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How Is the Pandemic Affecting Agents? Here’s What Providers Tell Us

As customers, agents and digital financial services providers adjust to COVID-19, it’s becoming clearer what a resilient agent network looks like. Providers should take note to prepare for future crises.

India’s Proposed Data Protection Bill Breaks from Notice and Consent

The proposed bill would mark a significant advance in rethinking how to protect digital consumer rights, putting India at the forefront of modern data protection regimes.

A New Generation of Government-to-Person Payments Is Emerging

Advances in payment infrastructure are enabling governments to channel payments through multiple providers, giving people greater choice over how to receive payments. This is an important shift with implications for financial services providers, recipients of government payments and financial inclusion.

Turning Remittances into Savings for Nepal’s Migrant Families

Remittances amount to 28 percent of Nepal’s GDP. Digital financial services that better meet young women’s needs could help migrant families put away more in savings.

These Emerging Fintech Innovations Are Centered on Poor Customers

After two years of piloting with 18 fintechs around the world, CGAP has identified several fintech innovations that advance financial inclusion.

Could e-Commerce Bring Women’s Financial Inclusion in Bangladesh?

Closing the financial inclusion gender gap is about more than account access. It’s about making sure accounts unlock real opportunities for women. In Bangladesh, linking mobile money to informal e-commerce could meaningfully advance women’s financial inclusion.

Pakistan Enigma: Why Is Financial Inclusion Happening So Slowly?

Just 21 percent of adults have accounts in Pakistan, despite decades of support for financial inclusion. What could accelerate progress?

How Bangladesh Digitized Education Aid for 10 Million Families

In just months, Bangladesh digitized financial aid payments for education to millions of families. What can other countries learn from this rapid transition to digital payments?

India Moves Toward Universal Financial Inclusion

The 2017 Findex shows India has made significant financial inclusion progress in the past four years, but use remains a challenge.

2017 Global Findex: Behind the Numbers on Bangladesh

Bangladesh has made great strides toward financial inclusion, but many challenges remain -- including one of the largest gender gaps in the world.

Bank-Led Digital Finance: Who’s Really Leading?

In countries where regulators favor “bank-led” digital finance models, nonbanks are playing important – even dominant – roles in digital finance.

Empowering Kids to Dream, Save, Do

When should children start learning about financial empowerment? The early years are the best, according to Sesame Workshop India. Find out how Sesame has taught 50 million children in India about spending, saving and other life skills.

When Savings Aren’t Enough: How Low-Income Bangladeshis Use Loans

Today, some 25 million Bangladeshis borrow from microfinance institutions. Financial diaries from central Bangladesh show how poor people are using their loans, from coping with emergencies to on-lending to others.

A Digital Finance Prescription for Universal Health Coverage

Digital finance is just beginning to realize its potential in the health care sector. Take a look at some early examples of how digital financial services are contributing to the goal of universal health coverage.

What Most Providers Don’t Realize About Microentrepreneurs

Conventional measures of creditworthiness paint an incomplete — even misleading — picture of microbusiness owners, whose success often hinges on strong local networks and unconventional business strategies.

India’s Latest Advances in Financial Inclusion: A Day in Royyuru

See how India’s Aadhaar-enabled payments system is making digital payments easy and convenient in the village of Royyuru.

Open APIs in Digital Finance: We Opened Up, Here’s What Happened

Is “going open” worth the risk for payment providers? A money transfer business in India shares how allowing other companies to deliver financial services based on its systems has fueled its recent growth.

India Stack: Major Potential, but Mind the Risks

India’s new financial infrastructure could connect hundreds of millions of people to financial services, but at its core is a biometric ID system that has stirred controversy around data privacy and security. What are the risks, and what can be done to minimize them?

Should Other Countries Build Their Own India Stack?

India’s new financial infrastructure, including its biometric ID system, has been making headlines lately. But what exactly is "India Stack"? Should other countries replicate it?

Is the Unbundling of Payments from Banking Regulation Imminent?

The unbundling of payments from banking is well underway in countries like India. Is the unbundling of payments from banking regulation soon to follow?