World Bank Archives - Lend Academy

The Global Covid-19 Fintech Market Rapid Assessment Survey Launches

The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, the World Bank and the World Economic Forum launch a new survey to analyze the impact on fintech of Covid-19

June 15, 2020 By Peter Renton Leave a Comment

The most ambitious survey in the history of fintech is getting under way today. The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF), in partnership with the World Bank and the World Economic Forum, is releasing the Global Covid-19 Fintech Market Rapid Assessment Survey.

It is a massive undertaking that will draw on the resources of these leading research institutions. They aim to reach more than 15,000 fintech companies in 190 countries to discover the impact of the pandemic on the fintech market.

LendIt Fintech is proud to be an official Global Industry Survey Partner and we will be helping to promote this survey over the coming weeks. It is really important that every fintech company responds to the survey so we can get an accurate assessment of where we are right now as an industry that will inform policymakers around the world.

Fintech plays a vital role in providing financial services to consumers and small businesses throughout the world. Governments are beginning to recognize the importance of fintech and one of the goals of this survey is to see what policy responses might be needed to support fintech in helping to stimulate the economy in these uncertain times.

The executive director of the CCAF, Bryan Zhang, had this to say about this survey:

Global challenges require global solutions, this survey is a collective effort to bring the global FinTech ecosystem together to share their insights, express their views and voice their concerns in light of Covid-19. In turn, the rapid assessment survey findings will inform market participants, regulators and policymakers to take swift, appropriate and evidence-based actions.

Take the Survey Today

On to the survey itself. It was just launched today and is available for all fintech firms to complete. It should take around 30 minutes to fill out and there are two versions:

Global Alternative Finance Benchmarking & Covid-19 Rapid Assessment Survey
For marketplace lending and crowdfunding platforms this combines the annual benchmarking study along with the Covid-19 survey.
Global Covid-19 FinTech Market Rapid Assessment Survey
For all other fintech companies, the above link with take you to the Covid-19 survey.

It is very important that you complete this survey in a timely manner. The goal of the CCAF, the World Bank and the World Economic Forum is to have the results for this survey published before the end of Q3. There will be a great deal of work to do to make this happen, so it is imperative that you complete the survey as soon as possible.

LendIt is a Long Time Collaborator With CCAF

LendIt Fintech has been collaborating with CCAF since 2014, even before the Centre was formally established. We have partnered on many surveys, the leadership there has spoken at LendIt in both Europe and the USA and I have spoken at their excellent event in Cambridge.

We partner with them because their work is important. While there are many universities around the world doing good research, no other institution has the global reach to take the pulse of fintech in every important region in the world. Their reports have become a must read for serious industry participants.

Please support their work and complete the survey right away. We will all be stronger because of it.

The Center for Financial Inclusion Digs Into the Global Findex 2017 Numbers

CFI has analyzed the Global Findex 2017 database, released by the World Bank in April, and finds a less than rosy picture

June 7, 2018 By Peter Renton Leave a Comment

A few weeks ago the World Bank released the triennial Global Findex Database for 2017. We covered the release on Lend Academy touting the progress the world has made towards more financial inclusion, particularly in developing countries. Now, the Center for Financial Inclusion, part of Accion, have released a follow up report digging into the Findex data and the picture is less rosy than what was highlighted in the World Bank’s initial report.

On the surface it looks like the world is making good progress towards financial inclusion with the Findex report showing that 68% of adults globally having some kind of bank account versus 61% in 2014 and 51% in 2011. That is rapid progress.

But CFI found a different story when just focusing on active accounts, those accounts that had some kind of transaction in the past 12 months. This takes the percentage down to 55% and what is worse the gap is widening between total accounts and active accounts indicating a growing number of people who open an account but never use it. This is true for both developing and high income countries but the gap is getting much wider in developing countries as shown in the graphic below.

For true financial inclusion to materialize we need to focus on account usage not just total accounts, that much is clear. But there are hundreds of millions of people now with inactive accounts. From the report: [Read more…]

World Bank Releases the Latest Global Findex Database

The Global Findex Database and accompanying report give a clear indication of how fintech is impacting access to financial services globally

April 23, 2018 By Peter Renton 1 Comment

In 2011 the World Bank released the first ever Global Findex Database as “the world’s most comprehensive data set on how adults save, borrow, make payments, and manage risk”. A new database was release based on 2014 data and last week the 2017 edition was released. The full database (in Excel format) and the summary and detailed report are all available for download here.

This is important work because it is the only in depth research of its kind that reaches to all corners of the globe. Here is the methodology quoted from the report:

Compiled using nationally representative surveys of more than 150,000 adults age 15 and above in over 140 economies, the 2017 Global Findex database includes updated indicators on access to and use of formal and informal financial services. It has additional data on the use of financial technology (or fintech), including the use of mobile phones and the internet to conduct financial transactions.

The Most Important Findings

One of the most interesting findings is that an additional 515 million people have opened some kind of financial services account between 2014 and 2017. This means that 69% of adults globally (around 3.8 billion people) now have an account, up from 62% in 2014 and 51% in 2011. This is an astounding change and one, I believe, that speaks to the growth of fintech around the world. Over the last six years it has become much easier to open an account digitally with both banks and non-banks.

What is even more interesting is that of the 1.7 billion adults who remain unbanked around two-thirds own a mobile phone. Now, this would not be a smartphone in most circumstances but many financial services are available on text-only flip phones. In China 82% of those people who are non-banked have a mobile phone, in India and Mexico it is more than 50%. This does speak to the potential to continue to increase the numbers of people with some kind of bank account in the coming years. [Read more…]