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Global Microscope Highlights Gains in Financial Inclusion and Digitization of Financial Services
Financial inclusion is now on the global agenda and is understood to be a critical foundation in the improvement of livelihoods, according to The Economist Intelligence Unit's (EIU) 2016 Global Microscope on Financial Inclusion. More than half of the 55 countries studied improved their enabling environment for financial inclusion in all areas in the past year.
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The Mismatch: Customers Seek Holistic Solutions, Financial Service Providers Operate in Silos
Digital financial service providers too often operate in silos, designing products to solve particular financial needs. Meanwhile, users tend to blend a mix of formal and informal financial services to meet their needs. The challenge for FSPs is to recognize users' behaviors and respond accordingly, particularly to their need for flexibility and timeliness.
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Grameen Foundation and Freedom from Hunger Unite as One Global Organization
Grameen Foundation and Freedom from Hunger, two global leaders in the fight to end poverty, announced today that they are joining forces to form a single unified global organization. Under the banner of Grameen Foundation, the combined organization will be able to reach more people across the spectrum of poverty, while deepening the focus on the very poor, especially women, its leaders say.
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Payday Loans Emerging As Nascent Market in India
Payday loans are decried a scourge, a menace and our dubbed "loan sharks" in the US and UK. With very high interest rates of 45%-50%, payday loans are given in advance of the next pay cheque and cater to blue collar workers, who are paid on a weekly basis. In India, payday loans are at a nascent stage and just taking off with a host of startups like RupeeLend, MoneyinMinutes, QuickCredit, Money4You.
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- South Asia
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- lending
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Hello Paisa Wins Second Annual MasterCard Foundation Clients at the Centre Prize
The MasterCard Foundation today presented its second annual Clients at the Centre Prize to Hello Paisa. The US$150,000 Prize recognizes the company’s innovative work in South Africa to facilitate international money transfers for foreign workers.
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- Sub-Saharan Africa
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More Women Are Financially Included in India Than Ever Before
India’s Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) programme has brought more individuals into the formal financial fold than any other inclusion-related intervention attempted to date. The level of financial inclusion among Indian adults increased by 20% between 2014 and 2015, an unparalleled rate of growth across the eight countries tracked by InterMedia’s Financial Inclusion Insights (FII) research programme.
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- South Asia
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How Does India Fare in Access to Banking?
Financial inclusion may have become a buzzword among India’s econocrats and central bankers but India continues to lag behind most major economies when it comes to access to banking, the results of the Financial Access Survey for 2016 released by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) shows.
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- South Asia
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India’s Big Banks Sets Their Sights on Small Towns, Villages
Billionaire Uday Kotak did something unusual last month. He signed off on his Kotak Mahindra Bank valued at Rs 1.4 lakh crore for buying BSS Micro Finance, a tiny lender which does not even have 1% of the assets the bank has.
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- South Asia