Financial inclusion in East Asia and the Pacific (EAP) no longer looks like an urgent problem. But dig a little deeper, and the challenges become clear.
Home to nearly 30% of the world’s population, spanning 14 economies and 11 Pacific Island countries, the region has long ranked ahead of its peers in financial inclusion. Many economies moved early on bank-led models of access, pioneered microfinance, and benefited from strong state support that digitized welfare payments, built payments infrastructure, and fostered conducive regulatory environments – underpinning today’s vibrant digital finance ecosystem.
In a region shaped by manufacturing, trade, mature financial systems, and increasingly complex AI-driven ecosystems, it is tempting to conclude that financial inclusion is a chapter largely written. Yet beneath these headline indicators, a more complicated story emerges: progress has been rapid but uneven, leaving persistent last-mile gaps in several economies, and even where access exists, households remain exposed to economic and climate shocks. To understand where the region stands today, we must look beyond regional averages and consider how much of its progress is driven by China.
Headline numbers put EAP at the global forefront of financial inclusion
Latest data from the World Bank’s Global Findex 2025 (covering 10 EAP economies excluding high-income countries and the Pacific Islands) show that 83% of adults in the EAP region have an account, placing it among the strongest-performing regions globally in terms of access. Notably, this progress is broadly shared across income levels and genders. Among adults in the poorest 40% of households, 76% have an account, compared to 88% among the richest 60%. Gender gaps in account ownership are virtually absent, which is rare by global standards.
Note: All indicators shown as a percentage of adults aged 15+, data for Myanmar is from 2021 round of Findex.
Note: EAP = East Asia & Pacific, ECA = Europe & Central Asia, LAC = Latin America & Caribbean, MENA = Middle East & North Africa, SA = South Asia, SSA = Sub-Saharan Africa.
More importantly, these accounts are actively used. Digital payments are commonplace, with eight in 10 adults using them regularly, supported by high mobile phone ownership of 94%. This represents a rapid doubling over the last decade, from 41% in 2014, with similar growth among women (from 41 to 80%) and even sharper gains among the poorest households (from 30 to 71%). Further, only 5% of accounts are inactive, and formal financial use is substantial, with around 60% of adults saving formally, a little over a third accessing formal credit, and 67% making digital merchant payments. Together, these indicators explain why EAP is often seen as a poster child for financial inclusion, yet a closer analysis of the data shows that a single country is having an outsized impact and conceals ongoing challenges in other parts of the region.
China does much of the heavy lifting, while averages mask wide differences
As one of the world’s largest economies, China’s scale has an outsized influence on EAP's regional averages. When CGAP analyzed Global Findex 2025 data for EAP excluding China, the numbers tell a different story. Account ownership falls from 83 to 62%. Digital payment use declines from 80 to 50%, and digital merchant payments drop by 40 percentage points to 26%. Formal saving halves from nearly 60 to 32% while formal borrowing falls from 35 to 14%. None of this diminishes the region’s progress, but it shows how much its headline success rests on China.
Note: All indicators shown as percentage of adults aged 15+, data for Myanmar is from 2021 round of Findex.
A closer look also reveals a more uneven picture across the region. On the one hand, several countries have made impressive gains. Vietnam recorded the largest increase in account ownership over the past decade, rising by nearly 40 percentage points to 71%, fueled by gains among the poorest households. Mongolia, Malaysia, and Thailand also witnessed rapid growth in mobile money accounts over the same period. Yet persistent last-mile gaps remain in other economies. The Philippines, a pioneer of mobile-based financial services with the launch of GCash in 2004, still reports only about half of adults with an account, while Indonesia, an early adopter of digitized social welfare payments, stands at 56%. In Cambodia and the Lao PDR, account ownership remains below 40%.
Digital adoption is uneven, too: only a third of adults in Cambodia and just over one-quarter in the Lao PDR use digital payments. Even where basic connectivity is high, deeper digital use lags. In Indonesia, around 80% of adults own a mobile phone, yet only about 12% use it to pay bills. Saving patterns point to similar gaps, with only around 40% of adults in Myanmar and the Lao PDR saving at all. The data point to lingering exclusion in some markets and shallow use in others.
A related challenge is ‘debanking,’ or the retreat of correspondent banking services, particularly in the Pacific Islands that are not covered by Global Findex data. High transaction costs, rising compliance burdens, and financial crime concerns have reduced cross-border payment links and raised the cost of remittances and basic financial transactions, intensifying people’s vulnerability where formal access was already thin.
Rising consumer risks, economic shocks, and climatic pressures erode resilience
Beyond access and use, the more consequential question is whether financial inclusion has strengthened household resilience. This matters particularly in EAP, where consumer risks are rising alongside rapid adoption of digital finance, even if comprehensive data remains limited. Across Asia, online scams are estimated to have cost individuals USD $688 billion in 2024 alone, much of them linked to industrial-scale fraud operations based in Southeast Asia. Survey data reinforce the scale: in 2025, 45% of consumers across ASEAN reported being scammed, and 68% percent of victims lost money.
Artificial intelligence is further compounding these threats through synthetic identity fraud and increasingly sophisticated deception, while weak digital and financial literacy increases vulnerability, weakens trust, and risks reversing recent inclusion gains.
Many countries in EAP also confront economic shocks from slowing growth and productivity, geopolitical trade disruptions, ageing populations, alongside climate-related risks. A quarter of adults in the region report experiencing natural disasters or severe weather events, rising to as much as 78% in the Philippines. While regional averages suggest that 78% of adults can access emergency funds within 30 days, this falls to 58% when China is excluded. Longer-term buffers also remain thin. Excluding China, only 36% of adults could cover more than two months of expenses if they lost their main source of income, while 11% could not cover even two weeks.
What’s next for East Asia and the Pacific?
Undoubtedly, real successes stand out with near-universal account ownership in some markets, the virtual elimination of gender gaps in access and use, and meaningful gains in digital payments among the poorest households. And this momentum looks set to continue in several economies with rising use of AI in finance, expanding cross-border payments, central banks testing digital currencies, and growing digital asset markets. Yet the same success risks obscuring what remains unfinished. Persistent last-mile exclusion, uneven depth of use, and thin household buffers suggest that financial inclusion challenges in the region have entered a harder and less visible phase. Closing these gaps will demand locally tailored approaches and sustained attention from sector stakeholders. East Asia and the Pacific risks becoming a victim of its own success if progress is mistaken for completion – much work remains.
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