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How Fostering Competition in LAC Can Revolutionize Financial Inclusion

Governments in LAC recognize the importance of advancing digital financial inclusion and fostering competition among financial service providers to improve choices and quality and lower costs for all consumers - including those living in poverty.

Success in Open Finance Requires Trust – Lessons from Brazil

Brazil's rapid expansion of open finance shows its potential to transform financial services, and recent CGAP research offers valuable insights into Brazil, as well as other markets interested in implementing open finance.

Why Don’t Fintechs Have a Larger Share of Peru’s MSE Credit Market?

CGAP market sizing research in Peru found that fintechs are only responsible for 0.3% of the MSE credit market. Here, we ask why fintechs have such a small segment of the MSE credit market and posit how that share can be increased.

How Did Bancolombia Create a Successful Rural Agent Network at Scale?

Bancolombia is a great example of a provider that's been successful in developing rural agent business models at scale, therefore playing a critical role in furthering financial inclusion. Here, we look at the factors that explain their success.

Peruvian Authorities Pilot Tool to Improve Consumer Listening

CGAP and Accenture LLP (Accenture) launched a pilot to help Peruvian authorities assess their consumer listening mechanisms and determine the necessary steps to design an integrated financial consumer protection platform.

Mobile Payments Take Shape in Latin America & the Caribbean

Mobile payments took hold over a decade ago, but Latin America didn't experience the traction seen elsewhere. Since then, two emerging business models for digital payments in Colombia and Haiti achieved particular success. What did they get right?

How Peru Is Elevating the Collective Consumer Voice

The steps Peru has taken to ensure consumers have a strong voice in financial consumer protection regulation may be instructive for other countries working to protect vulnerable consumers.

How SMS Messaging Can Change Financial Behaviors

Pilots with mobile money providers in the Philippines and Paraguay showed that simple SMS messaging can increase mobile wallet transactions.

Will Brazil Go Digital?

Small and medium banks in Brazil are starting to take advantage of new regulations that make it easier to adopt fully digital business models. What impact might this development have on financial inclusion in the longer term?

Sowing Opportunities and Growing Possibilities in Paraguay

In Paraguay, a partnership between Fundación Capital and the government of Paraguay offers a compelling example of how the Graduation Approach can be integrated into public policy to halt extreme poverty.

Cash or Cow? Weighing Monetary vs. In-Kind Asset Transfer

As Graduation Approaches have spread and scaled, so too have the discussions of the best approaches. Fundación Capital believes that programs should focus on in-cash rather than in-kind asset transfers. Why? Read more about the case for cash.

How a Retail Chain Became Mexico’s No. 1 Bank Account Supplier

Saldazo, a Visa debit card product co-branded with Banamex bank, has made Mexico’s largest corner store retail chain – OXXO – the country’s number one transactional account supplier. Here are some key success factors, challenges and insights from this project.

Those Star-Ratings Do Matter for Financial Inclusion

CGAP recently partnered with MercadoLibre, Latin America’s largest online retailer, to assess the potential of alternative data to boost financial inclusion. This research found that e-commerce data can be a powerful credit risk predictor for underbanked and unbanked people.

Graduation Case Studies: An Opportunity to Learn & Scale Up

To further understand the opportunities and challenges faced by governments in the implementation of a Graduation Approach, the Ford Foundation has commissioned three case studies to examine the planning and execution of Graduation programs launched by the governments of Colombia, Peru and Ethiopia.

The Replication Limits of M-Pesa in Latin America

Is the challenge of replicating the success of the M-Pesa model in Kenya more about implementation and management or about context and market structure? In Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), the evidence points to context.

Catalyzing Graduation with Village Savings and Loan Associations

In Haiti, Fonkoze recognized a need for post-graduation support for participants of its Chemen Lavi Miyò (CLM) (Pathway to a Better Life) program. One of the most promising solutions to date is the village savings and loan association (VSLA).

Building a Toolbox for Bundling Services

In an increasingly competitive marketplace, could the bundling of credit with non-credit financial services be a viable solution for FSPs? EA Consultants designed and implemented a study with Crezcamos in Colombia to find out.

Colombia’s Recipe for 100% Agent Coverage: Aggregation & Sharing

Universal coverage is a fundamental building block toward universal financial access. Last year Colombia announced that all of its 1,100+ municipalities had at least one banking agent serving customers in need of financial services. How did Colombia do it?

Tech Relief for the High Cost of Field Research

Client-centered research can be expensive and logistically challenging. How can technology simplify this process?

Reaching the Ultra Poor in Latin America

An interview with Alexandra N. Barrantes, of the OAS, on opportunities and challenges for the Graduation Approach in Latin America.