cat/womens-entrepreneurship-finance
SME Finance Forum member Ecobank recently shared information about their Female Entrepreneurs Initiative.
Managing Director Ecobank Nigeria, Patrick Akinwuntan said, “Increasingly, we are seeing the change in the attitudes of women, and their economic viability as individuals and leaders in their fields. Their banking and financial services as a whole therefore present vast opportunities, if properly understood and managed.”
With more than $3 trillion in assets under management—nearly $800 billion of which is allocated to emerging markets—private equity can be a powerful source of financing, especially for innovative businesses that cannot access bank loans or capital markets. Investors and funds with stakes in these privately owned companies not only help them expand, they also contribute to generating jobs, tax revenues, and better services.
Private equity and venture capital funds with gender-balanced senior investment teams generated 10 percent to 20 percent higher returns compared with funds that have a majority of male or female leaders, according to a report released today by IFC, a member of the World Bank Group.
Tracey Davies, President of Money20/20, and founder of the Rise Up initiative, outlines the five ways the program empowers women at work as the initiative comes to Singapore.
I have always been a hopeful optimist about the trajectory of women, but as the number of women reaching the top just hasn’t made the progress I expected, I have become much less accepting of the status quo. How can it be that we still aren’t seeing faster progress for women across the world and in every industry?
Open data is data that is made available for anyone to access, use and share. With more access to open data, people can help shape a more sustainable future with evidence-based solutions, contributing at the same time to a more transparent decision-making. But to reach the full potential of open data, it must be available to and used by all. Read more about web foundation’s investigation into whether open data is working for women in Africa.
IFC and Garanti Bank Romania launched a joint report highlighting the importance and impact of increasing access to finance for the country’s women entrepreneurs. “Taking Women Entrepreneurs to the Bank in Romania”, shows the impact of Garanti Bank Romania’s Women SME Banking Program.
Female start-up founders are missing out on billions of pounds of investment, new research published today finds. The UK VC & Female Founders report found that for every £1 of venture capital (VC) investment in the UK, all-female founder teams get less than 1p. By comparison, all-male founder teams get 89p and mixed-gender teams get the remaining 10p. The report found that venture capital investment in start-ups with female founders is increasing but progress is very slow.
This state of practice report identifies and describes 74 government initiatives in the Savings Group sector across 20 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa – related to financial inclusion, social protection, women’s empowerment, and sector regulation and coordination.
Proshare shared results of the Development Bank of Nigeria, that hosted a year-to-date business presentation on its activities since inception. Those results include N31.364bn Spent in 2018 on MSMEs and 35,000 MSMEs End-Borrowers Benefitted in 2018, among other accomplishments.
Established in 2017 the Development Bank of Nigeria is regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission, and is licensed by the Central Bank of Nigeria.
The DBN which is designed to provide access to funding for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, MSMEs has the following as it core mandate;
