The founder of Grameen Bank beat Irish rock star Bono and a bevy of others for the honour, and rightly so.

Financiers don't often register with the Nobel folks in Oslo. Giving this year's award to a banker . . . and the bank he created . . . caused some headscratching. Why not former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari or Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono? Or former Czech president Vaclav Havel or Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko? Or Bob Geldof?

Yunus, 66, deserved it more. The best part of his strategy of giving loans to the poor, known as microcredit, isn't the millions of people Yunus has helped so far. It lies in how the bank he founded in 1976 is inspiring a growing number of copycats. That may help provide credit in Asian economies where more is due.

By lending to the poorest of the poor in rural areas without asking for collateral, microcredit seeks to create economic and social development from below. It's called microcredit because the loan amounts are tiny by developed-nation standards, often $20, $50 or $100.

Incentive to global banks The money can have a powerful multiplier effect. Families can buy a cow to start a dairy farm, or a mobile phone to open a communications business or chickens to launch an egg company.

Yunus founded microcredit by lending $27 to a Bangladeshi bamboo-stool maker and 41 other villagers.

As of May, Grameen had 6.61 million borrowers, 97% of them women.

What Grameen proved is that money can be made when lending to the poor, thus giving the world's biggest banks incentives to focus on society's weakest links. It's an approach that ensures inclusive growth so that virtually everyone may have access to finance. For banks of all kinds, this is a fast-growing market they should consider tapping.

In the years ahead, securitisation efforts are likely to increase. They involve bundling tiny loans into one security with terms that cushion investors against default, not unlike securities backed by student loans or mortgages.

"Securitisation will be a tremendous boost for the world's poor, " Yunus said in 2000.

Yunus has carved out a financial empire in Bangladesh. More importantly, he has been exporting his microcredit model, catalysing a movement that reaches tens of millions of people in more than 70 countries. Some of the biggest names in finance, such as Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and ABN Amro Bank, are also involved in microcredit programmes.

Microcredit can be more profitable than some people think. Interest rates on Grameen's loans are about 16%, and 95% of them are repaid.

One reason for such low default rates is the shame factor.

The shame factor I first saw how it works in 2000, when I accompanied then US treasury secretary Lawrence Summers to India and Mozambique. We toured numerous villages in which women had pooled savings and lent out the funds to neighbours. When you are late on loan payments to HSBC Holdings, it's not public knowledge.

When you are behind on loans to people you live with, shame looms large.

Asia needs more Grameenlike operations, and fast. To understand why, spend an hour with Ifzal Ali, chief economist at the Manila-based Asian Development Bank. He will remind you that hidden under all the euphoria about Asia's booming economies are what he calls "vast pockets of paralysing and persistent poverty".

Take China, where 42% of the population lives on less than $2 a day. In India, threequarters of the population survives on less than the cost of a Starbucks latte.

It's a reminder that doubledigit growth doesn't always boost living standards broadly.

Ali points out that 60% of the region's population still lives in poverty. If left unchecked, this developing-nation phenomenon could hold back wealthier economies, too.

Poverty isn't something to which many investors give much thought. It doesn't figure readily into bond yields or stock valuations. It's not the first thing currency traders think about when placing bets.

Nor is it an issue the world's most powerful central banks ponder seriously.

Multinational companies are depending on rising Asian incomes to bolster consumer spending and spur demand for cars, electronics, travel and many other goods and services. Yet Asian consumers won't spend if growth doesn't reach them.

Profits versus altruism Ensuring that growth is more equitable will help morph Asia into a richer consumer market.

That's a win-win situation for Asia's people, and for the executives and investors aiming to profit from their increased prosperity.

There are risks to consider as Yunus basks in the glow of unprecedented media attention. One is that microcredit goes too mainstream, becoming more about big profits at commercial banks than helping the poor. That's true of Yunus too. Grameen has diversified into companies that knit shirts, write software and offer phone services. The risk is that it loses touch with poor borrowers.

Finding a happy medium between profit and altruism will leave millions of people . . . if not billions . . . better off. Hats off to the Nobel committee for shining a spotlight where it's badly needed.

William Pesek is a Bloomberg News columnist