The G20 s focus on financial inclusion directly contributes to its core goal of achieving strong, sustainable, and balanced growth. Studies show that broader access to and participation in the financial system can reduce income inequality, boost job creation, accelerate consumption, increase...

The first goal of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is the absence of poverty to be achieved by 2030. Thus, access to and usage of financial services play an important role in achieving this, where ICT and digital technologies are the main tools, that describe it as a digital financial...

In recent years we have witnessed a growing trend in cashless transactions as well as products and services sold exclusively in this way. Also, after the onset of the global financial crisis, private crypto currencies appeared that have raised some concerns. All of these changes beg the question...

The market for payment cards is inherently two sided. Consumers benefit from increased merchant acceptance of payment cards and vice versa. To quantify the interdependence of consumer and merchants or network externalities, we construct and estimate a structural two-sided model of a payment...

We discuss several uses of blockchain (and, more generally, distributed ledger) technologies outside of cryptocurrencies with a pragmatic view. We mostly focus on three areas: the role of coin economies for what we refer to as data malls (specialized data marketplaces); data provenance (a...

In late 2021 and early 2022, CEMLA conducted a thorough survey involving 12 central banks to analyze key aspects related to the potential implementation of a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). The findings revealed prevalent issues and objectives regarding digital payments in the region, as...