Eavesdropping on a Microfinance Conference

Couldn't make it to the annual research conference hosted by the Centre for Microfinance (CMF) and the College of Agricultural Banking (CAB) in Pune, India, last week? Neither could I. Not invited? Actually neither was I. But as far as I can tell, CMF is the brightest spot on earth for quality research on financial services for the poor. They are worth watching. I suppose this post is the next best thing to being there. Better, in jet lag and carbon terms.Abhijit Banerjee presented the CMF-executed Spandana RCT. I embed the slides here less for the content, which is familiar, than the form. Someone at the Poverty Action Lab makes slides like I do, and probably because of similar influences, in my case Edward Tufte and Andy Goodman.Late insertion: This presentation shows Spandana learning from that study---and requesting a follow-up after a couple more years, all of which is fantastic:Jonathan Morduch gave his presentation of Portfolios of the Poor, which you should watch if you haven't:Sucharita Mukherjee, CEO of the IFMR Trust Guarantee Company (in the same institutional family as CMF) talked about competition in Indian microcredit, the threat of overborrowing, and what to do about it:N. Srinivasan did too, focusing on troubles in the Kolar district of Karnataka state:Late additionMore at the conference's main page and Anita Sharma's notes.