Nearly 500 million micro and small enterprises (MSEs) are estimated to be operating around the world. Access to credit and other financial services is critical to the growth and sustainability of these businesses, and consequentially to the low-…
Microfinance institutions (MFIs) around the world are exploring ways to digitize their operations. While some have achieved success, others have found this to be a difficult, costly endeavor in which success is anything but guaranteed. This blog…
A diverse set of individuals and microenterprises generate their livelihoods through digital platforms, growing fast in emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs). In this blog series, CGAP unpacks its extensive research with platform workers…
Big tech platforms from Facebook and Amazon to Alibaba and Tencent are reshaping economies around the world. Increasingly, they are showing interest in entering the financial services space. While platform-based finance has significant potential to…
Bangladesh turned 50 in 2021. Over the decades since its independence, the country has made significant progress on many measures of development, among them financial inclusion. Bangladesh offers the financial inclusion community an opportunity to…
When COVID-19 hit, it did not take long for questions to emerge about whether the pandemic posed an existential threat to the microfinance sector. CGAP’s research has demonstrated the need to carefully monitor solvency in the longer term as the…
For more than a decade, the CGAP Annual Cross-Border Funder Survey has tracked and reported on international funding commitments for financial inclusion. Each year’s data reveals specific themes worthy of further analysis and emerging priorities for…
Asset finance offers donors and investors a potentially scalable approach to advancing several SDGs. In this blog series, we explore innovations and challenges in asset finance across emerging markets.
The nature of work has changed greatly over the past few decades. So have financial services. To better understand how today’s financial services intersect with people’s changing livelihoods, CGAP is researching how the digital economy and digital…
Cyber-threats have become a growing concern in emerging financial markets and are weakening consumer trust and confidence in digital financial services. Industry players and governments in emerging markets are becoming aware of the need to develop…
Interoperability, the ability for systems to connect and work together, allows for e-mails that pass effortlessly around the world and trains that travel between cities no matter who laid the tracks. Yet interoperability remains largely absent from…
The global microfinance sector faced a crisis in 2020, as many borrowers were unable to repay their loans due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. CGAP’s Global Pulse Survey of Microfinance Institutions, conducted June to December 2020, offered…
Digital banks have created new possibilities for financial inclusion, but are digital banks actually reaching low-income customers? A new CGAP working paper, “Inclusive Digital Banking: Emerging Markets Case Studies,” presents emerging evidence…
A regulatory sandbox is a framework set up by a regulator that allows FinTech startups and other innovators to conduct live experiments in a controlled environment under a regulator’s supervision. In this blog series, CGAP takes a critical look at…
CGAP's new "Guidelines for Funders: A Market Systems Approach" advocates that funders of financial inclusion shift their approach from institution building to building broader and sustainable markets. This blog series provides insight from a variety…
Digital gig platforms are on the rise globally, connecting millions of independent workers to expanded markets. But research indicates – and the COVID-19 crisis has highlighted – that such platforms have done little to alleviate risks fundamental to…
The coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis is first and foremost a public health crisis, but it is also threatening many people’s financial security. This is especially true for low-income families in developing countries. As reports of distress pour in from…
This blog series explores the role that financial services can play for displaced people. Topics include the demand for financial services among FDPs, disaster insurance, and cash transfers. The millions of refugees and people forcibly displaced…
Whether and how financial services improve the lives of low-income people remains the subject of intense debate despite decades of evidence-gathering. The evidence to date appears mixed and often contradictory. As a result, different factions in the…
This blog series explores how digital payment providers can unlock innovation in the digital finance ecosystem by selling open APIs to third-parties, empowering these companies to create new products and services that benefit providers, third-…
