Aujourd’hui, il ne s’agit plus seulement aux institutions de microfinance d’accorder des crédits mais de s’assurer que leurs activités contribuent bien au développement économique et social des territoires. Ainsi, pour améliorer leur performance totale, les institutions de microfinance sollicitent des structures susceptibles de les accompagner dans le processus d’identification et de formulation des besoins mais aussi, pour la mise en place d’actions concrètes pour leur réalisation. Plusieurs organismes de développement et prestataires offrent donc de l’accompagnement technique aux institutions de microfinance. Ce travail de thèse a pour objet d’appréhender le modèle d’accompagnement technique des institutions de microfinance en interrogeant à l’aide de grilles d’entretien des salariés d’organismes de développement en France, des consultants, des salariés d’IMF, des membres du Conseil d’Administration d’IMF, des structures étatiques au Burkina Faso et au Sénégal. Cette démarche nous a permis de noter que : l’accompagnement est toujours à réinventer en fonction du contexte et de la réalité spécifique de chaque organisation, aucun accompagnement ne se ressemble et un bon accompagnement est un accompagnement participatif qui crée de la valeur ajoutée, un changement, une évolution constatée qui doit prendre en compte tous les enjeux, les implications de la demande de l’institution de microfinance, être un accompagnement sur mesure. / Nowadays, it is no longer just microfinance institutions to grant credit but to ensure that their activities contribute to the economic and social development of territories. Thus, to improve their total performance, microfinance institutions solicit structures that can support them in the process of identification and formulation of needs but also, for the implementation of concrete actions for their achievement. Several development organizations and service providers therefore offer technical support to microfinance institutions. This Thesis work aims to formalize the process of technical support for microfinance institutions by interviewing stakeholders. This approach allowed us to note that: support is always reinvented according to the context and the specific reality of each organization, no support is alike and good support is a participatory support that creates added value, a change, an evolution noted that must take into account all the issues, the implications of the request of the microfinance institution, be a tailored accompaniment.

Cette recherche est une contribution au débat sur la possibilité de concilier rentabilité, faible coût du crédit et large portée relative des institutions de microfinance. Elle discute aussi l’efficacité des subventions accordées à ces institutions. Enfin elle cherche à articuler la microfinance et la croissance économique dans les pays d’Afrique subsaharienne. Notre étude produit des résultats qui tendent à montrer qu’en Afrique subsaharienne les institutions de microfinance issues de la privatisation directe ou indirecte d’anciens réseaux de collecte étatiques ont une rentabilité négative mais touchent un grand nombre de personnes. A l’inverse les institutions de microfinance d’origine locale ont une taille relative beaucoup plus faible, leur part dans la distribution du crédit total à l’économie est faible, mais elles sont rentables. Deuxièmement la politique de subventions doit encourager les institutions à devenir autonomes plutôt que chercher à pérenniser les situations acquises d’endettement, tout en cherchant à réduire l’effet des coûts fixes sur le taux du crédit. Finalement, de la nature de la politique économique dépendra le développement relatif des secteurs formel et informel. Par exemple, une politique monétaire restrictive favorisera le secteur informel alors qu’une politique monétaire expansionniste favorisera le secteur formel. / The aim of this dissertation is to contribute on the debate about the possibility to reconcile return, low cost of credit and high relative outreach of microfinance institutions. It deals with efficiency of the granted subsidies to these institutions and at last with the interaction between microfinance and economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa. The results of our study tend first of all to suggest that, in sub-Saharan Africa, microfinance institutions coming from the direct or indirect privatization of public development banks have a negative return but a high level of outreach, whereas microfinance institutions coming from local groups have a relative low size but are profitable and self-sufficient. The ratio of their gross loan portfolio to total loan is marginal. Secondly, subsidy policy should enforce microfinance institutions to become self-sufficient rather than perpetuate overdraft situations coming from the past. It should also aim at reducing fixed cost on loan rate. The development of formal and informal markets will depend on the nature of economic policy: a restrictive monetary policy will increase the informal market while an expansionist monetary policy will increase the formal market.

The growth of micro-credit along with the excellent conditions to carry out microfinance activity in the economy and financial system of the Republic of Peru are pushing for Microfinance Institutions (IMF) increased competition with banks in this segment business. Like in commercial banks, in microfinance questions such as: is this customer profitable?, What is the credit limit that I must accept to his/her application?, What interest rate should I charge to him/ her?, How I can reduce the risk default?, etc., are matters to be assessed properly. We propose a method that could facilitate improvement in customer qualification between failed and not failed. To this end, we propose a methodology that analyzes credit risk in the provision of microcredit through the design of a credit scoring model that we apply to a Development Agency for Small and Micro Enterprise (EDPYME), which is an IMF under the supervision by the Banking and Insurance Superintendency (SBS). / El crecimiento del número de microcréditos junto con las excelentes condiciones para llevar a cabo la actividad microfinanciera en la economía y sistema financiero de la República de Perú están impulsando a las instituciones de microfinanzas (IMF) a una mayor competencia con las entidades bancarias por este segmento de negocio. Al igual que en la banca comercial, en microfinanzas preguntas tales como: ¿conviene este cliente?, ¿cuál es el límite de crédito que debo aceptar a su solicitud?, ¿qué tasa de interés debo cobrar?, ¿cómo puedo reducir el riesgo de impago?, etc., son cuestiones que deben valorarse de forma adecuada. Este trabajo plantea un método que podría facilitar una mejora en la calificación de los clientes fallidos y no fallidos. Para ello, se propone una metodología que analiza el riesgo de crédito en la concesión de microcréditos mediante el diseño de un modelo de credit scoring aplicado a una entidad de desarrollo de la pequeña y micro empresa (EDPYME), IMF sometida a supervisión por la Superintendencia en Bancay Seguros (SBS).

La microfinance est un moyen de lutte contre la pauvreté dans les pays en développement, à travers le financement des activités génératrices de revenus des ménages pauvres. Cependant, la meilleure manière d'aider les pauvres à avoir accès aux services financiers suscite des débats entre deux approches opposées : les welfarists et les institutionalists. Ces approches oscillent entre deux exigences fondamentales de la microfinance : le principe de solidarité qui renvoie à la performance sociale et la rentabilité de l'institution qui relève de la performance financière. Y-a- t- il arbitrage ou compatibilité entre ces deux performances? L'état d'avancement de la recherche sur cette question suggère la compatibilité, voire la complémentarité, de ces deux exigences de la microfinance.Une analyse factorielle en coupe instantanée (année 2008) sur un échantillon de 52 IMF dans 9 pays de la région MENA examine la relation entre ces deux performances. Les résultats de cette analyse soulignent que la plupart des IMF d'Egypte sont à la fois socialement et financièrement performantes alors que celles du Yémen ne sont que socialement performantes et celles de la Jordanie ne sont que financièrement performantes. Les facteurs déterminants de ces deux performances varient notamment selon le statut (ONG vs. non ONG), la maturité, la méthodologie de prêt (solidaire vs. individuel), la zone d'intervention (rurale vs. urbaine), le niveau de transparence informationnelle, la localisation géographique (pays) et la réglementation des IMF.Une étude économétrique en panel (1998-2008) examine la causalité univoque et interactive entre la performance sociale et la performance financière. Les résultats des régressions statistiquement significatives montrent que la performance sociale a un impact négatif sur la performance financière et inversement ; l'interaction à long terme entre ces deux performances est encore floue. Les résultats montrent aussi que les principaux déterminants de ces deux performances varient selon le cycle de vie de l'IMF ; la relation entre l'âge et la performance n'est pas linéaire ; la règlementation de l'IMF dépend non seulement de son pays mais aussi de son statut institutionnel ; les effets macroéconomiques sont importants dans l'atteinte de deux performances ; les IMF matures cherchent à assurer un bon taux de remboursement au lieu d'augmenter les rendements de leurs portefeuilles. / Microfinance is a means of the struggle against poverty in developing countries through financing activities that generate incomes for poor households. The issue regarding the best way to provide financial services to the poor has fuelled intensive debates between two different schools of thought: institutionalists and welfarists. This opposition faces two requirements of microfinance: Targeting the poorest among the poor, which refers to the social performance and enhancing the profitability of the institution (financial performance). Is there a trade-off between these two performances or can they combine? The state of research upon this issue suggests that these two requirements are compatible and may even be complementary.Following a cross-section factor analysis, we examine the relationship between social performance and financial performance on a sample of 52 MFIs in 9 selected countries of the MENA region: Most MFIs in Egypt are both socially and financially successful, whereas those in Yemen are socially successful and those in Jordan are financially successful. The determinants of these performances vary according to the status (NGO vs. non NGO), maturity, credit methodology (collective vs. individual), the level of information disclosure, geographical location (countries) and regulations of MFIs.An econometric panel study (1998-2008) examines the unequivocal causality and causal interaction between social performance and financial performance. The regression results show that social performance has a negative impact on financial performance and conversely, and the causal interaction between these two types of performances remains unclear in the long run. The results also show that the main determinants of these two performances depend on the life cycle of MFIs, the relationship between age and performance is not linear, the regulation of MFIs depends not only on their countries but also on their institutional status, macroeconomic effects are important in achieving performances, mature MFIs seek to ensure good repayment rates instead of increasing portfolio yield.

Remittances (money sent home by migrants) to developing countries are estimated to have reached US$ 325 billion in 2010 (World Bank, 2011). These amounts reflect only officially recorded transfers, transferred through formal channels and calculated as the sum of three items of the Balance of Payments Statistics, namely: compensation of employees, workers’ remittances and migrants’ transfers (Salomone, 2006; Aggarwal et al. 2011). Unrecorded remittances could represent 50 to 100% of recorded flows (World Bank, 2006; Hagen-Zanker and Siegel, 2007).<p>Remittances are three times the size of official development assistance (ODA) and the second source of external funds after foreign direct investment (FDI) for developing countries. Given their weight in receiving countries’ economies and household livelihood in many developing countries (for instance, remittances flows represent more than 25% of Lesotho’ and Moldavia’s gross domestic product in 2008), there is increasing policy and research interest in remittances as development resource. Furthermore, unlike FDI and ODA, remittances have the particularity to be directly affected to families, even those in remote areas, where development funds don’t arrive (Shaw, 2006). The thesis addresses the relationship between microfinance and the impact remittances have on domestic investment in developing countries. <p>Like other sources of external finance, remittances allow the economy to invest in human and physical capital (health, education), which contribute to growth (Ziesemer, 2006; Acosta et al. 2008). However, as remittances may be either directly consumed (remittances allow households to smooth their consumption, see for instance Lucas and Stark, 1985 and Glytsos, 2005) or used to invest in physical and human capital, it appears that their impact on domestic investment is perceived to be low or limited, given the amount of money they represent each year. According to literature, this is due to the small share that is dedicated to the launch or the support of economic activities. Actually, the allocation between consumption and investment, which depends on various factors such as the level of dependence households have with remittances, the migrant gender, and the existence of a credit constraint, varies on average around 10-20% of remittances that are not directly consumed (Salomone, 2006; Sorensen, 2004; Orozco, 2004). In the thesis we focus on the share of remittances that is saved and wonder how to maximize its impact, whatever this share. We are interested in the role of microfinance institutions, as actors of the financial sector, on this issue. Actually, two recent contributions, Mundaca (2009), and Giuliano and Ruiz-Arranz (2009), stress the role of the development of the financial sector. More precisely, the thesis focuses on a set of questions or issues that may be important for the microfinance industry to consider when interested in remittances flows and the deposits they may generate. <p>Financial development is generally defined as “increasing efficiency of allocating financial resources and monitoring capital projects, through encouraging competition and increasing the importance of the financial system. In other words, the development is about structure, size and efficiency of a financial system” (Huang, 2006). A large line of research work provides evidence that development of a financial system is a key driver of economic growth. <p>King and Levine (1993) argue that greater financial development increases economic growth. Levine and Zervos (1993) shows that growth is related to stock market activity, among other variables. Levine (1999) finds a significant effect of determinants of financial intermediation on economic growth. Beck et al. (2004) find strong evidence in favor of the financial-services view which stresses that financial systems provide key financial services, crucial for firm creation, industrial expansion, and economic growth. Levine (1997), Levine et al. (2000), and Beck et al. (2000) also stress the impact of financial development on growth. There is also an empirical literature that argues that the expansion and the deepening of the financial system lead to higher investment (see for instance Rajan and Zingales, 1998; Demirgüç-Kunt and Macksimovic, 1998). <p>By providing financial services to people whom traditionally do not have access to financial institutions, microfinance institutions (MFIs) may contribute to increasing the size of the financial system in many developing countries. Actually, according to the CFSI’s 2011 report, the one thousand-plus MFIs that report to the Microfinance Information eXchange (MIX) have 88 million borrowers and 76 million savers. Total assets of these MFIs amount to US$ 60 billion (CFSI, 2011). <p>The quite recent literature on remittances, financial development and growth can be categorized under two main approaches (Brown et al. 2011). One approach explores the relationship between remittances and financial development, with a view to assessing their impact on the level of financial development in receiving countries. The underlying argument is that remittances potentially contribute to financial development through both demand- and supply- side effects: by increasing households’ demand for and use of banking services, and by increasing the availability of loanable funds to the financial sector. According to this approach which consider the direct relationship between remittances and financial development, remittances have an impact on both financial outreach and depth in receiving countries, respectively through the fostering of financial literacy among remittances receivers and through the increasing availability of funds (see for instance Gupta et al. 2009, Aggarwal et al. 2011, Brown et al. 2011). <p>The second approach examines the remittances – financial development relationship indirectly by investigating how the given level of financial development in a country affects the impact of remittances on growth. This growth-focused approach allows for interactions between remittances and financial development in estimating growth equations for remittances receiving countries. Within the set of studies related to this approach, two opposing positions have emerged. The first position hypothesizes that the greater availability of financial services helps channel remittances to better use, thus boosting their overall impact on growth. Remittances are seen as financial flows in search of good investment projects, and good financial institutions are needed to facilitate the channeling of remittances to such investments. In this sense, remittances and financial system are complements. This position is supported by Mundaca (2009) who find that financial intermediation increases the responsiveness of growth to remittances in Latin America and the Caribbean over the 1970-2002 period. Other few studies also argue that channeling remittances through the banking sector enhances their development impact (see for instance Hinojosa Ojeda, 2003 and Terry and Wilson, 2005). <p>The other position argues that remittances contribute to investment and growth by substituting for inefficiencies in credit and capital markets. Remittances provide an alternative source of funding for profitable investments by alleviating liquidity constraints. In this sense, remittances promote growth more in less financially developed countries by substituting for lack of credits from financial institutions. This hypothesis is supported by Giuliano and Ruiz-Arranz (2009) who argue that poor households use remittances to finance informal investment in poorly developed financial markets with liquidity constraints. In their study, they interact remittances with a measure of financial development in standard growth equations, for a sample of 73 countries over the 1975-2002 period. Ramirez and Sharma (2009) obtain similar results using data from 23 Latin American countries over the 1990-2005 period. <p>The thesis contributes to existing knowledge on this indirect, growth-focused approach. Given the two existing opposite views on remittances impact on investment and the level of financial intermediation (a high level of financial development implies a high level of financial intermediation), in the thesis we first analyze the relationship that links these variables. We then analyses questions related to microfinance institutions (MFIs), as financial intermediaries. <p>Our focus on microfinance is made from two different perspectives, leading to different research questions. First, from the demand or microfinance clients’ perspective, we question about the interest for them to have MFIs entering the money transfers market (through the money transfer facilities and/or financial products that may be directly linked to remittances). The underlying argument is that MFIs enter the remittances market by providing money transfer services because there is a need for such services (and for other financial services) from their (potential) clients who are remittances receivers and migrants. According to this point of view, MFIs can contribute to recycle remittances flows into the financial system by contributing to the financial inclusion of remittances receivers and migrants thanks to the supply of adapted financial products. The occurrence of this assumption can therefore be measured by considering the involvement of MFIs on the remittances market as a determinant of financial inclusion indicators. Second, from the supply or MFIs’ perspective, we question about the rationale for MFIs to enter the remittances market. Here, the underlying argument is that MFIs are interested in operating on the remittances market because working with migrants can potentially contributes to the improvement of their financial and social performances. According to this perspective, remittances market opportunities as well as MFIs’ characteristics will determine the offer of money transfer services by MFIs. This supply approach therefore leads to the consideration of money transfers activities in MFIs as depending on remittances market opportunities and institutional variables. <p>Therefore, our papers related to microfinance will be articulated around these two questions (interest for clients and rationale for MFIs to have MFIs operating on the money transfers industry) by focusing, as argued earlier, on the deposits resulting from remittances flows. <p>As a matter of facts, by studying the relationship between microfinance and remittances respectively through the demand and the supply perspective, we raise causality issues related to MFIs’ money transfer activities and their impacts on MFIs performances. Actually, MFIs’ characteristics such as the right to collect public savings, as a potential source of efficiency gains, may significantly determine the supply of a money transfer service (MFIs’ perspective), while a money transfer service may itself be the determinant of some MFIs’ performance indicators related to financial inclusion, such as the volume of deposits made by clients (demand approach). However, given currently existing data on MFIs’ involvement on the remittances market we cannot consider simultaneously both perspectives in order to implement causality treatment techniques. Actually, the indicator of MFIs’ involvement we will use in our regressions is time invariant, therefore we are not able to build instrumental variables for instance (such as lagged values of our variable of interest) to eliminate econometric issues in our regressions. Nevertheless, through these two approaches taken separately, we contribute to some extend to the knowledge by putting in perspective different issues at stake for the microfinance industry. <p>Before we tackle our research questions we have an introductory chapter related to remittances flows: what are their trends, determinants and characteristics? The chapter also includes the definition of money transfer activities that we will use in the thesis, as well as an overview of MFIs’ involvement on the money transfers market. <p>Then, our research framework is divided into 4 sub-questions. The first one, treated in Chapter 2, is about the relationship between our variables of interest. What is the impact of the financial sector development (FSD) on the remittances’ impact on investment? This chapter aims at stressing the relationship existing between financial intermediation and remittances’ impacts on investment, which motivated our focus on MFIs (as financial intermediaries between remittances and the formal economy) in the following chapters. We focus on two transaction costs that decline with FSD. The first is the “Cost of Bank Depositing”, henceforth CDEP, which measures the difficulties of savers, particularly the less well-off, of depositing their savings in the formal banking system. The second transaction cost is the “Cost of External Finance”, henceforth CEXF, which measures the marginal cost for the banking system of borrowing in global financial markets. This cost is notably associated with the robustness of the country’s financial sector. In a stylized model of the lendable funds market, we analyze how both these variables affect the marginal effect of remittances on investment. We test model’s propositions using country-level data on remittances, investment, and proxies for both CDEP and CEXF, on a sample of 100 developing countries. We perform empirical tests using both cross-section and panel-data with country fixed effects, over the period 1975-2004. The results demonstrate, theoretically and empirically, that remittances and ease of access to the banking sector act as complements to stimulate domestic investment, while remittances and external borrowing are substitutes. We find that remittances flows stimulate local investment, as a part of remittances indeed become banks’ deposits, which increases the availability of lendable funds, reduces the interest rate and stimulates investment. In terms of policy implication, results suggest that enhancing financial sector development is crucial as it allows remittances to better fuel domestic investment. This is even truer when the access to international funds is difficult or costly. Improving the financial inclusion of remittances receivers by developing domestic banks’ ability to collect their savings is then a straightforward recommendation to policymakers who want to improve remittances impact on investment. <p>The second question, developed in Chapter 3 is related to the demand perspective of the relationship between microfinance and remittances. We want to assess whether there is a need from remittances receivers for financial products that may be linked to remittances. We aboard this question by assessing whether the supply of MTA leads to higher volume of deposits mobilized by MFIs, meaning that MFIs actually contribute or succeed in turning remittances into deposits. Using an original database of 114 MFIs –operating in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), South Asia (SA), East Asia and the Pacific (EAP), and Africa–, we perform empirical tests to study whether MFIs are able to capture migrants’ savings thanks to their money transfer activity. We test the impact of money transfer activity on deposits, using the natural logarithm of deposits as explained variable. Our main result suggests that money transfer activity has a significant positive impact on savings collection. MFIs involved in the remittances market thus attract more savings than MFIs that are not involved in it, probably coming from migrants and remittances receivers who are in need of adapted financial services. This confirms the opportunity MFIs may represent as a tool or a channel to improve remittances impact on investment. In that sense, MFIs should then be encouraged to operate on the remittances market, and to design financial products dedicated to migrants and remittances receivers. <p>The third question, developed in Chapter 4, is related to the supply approach of the relationship between remittances and microfinance. More precisely, we try to identify factors that seem to explain the availability of such service in the scope of services provided by MFIs. In this chapter, we focus first on potential sources of efficiency gains linked to the money transfer activity as a rationale for diversification (i.e. the expansion of the offer). And second, using an original database of 435 MFIs –operating in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), South Asia (SA), East Asia and the Pacific (EAP), and Africa–, we perform empirical tests using cross-section over the year 2006, to identify which environmental and institutional parameters have an impact on the willingness of a MFI to provide a money transfer service. We test the impact of various variables that are related to one of the rationale for MFIs to enter the money transfer market, namely economies of scale and scope as a source of efficiency gains, on the probability to have a money transfer service provided by a given MFI. Our main result suggests that the size, as well as the fact that an MFI collects savings have a positive and significant impact on this probability, while the level of financial development negatively impact it. This confirms among other things that the ability to realize economies of scale through a potential increase of collected deposits may be a determinant of managers’ choice to diversify. Policies that contribute to reduce entry barriers in low financially developed countries should then, among other things, be encouraged to have MFIs fully playing their role of intermediaries between remittances and the (formal) economy. <p>The chapter 5 questions about the institutional consequences for MFIs to collect migrants’ savings. The aim of this chapter is to give an insight on the opportunity migrants’ money (including remittances) could represent for the microfinance industry as a source of stable medium- and long-term funds. It is therefore related to the supply approach and the motivation for MFIs to enter the remittances market by analyzing the impact of migrants’ deposits (which include remittances) on another potential source of efficiency gains, namely the internal capital market. Through a case study approach, this chapter is devoted to the analysis of funding risk in microfinance, comparing migrants’ and locals’ time deposits. Migrants’ time deposits are expected to be of longer term and more stable (in terms of early withdrawals) than locals’ deposits. This assumption had never been tested yet. Based on an original database of 7,828 deposit contracts issued between 2002 and 2008 by 12 village banks belonging to a major Malian rural microfinance network (PASECA-Kayes), we used the Cox proportional hazard model to identify the variables that have an impact on the probability to have early withdrawals, and the technique of re-sampling to calculate withdrawal rates and deposits at risk. Results from the Cox methodology suggest that the migration status is not a direct determinant for the probability to have an early withdrawal. However, this probability increases with the amount deposited and the term of the contract which are both higher for migrants compared to non-migrants. The re-sampling method results suggest that withdrawal rates are not the same for the two categories of depositors observed. We find higher withdrawal rate distributions for migrants than for locals. The value at risk is also higher on migrants’ deposits than on locals’ deposits. However, as migrants tend to deposit for longer term than locals, through the calculation of durations we have measured to which extend migrants’ deposits still have a positive impact on MFIs’ liabilities. It appears that migrants’ money has a marginal but positive impact on time deposits durations, either when considering early withdrawals, which impacts are very limited, except in 2007 (the worst year in terms of amount withdrawn early). As our results show that MFIs that receive migrants’ deposits are not necessarily better-off than without migrants’ money in terms of funding risk - and durations - this paper has stressed the importance of assessing more carefully the role of migrants for the microfinance industry. <p><p><p><p> / Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestion / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Le but de cette thèse est de déterminer si les objectifs que se fixent les institutions demicrofinance (IMF) en France en matière de lutte contre la pauvreté et l’exclusion, et en matièrede soutien au micro-entrepreneuriat, se traduisent dans les faits. Il s’agit plus précisémentd’apprécier la performance sociale des IMF tant en termes de portée sociale qu’en termesd’impact. Nous montrons dans une première partie que le microcrédit extra-bancaire en France aclairement un impact social car octroyé principalement aux personnes les plus pauvres et à cellesles plus en risque d’exclusion. Sa capacité à servir durablement le plus grand nombre estcependant remise en cause compte tenu du fait qu’aucune institution étudiée ne répond à lacontrainte de pérennité qu’est l’autosuffisance financière. Le maintien des subventions dans cecontexte s’avère donc indispensable. Nous trouvons en outre une adaptation de l’offre auxbesoins de la clientèle et mettons en évidence l’existence d’une stratégie dichotomique dans lesecteur (sociale vs économique), ce qui entraine un traitement différencié de la clientèle suivantl’objectif poursuivi par l’IMF. Dans une seconde partie, nous trouvons que dans un contextemarqué par la persistance de la crise économique, le microcrédit démontre une certaine capacité àsoutenir la création d’entreprises et d’emplois de qualité. Cette capacité dépend cependant dutype de microcrédit dont il s’agit (entrepreneurial vs insertion sociale). L’accompagnement serévèle fort utile dans l’ensemble, mais nous montrons des différences de perception parmi lesbénéficiaires. Le microcrédit se révèle en outre avoir un fort impact psychologique mais sesretombées économiques sont de faible ampleur. Nous trouvons en effet une amélioration globalede la situation professionnelle des bénéficiaires, mais soulignons la précarité des emplois occupéset la faiblesse des revenus. Ceci suggère un contraste entre perception et réalité économique / This thesis aims at determining whether microfinance institutions (MFIs) in France succeed inovercoming poverty and exclusion and in supporting entrepreneurship. More precisely, we assessthe social performance of the MFIs both in terms of outreach and impact. We show in a firstsection that non-bank MFIs in France reach the poor and individuals at high-risk of exclusion,and their offer is adapted to their clientele. However, because none of these IMFs are viable,their capacity to durably serve the largest number is questioned. This underlines the need formaintaining subsidies. We also highlight the existence of two types of strategy within the sector(social vs economic), which leads to a differentiated treatment of customers according to theobjective pursued by the MFI. In a second section we show that in a time of persistent economiccrisis, microcredit demonstrates some ability to support business and job creation. However, thisability depends on the type of microcredit in question (micro-enterprises lenders vs socialinclusion lenders). Business support shows itself very useful on the whole, but we bring to theforeground differences in perception among the beneficiaries. Besides, microcredit proves tohave a strong psychological impact even when economic gains are low. There is an overallimprovement in the working position of beneficiaries, although gains are limited by theprecariousness of jobs and relative low incomes. This suggests a contrast between perception andeconomic reality.