Financial inclusion is on the rise globally, accelerated by mobile phones and the internet, but gains have been uneven across countries, according to a World Bank report.

Globally, 69 per cent of adults – 3.8 billion people – now have an account at a bank or mobile money provider, up from 62 per cent in 2014 and just 51 per cent in 2011. From 2014 to 2017, 515 million adults obtained an account, and 1.2 billion have done so since 2011, according to the Global Findex database – which takes financial services usage data from people in 144 economies.

While in some economies account ownership has surged, progress has been slower elsewhere, often held back by large disparities between men and women and between the rich and poor. The gap between men and women in developing economies remains unchanged since 2011, at nine per cent.

World Bank Group president Jim Yong Kim said that access to financial services is a critical step towards reducing both poverty and inequality, “and new data on mobile phone ownership and internet access show unprecedented opportunities to use technology to achieve universal financial inclusion”.

There has been a significant increase in the use of mobile phones and the internet to conduct financial transactions. Between 2014 and 2017, this has contributed to a rise in the share of account owners sending or receiving payments digitally from 67 per cent to 76 per cent globally, and in the developing world from 57 per cent to 70 per cent.

Globally, 1.7 billion adults remain unbanked, yet two-thirds of them own a mobile phone that could help them access financial services. The report suggested that digital technology could take advantage of existing cash transactions to bring people into the financial system – for example, paying government wages, pensions and social benefits directly into accounts could bring formal financial services to up to 100 million more adults globally.

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