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Visa and MFS Africa Team on Digital Payments
“Africa is adopting a mobile-led, digital payments ecosystem and with Visa looking to accelerate the distribution of payment credentials and expand the acceptance space for digital payments, this partnership is an important one,” says Jack Forestell, chief product officer, Visa.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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The Tech Revolution in Financial Inclusion is Excluding Last-Mile Customers: Here are Four Ways to Reach Them
The world is experiencing a surge in internet access, with almost 300 million new users in 2019 – and this growth is happening especially in developing countries. But in many communities, this access is unreliable and unevenly distributed, say Rodrigo de Reyes and Mauricio Romero at Fundación Capital – and this has serious repercussions for digital and financial inclusion. They explore four key ways to deal with this challenge when serving last-mile customers.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
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Kenya’s Safaricom Tests New Mobile Savings Service
Policymakers say the East African nation suffers from a low national savings rate and analysts said Safaricom could be looking to target that untapped market with the new product, dubbed “Mali” (Kiswahili for wealth).
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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From Heritage to Habit: Why Digital Remittances Languish in Some Cultures But Surge in Others
Thirty years after their introduction, digital remittances have failed to take off. Some 90% of remittances still begin as cash and end as cash - even when banks are the intermediary. Lack of trust, access and interoperability - to name just a few challenges - are keeping lower-income people tied to costlier cash transfers. However, remittance providers and related fintech entities are exploring many new avenues to encourage recipients to keep remittances in the digital ecosystem and possibly use them for other financial products, writes Steven Davidson with Mondato.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
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Central Bank Of Sri Lanka Looks To Build Know-Your-Customer System On Blockchain Tech
“The Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) together with experts in Sri Lanka’s Financial and Information Technology (IT) industries, is assessing the possibility of applying Blockchain Technology to streamline Know-Your-Customer (KYC) processes at financial institutions. It is expected that this would facilitate several potential use-cases that will increase efficiencies in the financial sector. It is also expected that it would help increase financial inclusion in Sri Lanka.”
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- South Asia
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India’s Financial Services Firm Paytm Raises $1B
Paytm mobile wallet enables users to transfer money to each other, pay for food delivery and clear utility bills, buy train and movie tickets as well as secure small loans.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- digital finance, fintech, startups
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Three Key Sessions from Three Days of Discussion at European Microfinance Week
European Microfinance Week is always a whirlwind of activity and insights, and this year was no exception. As a media partner at the event, NextBillion covered some of the key sessions. Here we highlight three of them, one from each day of the event – starting with Friday's must-see plenary, which was streamed live and can now be viewed in a video embedded in this article.
- Categories
- Finance
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Viewpoint: Digital Impact Investing Is Here Now
In an often bleak political epoch, what a ray of light—capital and digital are working in partnership and we are moving the dial on impact.
- Categories
- Investing
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