HONGKONG- The GSMA today issued the initial findings of its 2013 Mobile Money Adoption Survey. The report underscores the critical role of mobile and mobile network operators (MNOs) in driving the adoption of convenient and affordable financial services among unbanked and under-banked individuals around the world. According to the survey, there are now 208 live mobile money for the unbanked services in 83 countries, compared to 178 in 74 countries as of January, and an additional 117 deployments are planned over the coming months.
“The impressive and encouraging results of the study demonstrate that mobile money services are increasingly reaching scale and are becoming even more essential in providing convenient and affordable financial services to the underserved,” said Chris Locke, Managing Director, GSMA Mobile for Development. “This survey offers an important snapshot of the mobile money industry today and also gives mobile money service providers a valuable source of benchmark data. Through our Mobile Money for the Unbanked programme, the GSMA is committed to facilitating the widespread adoption of mobile money services by identifying and sharing operational best practices, as well as working with operators to create commercially viable, interoperable mobile money services to enable greater financial inclusion.”
One point that is clearly illustrated in the survey is the increasingly competitive landscape for mobile money services. Globally, mobile money services were launched in nine markets in 2013 and the majority of these launches were in markets where mobile money services already existed. There are now at least two or more mobile money services available in 51 markets, compared to 40 markets at the end of 2012 and 33 at the end of 2011. Further, 24 of these markets each have three or more mobile money services, offering even greater choice to consumers. Mobile money is now becoming a mainstream service for MNOs rather than a differentiator; this is especially true in Sub-Saharan Africa, which boasts 53 per cent of all live mobile money services and where services are available in 36 out of 47 countries in the region.
The Adoption Survey gives insights into the development of mobile money services globally and shows specifically how mobile money is enabling the financial inclusion of unbanked and under-banked people. The findings show that the adoption of mobile money services by customers is rising and that an increasing number of services are reaching scale. The GSMA has identified three mobile money services that each exceeded 1 million active users between June 2012 and June 2013 and globally, there are at least nine services that currently have more than 1 million active users.
The full results from the 2013 Mobile Money Adoption Survey will be published at the GSMA Mobile World Congress 2014 in Barcelona.
