News Briefing: Microcredit Pioneer Ousted, Head of Bangladeshi Bank Says

• The Gates Foundation invests $10 million in vaccines developer Liquidia Technologies.  [Bloomberg]

 

• Microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus said to be ousted from the bank he founded.  [New York Times]

News Briefing: Doping Scandal May Hurt Lance Armstrong Foundation

• Philanthropy experts say the Lance Armstrong Foundation is at risk for losing future donations if its namesake and chairman is dragged down in a doping scandal.  [Associated Press]

• An Indian company with rich American backers is about to raise up to $350 million in a stock offering closely watched by philanthropists around the world.  [New York Times]

News Briefing: Nonprofit Groups Hopeful but Wary as New York City Aims to Cut Red Tape

• Thousands of New York nonprofits brace for an ambitious change in the way the city awards $4 billion in contracts every year.  [New York Times]

• Muhammad Yunus, winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, brings low-interest credit to the poor and unemployed in Washington.  [Washington Post]

• The Baltimore Community Foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies, and the Leonard and Helen R. Stulman Foundation tap the value of older adult volunteers to strengthen five city neighborhoods.  [Baltimore Sun]

News Briefing: Grassley Asks Medical Nonprofits About Financial Support

• Only 41 cents of every dollar raised by professional charity solicitors in Massachusetts last year went to charitites.  [Boston Globe]

• Vittana, a nonprofit organization, is building a student loan business for microfinance institutions that cater to poor people in the developing world.  [New York Times]

• Sen. Charles Grassley asks 33 nonprofit medical groups, including the American Medical Association and American Cancer Society, for information on the financial support they receive from corporations.  [Wall Street Journal]

News Briefing: Confusion on Where Money Lent via Kiva Goes

• Kiva overhauls its explanation of how it works after a blog post questions its claims of direct loans.  [New York Times]

• The Wall Street Journal offers a special Philanthropy report. 

• Venture Philanthropy Partners announces a $4.5 million grant to Year Up.  [Washington Post]

• One Laptop Per Child, one of the most ambitious design projects of recent times, is still criticized by many.  [New York Times]

News Briefing: Research on Worst Skin Cancer Struggling

• The McCune Foundation's wealth, tied to stock in National City, plummets, hampering its ability to help nonprofits in the Pittsburgh area.  [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review]

• Traditional microlenders voice disapproval of market-oriented model of microfinance, with its emphasis on investor returns.  [New York Times]

• Rare diseases struggle against more common killers in the race for funding research studies.  [Associated Press]

News Briefing: Foes of Randolph College Art Sale Go to Court

• Fisk University and the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum argue over terms of the artist's gift to the school.  [Associated Press]

• A group of students, alumnae, art donors, and former employees of Randolph College file motions to keep the financially ailing school from selling four paintings.  [Associated Press]

• eBay launches site allowing ordinary investors to buy securities aimed at improving conditions in the world's poorest countries.  [Reuters]

You Know Microfinance Has Arrived...

...When it hits Doonesbury. This Sunday's strip featured a reference to Muhammed Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank and a (humorous) discussion of microfinance by Gary Trudeau's corps of soldiers stationed in Iraq. Amazing (though the joke was on Halliburton). Here's a link to the full strip.

News Briefing: Gates Foundation is Learning, Growing, and Changing

• Melinda Gates shares lessons, mistakes at the Council on Foundation's annual conference.  [Associated Press]

• The National Park Foundation will take over efforts to raise $30 million for the Flight 93 memorial.  [Associated Press]

• Nonprofits adopt business methods to help the poor — and make a profit.  [Seattle Times]

Nobel Winner: Ensure Microcredit Money is Well-Spent

Seattle Times: What a difference a peace prize makes.  A month after Muhammad Yunus was awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, the work of the so-called banker to the world's poor is in the global spotlight, giving a major boost to efforts to relieve poverty by making tiny loans to people who have no access to banks.