Cambodia - How microcredit is making the world's poor even poorer | DW Documentary (youtube.com)
Average microloan is $5000 (the largest microloan average globally, according to a Cambodian human rights org, which who knows how reliable this is, I've seen stats provided by this type of org for other tihngs which have no bearing to reality, and there are a lot of orgs in Cambodia). $5000 is a massive amount to be considered micro. You can start a business in Cambodia for much less. One group said they gave girls some skills and $50 loans.
It seems a way for loan sharks to get property cheap, as that is the only collateral their clients have. Some say the loan sharks are Chinese.
DW reports that Cambodians now claim they are victim to ‘predatory loans’. Could we replace that word with ‘free money’ maybe? Or ‘loans without any security’ maybe? The orgs say this results in human rights abuses, trafficking, etc, things Cambodian orgs are specialized in.
‘The topic just got attention in Thailand when the people complain so loud the government has to ban the sale of OPPO.’
A commenter: 'As a 25-year resident of Cambodia, I have seen similar situations all too often.
Part of the problem is the lenders giving loans to those who have land but no income.
Another part is the willingness of uneducated people to borrow now without understanding what repaying it with interest means.
I have helped people get out of debt only for them to immediately go, get another loan and spend it on unproductive things.
Education and regulation are needed.'
Another: 'I can testify as a former Loans Officer for village groups in my country, Uganda for four (4) years; there is no single village or household that I can be proud of that got financially independent or secure as a result of acquiring a loan from the financial institution I worked for. On the contrary, most of the villages we visited and gave people loans were either left too indebted, impoverished or they ran away from their homes for fear of being arrested for defaulting to repay their loans. It's just mere luck that someone benefited from the loan and not from their own input.'
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‘I think YOLO is how I would describe the administration’s policy now on crypto'. Jcal
Jcal has criticized Microstrategy because what they do may be antithetical to what Bitcoin is supposed to be, since they're taking out loans and trying to corner the market and be the largest shareholder in Bitcoin. Also, taking out loans for something with so much volatility.