The so-called “shadow economy” or “gray economy” gets brought up in discussions about providing pfinancial services to unbanked and underbanked people. The focus of these discussion is usually around personal financial services, but that leaves out a large piece of what makes up the “economy” of this segment. Arjan Schutte, the manager of a venture capital fund that invests in companies providing services to the underbanked, wirtes in his blog that in addition to providing personal financial services to those without banking relationships, companies should consider the possibilities of providing business services to entrepreneurs in this segment. IN
Schutte writes:
We know surprisingly little about underbanked small businesses like these. I know there are many. Many generate an income for at least one family. Many have one or more employees and are in fact those people who are picking themselves up by their bootstraps. But just like underbanked consumers, underbanked small business lacks financial services options, and many of the options that do exist are quite expensive.
Read the full blog post at: http://blog.corevc.com/?p=313