SECP clears digital financing product for women-led MSMEs

ISLAMABAD: The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has approved what it described as the country’s first digital financing product designed exclusively for women-led micro, small and medium enterprises, opening a new channel of Shariah-compliant asset financing for female entrepreneurs.

The facility, named Khudmukhtar Khatoon, will be operated by Walee Financial Services through a fully digital platform. Under the product, women entrepreneurs will be able to obtain asset financing from Rs100,000 to Rs1.5 million. The financing process will be completed through a mobile application, while repayment will be made in monthly instalments over a period of up to one year.

The product is aimed at easing barriers that have long limited access to formal credit for women-owned businesses in Pakistan. Many such enterprises operate informally, do not have collateral, or face difficulty navigating conventional banking procedures, which often leaves them reliant on personal savings or family support for business expansion. The new facility seeks to address some of these constraints by digitising the full process from application to disbursement and linking borrowers to a marketplace where they can purchase machinery, equipment and other productive assets.

Access to credit remains a key challenge

Ahmed Ali Siddiqui, founding director of the IBA Centre for Excellence in Islamic Finance, said the main issue for women entrepreneurs is not only the size of available financing but access to it. He said women-led startups and enterprises in Pakistan can play an important role in the country’s economic development, but limited access to finance remains one of their central challenges.

"Expanding access to Shariah-compliant SME financing, credit guarantees and cash-flow based lending solutions can unlock a significant untapped segment and contribute meaningfully to economic growth, job creation and women's economic empowerment," he added.

Siddiqui said Pakistan had made notable gains in women’s financial inclusion, with more than 17 million new women-owned bank accounts opened since 2021, but added that the next stage is to help women-led small and medium enterprises move beyond microfinance and scale their operations.

Part of broader digital finance push

The approval also fits into the regulator’s wider emphasis on digital finance and the growing role of non-banking finance companies in serving segments that remain outside mainstream lending channels. SECP data showed that lending non-banking finance companies disbursed around Rs7.5 billion to nearly 1.7 million micro and small businesses in the six months ending December 2025.

The performance of the new women-focused financing product will depend on how widely it is adopted and how accessible it proves to women outside major urban centres. If uptake is strong, it could provide a model for narrowing Pakistan’s gender financing gap and widening formal financial inclusion for women-led businesses.