Muhammad Yunus had this crazy idea: Why not lend money to really poor people? The obvious answer—because they're not good credit risks—didn't stop him from lending a total of $27 to 42 bamboo weavers in his native Bangladesh in 1976. No longer prey to loan sharks, the weavers thrived—and paid him back.

The concept of microcredit, which Yunus pioneered, paid him back again last week when he won the Nobel Peace Prize. Through the Grameen Bank, which he founded and with which he is splitting the prize, Yunus, 66, has lent about $5.7 billion—mostly in amounts averaging $130—to some 7 million people, while his innovation has benefited many millions more and attracted celeb supporters like Bono, Brad Pitt and Bill Clinton. "By treating the poor like they have something good to contribute," says actor Hugh Jackman, a supporter, "he has put his finger on the thing that can save the world."

The third of 14 children born to a businessman and his wife, Yunus studied economics in the U.S. before returning to Bangladesh to implement his idea. He lives modestly in Dhaka, Bangladesh, with second wife Afrozi and daughter Deena. (His other daughter, Monica, 29, lives in New York.) He plans to use part of his share of the $1.4 million Nobel prize to open eye hospitals. His ultimate goal? "Putting homelessness and destitution," he recently said, "in a museum."

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Microcredit Benefits the U.s. Too
Thanks to Yunus, microfinancing is available in more than 100 countries as well as all 50 states in the U.S. Some 700,000 U.S. entrepreneurs have received loans or business training or both; more than $300 million in small loans, typically between $15,000 and $35,000, has been distributed, according to the Association for Enterprise Opportunity, the umbrella group for microcredit lenders. One beneficiary, DaNesha Antrece Fuller, a single working mother who was laid off, used training from AEO member Start Up and a $2,500 loan from a Start Up partner lender to open a day-care center in East Palo Alto, Calif., in 2005, providing both job security and a safe place for her son during working hours.