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| What we do |
United Prosperity helps you combat global poverty and multiply the impact of your money through loan guarantees.
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| What is United Prosperity? |
United Prosperity is the world’s first person to person loan guaranteeing website. Small entrepreneurs all over the world need funds to start and grow their businesses. Banks however don’t lend to them without collateral. Small entrepreneurs cannot give collateral since they are often very poor.
You can become a social guarantor by providing cash collateral to the entrepreneur on our website. Your guarantee allows the entrepreneurs to access funds from local banks either directly or through our partners.
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| Who does United Prosperity partner with? |
We partner with microfinance institutions (MFIs), technology innovators as well as banks who are committed to helping the poor.
- Microfinance institutions (MFIs): Microfinance institutions make microloans to poor entrepreneurs. However smaller MFIs are often unable to raise enough funds to meet the demand by poor entrepreneurs. In some cases, banks will not lend to an MFI without a guarantee. We provide a cash-secured guarantee to the bank based on the funds collected from guarantors on our website. Based on our guarantee, the bank lends to the MFI and the MFI disburses the loan to the entrepreneurs. The MFI also manages the administration and collection of individual loans.
- Technology and innovation partners: Our technology and innovation partners have products or solutions that improve the lives of poor entrepreneurs. However most poor entrepreneurs cannot afford these products and need to take a loan from a bank to buy the product. Most banks will not lend to them without a guarantee. We provide a cash-secured guarantee to the bank based on the guarantees given by guarantors on our website. Based on our guarantee, the bank will make loans to the poor entrepreneurs who can now buy or implement the solution of our technology and innovation partner. Often our technology and innovation partners also monitor the loans.
- Banks: We also partner with banks that are committed to financial inclusion. These banks lend to MFIs or entrepreneurs based on our guarantee.
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| Why do we need United Prosperity when microfinance institutions lend to poor entrepreneurs without asking for collateral? |
 Most emerging microfinance institutions (MFIs) don’t have enough funds to lend to poor entrepreneurs.
Nobel Laureate Prof. Mohammad Yunus1 notes that the biggest problem we face in trying to expand the reach of microcredit is not the lack of capacity, but the lack of availability of money to help microcredit programs get through their initial years until they reach break-even level. Local banks cannot lend to MFIs because MFIs cannot provide collateral. However, if an organization guarantees the loan, local banks are happy to provide the money.
United Prosperity empowers you to guarantee micro-loans loans to specific entrepreneurs. United Prosperity then consolidates the guarantees on several such micro-loans and issues a guarantee to the bank, which then lends to the microfinance institution. Thus your guarantee allows the microfinance institution to raise bank funds and lend to the specific entrepreneur whom you chose to support.
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| Is UnitedProsperity.org a for-profit or non-profit organization? |
UnitedProsperity.org is a US 501(c)3 non-profit organization.
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| How is United Prosperity different from other non-profit organizations? |
We hope to become a self sustaining social business. Nobel Laureate Mohammad Yunus states that a social business is ’designed to be both self-sustaining and to maximize social returns’2. We have only one objective: to combat global poverty. As a result, we do not provide any financial returns or interest to our social guarantors and hope to attract social guarantors who share our objective.
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| Are the individuals on the site the individuals that we would be supporting? |
The people you see on our website are real individuals, to whom loans will be made based on your guarantee. When you select an entrepreneur whose loan you will guarantee, you are making a real difference to the life of the individual, his or her family and the community. Throughout the life of the loan that the entrepreneur is able to access based on your guarantee, our partners will be posting updates on the entrepreneur’s progress. When the loan is completely repaid, and you get your money back, you can either withdraw the money or use it to guarantee other entrepreneurs.
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Citations:
1. Mohammad Yunus and Karl Weber, 2007, The Microcredit Revolution in ‘Creating A World Without Poverty: Social business and the future of capitalism’, New York, PublicAffairs, page 70
2. http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0215/p09s01-coop.html?page=1
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