The microfinance sectors in Peru and Mexico: Why have they followed different paths?

According to the Inter-American Development Bank (Pedroza, 2010) microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Latin America have served around ten and a half million people and reached a loan volume of more than US$12.3 billion by the end of 2009. Driving these numbers is the expansion in the number of institutions that offer these services as well as the number of clients served. According to information from the Microfinance Information Exchange Market (www.mixmarket.org) database, between the years 2000 and 2008 the number of institutions that offer microfinance services in the region has increased four times and the number of clients has risen by close to 200 per cent.