Economics and Sociology Occasional Paper No. 2346 MICROFINANCE MARKET NICHES AND CLIENT PROFILES IN BOLIVIA by

This paper presents and interprets descriptive statistics generated from data obtained in a survey of clients of five micro finance organizations believed to be among the best in Bolivia. These lenders represent different combinations of organizational design, lending technology, and market area of operations. Two are regulated financial intermediaries and three are NGOs. Two operate in rural areas (PROD EM and Sartawi) and three operate in urban areas (Banco Sol, FIE, and Caja Los Andes). Two offer individual loans and three grant loans through joint liability groups. The paper discusses household-enterprise profiles of a sample of 622 clients and identifies terms and conditions of loan contracts with these organizations to evaluate the depth and quality of their outreach. The interpretation seeks to establish connections between key characteristics of the clients and features of the lending technologies that lead to the matching of classes of borrowers with particular organizations and that influence the choice of market niches. Data on loan sizes suggest the existence of different but broadly overlapping market niches associated with three tiers of clients. The sharpest distinction is between urban and rural clients. The matching between clients and organizations also reflects a weak but positive correlation between levels of poverty and loan sizes