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Analysis: Profits and Investment Appear to Be Aligning More Closely as the International Taxation Landscape Evolves
Tax competition can attract profits and investment and boost innovation, but the overall gains are often offset by diminished government budgets and negative short-term spillovers if the tax cuts are financed through debt.
- Categories
- Finance, Investing, Technology
- Region
- Global
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PAYGo’s Credit Problem is Putting Off-Grid Solar at Risk: Why the Sector Needs to Separate Sales from Lending
Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGo) solar has brought light and power to millions of rural households, demonstrating that they will use the installment payment model to purchase assets that improve their lives. But as Willem Nolens at in24 argues, the sector is now confronting a credit problem that puts both PAYGo businesses and their customers at risk, as low repayment rates are leading to power and asset loss among households across sub-Saharan Africa. He explores the causes of this challenge, and argues that the solution lies in splitting the sales and lending elements of PAYGO solar into separate providers.
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Harder Choices Ahead: What the Financial Inclusion Compass 2026 Tells us About the Sector’s Shifting Challenges
What is the biggest story in financial inclusion in 2026? Sam Mendelson at European Microfinance Platform (e-MFP) shares insights from e-MFP's “Financial Inclusion Compass 2026,” a survey of sector trends, risks and priorities that's been published since 2018. As he explains, the survey responses show a sector that is raising its ambitions for what financial inclusion has to achieve, at the same time as the environment in which it operates is becoming more difficult. He explores some key findings, as financial inclusion moves away from an era characterized by access, growth and donor-supported expansion, and towards one increasingly shaped by resilience, adaptation, commercial pressure, and harder choices about who gets served, how and at what cost.
- Categories
- Finance
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Nigeria: African Development Bank Group Commits $750,000 to Boost Women-Led Enterprises Through Lagos State Government and National Partners
Through its Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA) initiative, the Bank is providing $750,000 in grant support to strengthen women-led enterprises across Nigeria.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Salary Hero Raises US$7.6 Million to Expand Earned-Wage Access Business in Malaysia
Thailand-based fintech firm Salary Hero has raised US$7.6 million in Series A funding led by Cento Ventures as it expands its earned-wage access business into Malaysia.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- South Asia
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Is the World Bank to Blame for the Cambodian Microfinance Crisis?
For the past five years, Cambodia’s microfinance sector has been experiencing a major over-indebtedness crisis. And as inclusive finance consultant Daniel Rozas explains, despite multiple warnings that the sector was overheating, IFC, the World Bank’s private investment arm, poured fuel on the flames by investing in the largest and fastest-growing of the country's leading microfinance institutions. Making matters worse, after an investigation by IFC’s own ombudsman concluded that clients had been harmed due to its failure to monitor the social risks created by its investments, its board dismissed those findings. He explores how the industry went off the rails in Cambodia, and argues that IFC not only worsened the crisis, it helped undermine the sector’s own efforts to avert it.
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Press Release: New Global Survey from Kiva by The Harris Poll Finds an Affordability Crisis Is Putting Everyday Giving to the Test
These findings reflect broader headwinds tracked by Giving USA, which found that even as total charitable giving reached a record $617.20 billion, giving by individuals has fallen from roughly 80% of total contributions in past decades to just 64% today, as everyday households face mounting cost-of-living pressures.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Global
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Crypto Moves in Minutes; The Law Takes Months
"Chainalysis' 2026 Crypto Crime Report estimates that $17 billion was stolen through crypto scams and fraud in 2025."
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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