Recent Blogs
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China – The Future Leader in Branchless Banking for the Poor?
A look at the world's biggest market for branchless banking.Blog
Enabling Data Driven Decisions for Expanding Financial Inclusion
The Financial Service for the Poor (FSP) team at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and its partners have developed an interactive web portal that aims to improve the way financial access is measured and tracked.Blog
Indonesia Moves Towards a Cash Light Economy
In mid May 2013, the three leading mobile network operators in Indonesia surprised the financial services industry by announcing they will interoperate their wallets.Blog
A New Wave of E-Money in Latin America
In Latin America, the banking sector is highly rooted in the economy, and to think about non-bank issued electronic money is almost heretic. But things are changing.Blog
The Future of Provider Ecosystems for Financial Inclusion
CGAP’s five-year strategy recognizes that in most countries poor people are more likely to get financial services from a range of commercial and public sector actors.Blog
Mobile Money Agents in Tanzania: How Busy, How Exclusive?
The Financial Sector Deepening Trust of Tanzania (FSDT) undertook a census of cash outlets in the country, and discovered that half of all agents do more than 30 transactions per month and nearly two-thirds of agents are exclusive to M-PESA.Blog
Where’s The Cash? The Geography Of Cash Points In Tanzania
Places where one can exchange cash for transferable or storable electronic value is an essential component of financial access. Given the paucity of financial infrastructure in Tanzania, we wanted to know how deeply mobile money agents have penetrated rural areas.Blog
Consumer Education and Mobile Money Adoption
Consumer education adds value not only for clients, but also for mobile money providers and for their financial institution partners. This post from Microfinance Opportunities shines a light on client behaviors and challenges, and identifies ways to address them: either through information to the consumer, or by helping providers to look inwardly for solutions which result in an improved consumer experience that can lead to greater uptake and use of mobile money products.Blog
Cash Management Innovation in Latin America
An ongoing trend in Latin America is bringing forward an innovative solution to the problem of cash management through a far-reaching network of small retailers who process cash payments in real time. Could this be a way to forge a Latin American alternative path to address the problem of liquidity management?Blog
Unlocking Barriers: Advances in Rural Mobile Banking in Mexico
Telecomm is a decentralized government agency that operates the telegraph services, bridges data connectivity across the territory, and offers financial services such as domestic and international remittances, as well as bill payments. It has decided to launch a pilot program which seeks to close the three most common gaps in financial inclusion: technological infrastructure, channels and products.Blog
Are Retailers Better Positioned to Offer Financial Services?
In our first post in this series on the role of consumer goods retailers in financial inclusion, we discussed how retailers are similar to MNOs in their ability to reach unbanked customers. However, the opportunity for financial inclusion via organized retail, while significant, is not present in every country and not necessarily for every type of retailer.Blog
Building India’s Model of Agent Banking
CGAP, in collaboration with the College of Agricultural Banking, just completed a national survey, which captured the big picture on agents across the country. In India, the term customer service point (CSP) is used to refer to individuals who act as agents on behalf of banks.Blog
Unlocking the Potential of Mobile Money in New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (PNG) is a country so complex it defies easy description. A place of such diversity it hosts 850 distinct languages for a population of about 7 million. The population figure, mind you, is only a guess as nobody really knows.Blog
Can Third-Party Providers Lead to New Business Models?
Until recently, Zoona, formerly known as Mobile Transactions could have been considered the best kept secret in Africa. Operating in Zambia on a shoe-string budget, they have been developing their own unique business model for electronic financial services slowly and with little media attention. Now, as of February 2012, this small company has secured investments from three big investors, Omidyar Network, ACCION Frontier Investments, and Sarona Asset Management. All three are banking on the fact that Zoona’s experience and innovative approach to serving a range of consumers situates them to fill crucial gaps in the mobile money transactions and payments market in Africa.Blog
Branchless Banking in India: More Reasons for Optimism
In keeping with this optimistic view of a still uncertain India venture, we conclude with three more positive items to highlight. Two reflect new changes by the government and one goes back to the fundamentals.Blog
Eko’s Mobile Banking: A Basic Payments Product
Eko was the first company dedicated to a mobile phone-based basic savings account and payment service for the unbanked in India. Launched in 2007, Eko has carefully developed a mobile-based service usable on the most basic of handsets and continually revised and re-fashioned its approach.Blog
Strong Customer Activity Should Begin on Day One
One of the keys to high levels of customer activity is getting it right from the very beginning – ensuring that the registration agent and first customer transactions are both focused on long-term customer activity.Blog
CGAP Releases Paper on G2P Payments and Financial Inclusion
Branchless banking is, fundamentally, a business built on high-volume, low-value transactions.Blog
Banking Services Transforming A Town in the Amazon
What do the inhabitants of this small town of 15,000 people (30,000 including surrounding communities) in the Amazon need banking services for?Blog