About a dozen developing countries have deposit insurance systems and several others are considering establishing them. These systems are typically created to prevent contagious bank runs, to provide a formal national mechanism for handling failing banks, and to protect small depositors from...

We present a model of human decision-making that can be used to design future financial services. The purpose of our model is to collate a wide variety of observed financial practices of the privileged and the poor into a common framework that can be applied in different contexts. Think of it as...

M-PESA, a mobile-phone based electronic payments system, has been adopted by 8.5 million Kenyans in the relatively short span of 2½ years. Surveys of users show it is a highly valued service, and Safaricom continues to expand the range of applications it can be used for. This paper explores how...

This paper provides an overview of the potential for and constraints to using broadband channels and applications to increase financial inclusion globally and specifically in Latin America. We review ten different financial service opportunity areas, including savings services with enhanced...

This paper has three objectives. It lays out the key differences between a banking and a payments mindset, within the historical context in which these fields have developed. It initiates a discussion on whether it is useful to articulate the digital payments space as an emerging profession...

In inclusion circles, the issue of digital identity tends to be dominated by the perspectives of law enforcement (anti-money laundering and – terrorist financing), legal compliance (how long records need to be kept), and technological implementation choices (phones or cards, biometric or not)....

This report contains an initial evaluation of the opportunities for spreading financial services through business networks in local communities across sub-Saharan Africa. The central premise is that small, local business that are able to establish a data-rich, trusted relationship with financial...

Technology, and in particular the spread of real-time communications networks, permits banks to delegate last mile cash management and customer servicing functions to third-party retail outlets. By making basic deposit, withdrawal, and payment functions available securely through retail shops...