Greg Chen

Gregory Chen served as CGAP’s Policy team lead through October 2021. The team helps policy makers adapt to the fast-changing world of digital finance, including developing and executing a strategy to engage multiple countries, regions, and global bodies—and oversight of the work of more than a dozen staff and consultants.

Gregory has 25 years of financial inclusion experience and deep regional experience in South Asia. His work has focused on hands-on start-up pioneer microfinance institutions, digital finance players, and FinTech. He has been part of forging new institutions and regulatory environments to support financial sectors. This includes work with the Aga Khan Development Network, BRAC, Telenor, and Dvara. He also has experience as a corporate banker at Bank of America and led the establishment of the financial services consulting firm Enclude in South Asia.

Gregory is a frequent speaker and lecturer on microfinance and digital finance in academic circles at BRAC University, Johns Hopkins, Tufts, Yale, and American University. He has been interviewed by BBC and quoted in the Economist. He has a Master’s degree in International Development from Harvard’s Kennedy School and an undergraduate degree from Wesleyan University.

By Greg Chen

Blog

Bangladesh’s 50 Years: Taking the Long View of Financial Inclusion

Bangladesh turned 50 this year. What does the country's decades-long journey with financial inclusion reveal about how financial inclusion connects to wider development? This post kicks off a new series exploring this question.
Blog

Let Her Choose: Supercharging G2P for Women

Government-to-person (G2P) programs can reach millions of women. What if instead of requiring women to receive payments from a single provider, they enabled women to select among several options and to reward good service with their business?
Blog

Open Data and the Future of Banking

Although growing numbers of low-income people are entering the formal financial system, many are not yet leveraging its full value. Emerging regimes for data sharing and payments flexibility have the potential to bypass traditional financial sector development and give poor customers better products and more choices.
Research

The Future of G2P Payments: Expanding Customer Choice

There’s a better way to deliver government-to-person (G2P) payments. Modernizing the delivery architecture can increase value for customers, lower government costs and create competition among financial service providers.
Blog

It’s Time to Deregulate Agent Cash In/Cash Out

Agent regulations often treat agents like extensions of bank branches. But the reality is that many agents conduct a far more limited range of financial activities and should be regulated differently.