Financial Technologies (FinTech), Instruments, Mechanisms, and Financial Products in the Current Context of Artificial Intelligence and Globalization

2021 ◽  
pp. 22-45
Author(s):  
Otilia P. Manta
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Virtual Space ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Financing System ◽  
Financial Innovations ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Current Context ◽  
The One

The holistic approach of the phenomenon of expansion of financial innovations, respectively of current financial technologies, as otherwise abbreviated to FinTech, knows very specific elements and is adapted to the global financial context, and lately, the share of financial services in the virtual space is dominant compared to their traditional form. Moreover, this new financing instrument has arisen mainly due to the need to streamline the financing system, based on technology, either to provide financial services adapted to the current needs of consumers (especially those who are in need of financing, this is also the real reason for the FinTech coupling of the financial inclusion of the financially excluded), as well as the design of new financial products that are reliable and responsive to the market. The financial space is dual, presenting two often contradictory assumptions (all channels, stocks, and collection flow, on the one hand; and all entities, channels, stocks, and investment flows), and in the current context of digital financial technologies, this is in virtual space.

Quality financial inclusion and its determinants in South Africa: evidence from survey data

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kudakwashe Joshua Chipunza ◽  
Ashenafi Fanta
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Survey Data ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Ordinary Least Squares ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Least Squares Regression ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Demographic Groups ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Data Limitations

PurposeThe study measured quality financial inclusion, a more comprehensive measure of financial inclusion, and examined its determinants at a consumer level in South Africa.Design/methodology/approachThis study leveraged on FinScope 2015 survey data to compute a quality financial inclusion index using polychoric principal component analysis. Subsequently, a heteroscedasticity consistent ordinary least squares regression model was employed to assess determinants of quality financial inclusion.FindingsThe empirical findings indicated that gender, education, financial literacy, income, location and geographical proximity determine quality financial inclusion. These findings could inform policymakers and financial services providers on how quality financial inclusion can be promoted through tailoring financial products for various socio-demographic groups.Research limitations/implicationsDue to data limitations, the study was confined to South Africa and did not capture digital financial inclusion. Hence, future studies could replicate the study in Sub-Saharan Africa's context and compute an index that captures digital financial inclusion.Practical implicationsThese findings could inform policymakers and financial services providers on how quality financial inclusion can be promoted through tailoring financial products for various socio-demographic groups.Originality/valueThis study proposed a more comprehensive measure of quality financial inclusion from a demand-side perspective by accounting for important dimensions that include diversity, affordability, appropriateness and flexibility of financial products and services.

scholarly journals Empowering Women through Financial Inclusion in Zimbabwe Is the Gender Gap Not Encroaching This Noble Cause?

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-64
Author(s):  
Lettiah Gumbo ◽  
Precious Dube ◽  
Muhammad Ridwan
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Gender Gap ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
National Development ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
The Government ◽  
Financial Awareness

One of the most effective catalysts of economic growth of any nation is obviously financial inclusion. However, in developing countries such as Zimbabwe gender gap is still an impediment to the achievement of financial inclusion for all. Research findings for this paper show that, increasing women’s financial opportunities and financial awareness on how to access financial products and services will go a long way in reducing the gender gap. Furthermore, increasing access to and use of quality financial products and services is essential to inclusive economic growth and poverty reduction. Although the government of Zimbabwe is taking steps to increase women financial inclusiveness, research shows that women in Zimbabwe trail behind men in as far as access to financial services is concerned. Zimbabwean communities remain dominantly patriarchal and women are always lagging behind in developmental projects meant for their empowerment. This paper seeks to assess the implementation of women’s financial inclusion highlighting opportunities and barriers such as the gender gap and how this may be overcome. The study is qualitative in nature and therefore makes use of interviews and questionnaires for data collection. It is envisioned by the researchers that the research findings will be beneficial to women; their empowerment and development and national development. It is hoped to change the way in which the banking and financial sectors deal with women’s financial inclusion for the betterment of their livelihoods.  Furthermore, women’s financial empowerment will improve livelihoods of many families given the caring nature of mothers, sisters, aunts and grandmothers.

FinTech Adoption in China

2021 ◽  
pp. 166-173
Author(s):  
Gagan Kukreja
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Machine Learning ◽  
Deep Learning ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Large Population ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
High Penetration ◽  
Digital Payments ◽  
Almost All

Almost all financial services (especially digital payments) in China are affected by new innovations and technologies. New technologies such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, machine learning, deep learning, and data analytics have immensely influenced all most all aspects of financial services such as deposits, transactions, billings, remittances, credits (B2B and P2P), underwriting, insurance, and so on. Fintech companies are enabling larger financial inclusion, changing in lifestyle and expenditure behavior, better and fast financial services, and lots more. This chapter covers the development, opportunities, and challenges of financial sectors because of new technologies in China. This chapter throws the light on opportunities that emerged because of the large population of 1.4 billion people, high penetration, and access to the latest and affordable technology, affordable cost of smartphones, and government policies and regulations. Lastly, this chapter portrays the untapped potentials of Fintech in China.

scholarly journals Artificial Intelligence-Enhanced Predictive Insights for Advancing Financial Inclusion: A Human-Centric AI-Thinking Approach

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Meng-Leong How ◽  
Sin-Mei Cheah ◽  
Aik Cheow Khor ◽  
Yong Jiet Chan
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
World Bank ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Social Good ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
The World Bank ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Legacy Data

According to the World Bank, a key factor to poverty reduction and improving prosperity is financial inclusion. Financial service providers (FSPs) offering financially-inclusive solutions need to understand how to approach the underserved successfully. The application of artificial intelligence (AI) on legacy data can help FSPs to anticipate how prospective customers may respond when they are approached. However, it remains challenging for FSPs who are not well-versed in computer programming to implement AI projects. This paper proffers a no-coding human-centric AI-based approach to simulate the possible dynamics between the financial profiles of prospective customers collected from 45,211 contact encounters and predict their intentions toward the financial products being offered. This approach contributes to the literature by illustrating how AI for social good can also be accessible for people who are not well-versed in computer science. A rudimentary AI-based predictive modeling approach that does not require programming skills will be illustrated in this paper. In these AI-generated multi-criteria optimizations, analysts in FSPs can simulate scenarios to better understand their prospective customers. In conjunction with the usage of AI, this paper also suggests how AI-Thinking could be utilized as a cognitive scaffold for educing (drawing out) actionable insights to advance financial inclusion.

scholarly journals Banking on refugees: Racialized expropriation in the fintech era

2020 ◽  
Vol 52 (8) ◽  
pp. 1498-1515 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Bhagat ◽  
Leanne Roderick
Keyword(s):  
Financial Services ◽  
Small Businesses ◽  
Capital Accumulation ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Disruptive Technology ◽  
Viable Option ◽  
Credit Access ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Private Citizens ◽  
Global North

Fintech and digital financial services involve the delivery of financial products and services through technology. Fintech companies are part of a financial lending infrastructure claiming to offer an alternative to ‘big banks’, and are often touted as digitally disruptive technology that is rapidly reshaping financial inclusion agendas and improving the lives of the poor. For many refugees living in camps and informal settlements in Kenya, fintech is often the only viable option for credit or microfinance aid. While refugees are often excluded from credit, the spread of fintech as a solution for direct peer-to-peer aid transfers from the Global North to refugees has resulted in the uneven distribution of credit access and livelihood support. Through fintech, private citizens and groups in the Global North are able to disrupt and subvert refugee assistance, deeming some worthy of aid while others face ongoing exclusion. While fintech remains a hopeful source of greater efficiency and empowerment, the direct transfer of aid money masks profit and corporate power by only extending assistance to those refugees who are appropriately entrepreneurial, that is to say those who will start small businesses and pay back their loans. This paper argues that processes of financial inclusion carried out by and through fintech are still distinguished largely by exclusion. In so doing, this paper highlights a theoretical position that refugee governance is embedded in racial forms of capital accumulation and expropriation.

scholarly journals Financial Inclusion, Awareness, and Understanding of Financial Products among People Selected Gewogs (Blocks) of Bhutan

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (11S2) ◽  
pp. 485-494
Keyword(s):  
Financial Services ◽  
Financial System ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Primary Objective ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Journal Articles ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
The People ◽  
Survey Finding

The financial products that are being offered by the banks in the contemporary era are significant to enhance the primary objective of the banks that is, ‘Financial Inclusion’ (FI). However, due to umpteen reasons, the banks in many countries have failed streamlining the poor and the majority of the rural folk. Bhutan is not an exception as it is in a landlocked country. The Survey finding (2013) depicted a smaller share of Bhutanese involvement in the formal financial system (48%) whereas larger percentage of them involved in informal financial system. Further, the present Governor of Royal Monetary Authority (The central bank of the country), Dasho Penjor in his discussion on the review of His Majesty’s address on 109th National day Celebration in Trongsa stated that the majority of the rural folks are unable to avail banking services extended by the formal institutions. Besides, financial services can be availed by mass only when banks and other financial institutions run some awareness programmes. There are a few literature on FI in Bhutan in general; however literature on the awareness and understanding of financial products of the people are minimal in the country. The present study, therefore, investigates the scenario of FI along with awareness and understanding of financial products of commercial banks among Bhutanese in four Gewogs (Blocks) of the country that is, Bongo, Chapcha, Darla and Samphelling. The structured questionnaire was designed and primary data from 378 respondents were collected. Further, various articles and papers published in survey findings, magazines, and journal articles are used as secondary data sources of the study. The collected data have been tabulated, analysed, and interpreted with the help of Descriptive statistics, Independent t-test and Analyses of Variance (ANOVA).

scholarly journals Marketing of Financial Service: Evidence from Nigeria Financial Market

2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-46
Author(s):  
Lucky Anyike Lucky
Keyword(s):  
Financial Market ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Service Marketing ◽  
Distribution Channels ◽  
Financial Service ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Marketing Environment ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Growing Population

Nigeria financial market is emerging, the growth in institutions and products require a marketing strategy that will meet the needs of growing population. This study examined marketing of financial services. It discussed financial service products, segmentation of financial products, brands in financial market, financial service marketing environment, marketing of financial service through the internet, distribution channels of financial products, strength, weakness, opportunities and threat of Nigeria financial market, the needs for marketing of financial services, features of financial products and pricing of financial products. The study concludes that marketing of financial services is a determinant of financial inclusion, therefore policies and strategies should be advanced by management and regulators in the financial market.

scholarly journals Wykluczenie finansowe i integracja finansowa – aspekty terminologiczne

2018 ◽  
pp. 63-83
Author(s):  
Maria Czarnecka
Keyword(s):  
Financial Services ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Demand And Supply ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Sensitive Areas ◽  
Financial Exclusion ◽  
Use Of Services ◽  
Social Level

The aim of the article was to present the issue of financial exclusion and define sensitive areas of this phenomenon. The factors that may be relevant for measuring the degree of financial exclusion were analysed. An attempt was also made to determine the difficulties in access to financial services in the context of practices applied by both the supply and demand sides. In addition, barriers to the use of services were analysed as were financial products in terms of practices used by supply and demand. The typology of financial exclusion presented in the article is an attempt to define the type and scope of the phenomenon. Bank exclusion, credit exclusion and exclusion from the savings system are financial exclusion indicators. Each of those types of exclusion affects the economic and social level. Financial exclusion, which is one of the symptoms of the imbalance between demand and supply, is understood here as total or partial access to financial services offered by the market. The article also attempts to analyse the causes of exclusion with the division into supply and demand factors. The typology of financial exclusion proposed in the article may be a contributing factor to the reverse phenomenon, which is financial inclusion.

scholarly journals Revisiting the Impact of Mobile Banking in Financial Inclusion Among the Developing Countries

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 62
Author(s):  
Ummahani Akter ◽  
S. M. Rakibul Anwar ◽  
Riduanul Mustafa ◽  
Zulfiqure Ali
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Bandwidth Allocation ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Mobile Banking ◽  
Innovative Strategies ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
The Impact

Financial inclusion ensures financial products and services at reasonable rates for individuals and aims to introduce unbanked people into banking and financial services. The study aims to explore the effect that mobile banking facilities have on financial inclusion in 17 developing countries. From 2011 to 2017, this study took data from the three dimensions of financial inclusion called "Penetration," "Access," and "Uses". This paper took the Sarma model of Index of Financial Inclusion (IFI) to measure financial inclusion. This paper incorporates mobile money accounts as a "penetration" variable and Mobile banking outlet as an "Access" variable with existing model variables to quantify the effect of mobile banking. This research finds that mobile banking positively impacts the selected countries, though the degree of the changes is not symmetric. African regional countries have improved their financial inclusion after introducing mobile banking much better compared to other regions. This study is limited to examining mobile banking effects on selected emerging countries only. Future research may be devoted to developing more innovative strategies and tools to reach out to unbanked people, including people who face disparities in mobile phone ownership and bandwidth allocation.

scholarly journals The level of financial inclusion in Ukraine: Measuring access, quality, and usage of financial products and services

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-67
Author(s):  
Yuliia Shapoval ◽  
Andrii Shkliar ◽  
Oleksii Shpanel-Yukhta ◽  
Kateryna Gruber
Keyword(s):  
Financial Literacy ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Banking Sector ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Banking System ◽  
Financial Inclusion ◽  
Clear Understanding ◽  
Financial Products ◽  
Medium Level ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis

While financial inclusion is seen as a goal of socio-economic development, there is still no clear understanding of how to measure it. Following this concern, the paper deals with the computation of the financial inclusion index of the Ukrainian economy using an annual dataset spanning from 2008 to 2020 and following the Sarma methodology. The object of the study is a set of indicators of usage, access and quality of financial products and services. The obtained results demonstrate the medium level of financial inclusion. The improvement of financial inclusion is observed in 2012, 2013, 2020 (namely 0.55 – 0.56 in the range of 0 and 1). From 2015 (0.38) till 2018 (0.39), the revealed downward trend affirms that the withdrawal of banks from the market has deteriorated the level of quality and usage of financial products and services. Financial inclusion declined during the cleaning up of the banking system in 2014–2016, just as it did after the global financial crisis in 2009–2010. Despite the development of the payment infrastructure, there is a need to diversify access, increase quality, and quicken the usage of financial products and services due to existing distrust in national financial institutions. Improving financial literacy and consumer protection, and closing regulatory gaps in the non-banking sector are seen as ways to enhance financial inclusion. Thus, financial regulators should establish an upward trend in financial inclusion that will ensure full access to formal financial services and will not adversely affect the stability of financial system.

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