, and there is a lack of enforceable contracts. Despite these challenges, the student-loan market has experienced significant growth. Join the leading players as we discuss the challenges, successes and future landscape of the new frontier of harnessing microfinance for student education. 

Level: Open

As the largest metropolitan area in the United States, New York City’s economy is a hotbed for small and micro businesses— over 200,000 operate throughout the city’s five boroughs. This, in addition to New York’s history as a cultural melting pot and immigration destination, has led to the emergence of a vibrant, innovative domestic microfinance community. This session will explore the history of the microfinance movement in New York, the spectrum of microfinance providers serving New York City’s small business community, and the unique challenges that microlending in one of the world’s most complex economies presents. 

Level: Open

The FDIC initiated a two-year pilot project in February 2008 to develop case studies that illustrate how banks can profitably offer affordable small-dollar loans as an alternative to high-cost credit products. To participate in the pilot, institutions were required to create templates for loan amounts at or below $2,500, loan terms of 90 days or more, and maximum APR of 36%, among other criteria. The pilot program results indicate that there are models for delivery of sustainable small dollar loans. Join representatives from the FDIC and community banks as they share findings and lessons learned from developing these innovative financial products. Presented by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. 

Level: Moderate