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The Dual Binding Constraints to Scaling AI in Finance

Despite rapid advances in AI capabilities, the underlying data foundations have not kept pace. AI adoption is fundamentally constrained by the strength, inclusiveness, and usability of underlying data – not as much by the sophistication of algorithms.

Competition in Financial Services: Three Country Paths, One Bigger Question

While access to finance has grown, market concentration and high costs remain. Brazil, India, and the UK prove that when financial regulators prioritize competition through policy, they can lower prices and improve variety for all consumers.

Smart Fields, Strong Women: Data and AI in Rural India

In rural India, digital tools are bridging the gender gap in finance. By using satellite data and AI to track farm productivity, new agri-tech models help women farmers build credit histories and access the resources needed for climate resilience.

How Does Financial Inclusion Impact Financial Integrity?

Policymakers view financial inclusion and financial integrity as mutually reinforcing policy goals. Since 2011, about 2 billion people have gained access to formal financial services. But how has increased financial inclusion served financial integrity objectives?

Personal Financial Management Tools Can Boost Financial Health in India

Personal financial management (PFM) apps are emerging as a potential driver of improved financial health. By aggregating data across accounts and generating real-time insights, they promise personalized financial advice. But how is this translating into meaningful outcomes for users?

Mapping Credit Gender Gaps With Regulatory Data in Rwanda

Using disaggregated data—by gender, age, and location—can improve financial inclusion. Using CGAP's pilot with NBR in Rwanda as an example, we show how segmented insights help regulators and providers identify gaps, reduce bias, and better serve vulnerable groups.

How Providers Can Serve Micro-Merchants Sustainably

This blog discusses why digital merchant payments for micro- and rural merchants in sub-Saharan Africa struggle to be financially sustainable—and what providers, regulators, and development partners can do to fix that.

Financial Health: Driving Growth in Latin America and the Caribbean

Account ownership in LAC has surged, but true progress means translating access into financial health. Banks can lead by using technology to build trust, design customer-first solutions, and expand inclusive digital ecosystems.

Rethinking Evidence: When Does Inclusive Finance Work and for Whom

This leadership essay reassesses what we think we know as a sector, evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of the existing evidence base and proposing new methods for building a better one.

Innovation Requires New Skills – Are Regulators Hiring Accordingly?

Regulating innovation requires regulators to acquire new skillsets, most urgently around data and cybersecurity. Are they hiring experts in those fields? New CGAP analysis looking at leading innovative authorities provides some answers.

Towards Right-Fit IMM: Orienting Around Outcomes

Achieving outcomes orientation in inclusive finance investing starts with understanding what shapes it. CGAP’s emerging framework highlights the factors influencing outcomes orientation in IMM — and where the capital value chain can focus to make it stronger.

The Power of Microdata From Global Findex

In this blog, CGAP goes beyond the aggregate data in Global Findex and uses its microdata to examine financial inclusion at the individual level. Here’s how we are doing it and why.

Six Ways Open Finance Can Drive Competition and Inclusion

Open finance can make financial markets more inclusive and competitive, but only if designed intentionally. CGAP highlights six policy levers to ensure it benefits low-income and underserved people.

How Has Regulating Digital Lending Enhanced Women’s Credit in Indonesia?

Intentionally embedding gender considerations into Indonesia’s peer-to-peer (P2P) and other fintech regulations and guidance could unlock new finance pathways for women entrepreneurs to access the finance they need to grow and thrive.

Rethinking Impact Measurement and Management: Fit for Outcomes

Too often, impact measurement focuses on what’s easiest to track, rather than what’s most useful for decision-making. We challenge conventional approaches to impact measurement and management (IMM), offering a practical way forward: use cases that align IMM strategies with investment context, purpose, and outcomes goals.

How Can Financial Authorities Use Gender Data to Fulfill Diverse Mandates?

As the financial landscape grows more complex, integrating gender into regulatory data will help financial sector authorities fulfill their mandates more effectively, contributing to a more inclusive, responsible, safe, and sustainable financial sector.

How Digitization Is Disrupting Collateral-Based Lending

Data is upending traditional lending models and can broaden access to finance.

AI and Responsible Finance: A Double-Edged Sword

Artificial Intelligence can transform financial inclusion and digital financial services, but it can also increase consumer risks like fraud, data misuse, and lack of transparency.

Finance Meets AI: Considerations for Public Authorities

How can public authorities support the financial sector to harness the power of AI while ensuring it operates within safe and ethical boundaries? Here, we propose three key considerations that could enable the responsible use of AI in finance.

Beyond the Balance Sheet: How Data is Rewriting the Investment Playbook

Inclusive credit fintechs can help narrow the financial inclusion gap—but their path is challenging. New data-driven asset managers are stepping in with transaction-based financing, offering the capital and credibility fintechs need to scale responsibly.