A. Bouman described ROSCAs as "the poor man's bank, where money is not idle for long but changes hands rapidly, satisfying both consumption and production needs.
For example, ROSCAs are also known as tandas (or by other names) in Latin America, chamas in Swahili-speaking East Africa, kameti (کمیٹی) in Pakistan, visi (વિસિ) among Gujaratis in India, equb (ekub) (እቁብ) in Ethiopia, partnerhands, pardna or pardner in the West Indies,[2] cundinas in Mexico, hagbad in Somalia, stokvels in South Africa, susus or osusus in West Africa and the Caribbean, hui (會) in Chinese communities in East and Southeast Asia, hội/hụi (會) in Vietnam, paluwagan in the Philippines, gam'eya (جمعية) in Egypt, dart دارت in Morocco, gye (계/契) in South Korea, tanomoshiko (頼母子講) in Japan (or mujin in pre-1945 eras), wichin gye in Korea, lamka, committees or chit funds in India, pandeiros in Brazil, cuchubál in Guatemala, juntas, quiniela or panderos in Peru, C.A.R.
Țigănesc/Roata in Romania, arisan in Indonesia, lenshare (เล่นแชร์) in Thailand, dhukuti or dhikuti (धुकुटी/ढिकुटी) in Nepal, gün in Turkey, ménage or menodge in Scotland,[3] seettuva in Sri Lanka, likelembas in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, xitique in Mozambique, djanggis in Cameroon and صندوق Sanduq in Sudan, Lawm Sum[4] in Zomi regions in both Chin State in Myanmar and Kootu fund in Malaysia.
To determine the order of money distribution among members, a drawing of slots is done and agreed upon before the start of periodic fund accumulation.
A famous early study by anthropologist Clifford Geertz documented the arisans of Modjokuto in Eastern Java.
International development practitioners have been intrigued for years by the potential benefits of attempting to link ROSCAs and ASCAs to formal financial systems.
But such linkages tend to defeat the voluntary purpose of these groups and distort member incentives towards securing access to external funds.
Unlike informal ASCAs, these use a triple-locked box to secure the funds, have standardized election procedures and maintain a careful separation of various duties, such as record-keeping, money-counting, meeting facilitation etc.
[11] As of the end of June 2012 development agencies (including CARE, Oxfam, CRS and PLAN) were carrying out projects reaching 1.8 million members in 23 countries, mostly in Africa[citation needed].
Another interesting variant on this theme are the terminating deposits that formed part of product line of building societies in the last half of the nineteenth century.
[12] A few of the existing products include eMoneyPool, created by two brothers living in Phoenix, Arizona; Monk, founded by ex-Google and ex-Intel employees in Silicon Valley; Puddle, a Google-venture backed startup, Moneyfellows UK & African based online mobile and web platform digitizing the ROSCA model; ROSCA Finance, a patent pending startup creating a global, autonomous money sharing platform founded by former Santander bankers; Esusu, founded by ex-Goldman Sachs, PwC and LinkedIn employees in New York and Partnerhand,[13] a patent pending[14] UK based organisation facilitating online 'Pardner's'[15] between verified individuals, founded in 2010.
[17] In October 2017 Finlok platform launched a digital ROSCA product in India leveraging NPCI's Unified Payment Interface.
A. Bouman described ROSCAs as "the poor man's bank, where money is not idle for long but changes hands rapidly, satisfying both consumption and production needs.