Research interests
Economic development; microenterprises; microfinance.
Muhammad Meki
Muhammad Meki is a development economist whose research focuses on microfinance. He is interested in the effect of equity-like financial contracts involving, for example, shared ownership of fixed assets, sharing of revenue streams, or profit sharing, on the investment and growth of small firms. Equity-based products also have the potential to serve a large number of poor Muslim entrepreneurs across the world, who are often excluded from conventional microfinance products due to the classical religious prohibition on usury. Muhammad has conducted fieldwork in Pakistan, Kenya and Bangladesh.
Prior to academia, Muhammad worked for five years as a trader in the financial markets, for Bank of America in London and Deutsche Bank in Singapore, where he traded European and Asian government bonds, foreign exchange derivatives and other fixed-income products.
Muhammad completed his DPhil in 2018 from the Department of Economics, University of Oxford (St John’s College). He was a Junior Research Fellow at Pembroke College and affiliated with the Department of Economics until 2020. Muhammad has also previously completed postgraduate degrees in finance (MSc, LSE), economics (PGDip, Cambridge), and development economics (MSc, Oxford).
Dr Meki is an Associate Member of the Department of Economics.
Muhammad teaches on the MSc in Economics for Development, offering a module on microfinance, cash transfers and savings.
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Journal articles and special issues( ) Microfinance: An Overview . Oxford Review of Economic Policy 40 (1) 1-7( ) Microequity: Some thoughts for an emerging research agenda . Oxford Review of Economic Policy 40 (1) 176-88( ) Asset-Based Microfinance for Microenterprises: Evidence from Pakistan . American Economic Review( ) Levelling the Debt-Equity Playing Field: Evidence from a Belgian Policy Change . European Economic Review( ) ‘COVID-19 and the Future of Microfinance: Evidence and Insights from Pakistan . Oxford Review of Economic Policy
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Chapters( ) Mutuality and the Potential of Microequity . In Colin Mayer, Bruno Roche Putting Purpose Into Practice: The Economics of Mutuality , Oxford University Press
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Other publications( ) Finance for small-firm growth: Towards flexibility and innovation . Ideas for India( ) Microfinance . VoxDevLit
