Financial Inclusion

Many Filipinos switched to digital channels during lockdown. Bankers think customers are unlikely to return to branches now that they have had a taste of what it is like to go cashless. That would be good for banks – and for financial inclusion.

Nepal’s government wants everyone to have access to a bank and has ordered a branch in each of the country’s 753 districts. Asiamoney journeys to one of the poorest and most remote parts of Asia, high in the Himalayas, to see if its grand financial-inclusion plan is working.

Kamal Quadir has transformed financial services for the poor in Bangladesh with bKash. The mobile payments system is shaping up to be a great success story. Here’s how a child of independence put it together.