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Blockchain technology is disrupting the global financial system and may help increase access to essential financial services for approximately 1.4 billion adults who lack a financial account.1 As companies look to measure their social handprint — or their impact on society — quantifying the impact of their products and services on financial inclusion becomes important to address the changing technology landscape.
Our global financial inclusion framework introduces a structured methodology for financial service providers to use to help assess the ability of their solutions to foster financial inclusion. The framework enables businesses to measure gaps within existing financial solutions and identify strategic opportunities to help strengthen the capabilities of their offerings across four dimensions of financial inclusion:
For some financial solutions, blockchain networks may be a catalyst towards achieving a positive social handprint while also driving sustained business outcomes. In many cases, blockchains can be seamlessly integrated with traditional financial services to expand access to the digital economy. Our analysis of blockchain-powered solutions found that that blockchain technology demonstrated the ability to help fill in gaps of traditional solutions for financially underserved populations in the following ways:
Building off of our blockchain sustainability framework, which enables organizations to understand how blockchain can decarbonize their technology stack, our global financial inclusion framework enables businesses to measure the capabilities of their financial products and services against a structured set of parameters and metrics that contribute to financial inclusion. The financial inclusion framework’s assessment process consists of the following steps to help organizations identify and address opportunities to build more financially inclusive solutions:
Coupled with PwC’s ESG experience, both our global financial inclusion framework and blockchain sustainability framework can help financial services providers design for inclusion and track outcomes to improve their social handprint and measure business performance.
1. World Bank Group. (2021). Global Findex Database 2021. Retrieved August, 2023, from https://www.worldbank.org/en/publication/globalfindex/Data
2. The team took a sample of 12 applications operating in Colombia, Argentina, Kenya, and the Philippines for which transaction fees were publicly disclosed. Based on publicly available data and conversations with customer service operators, the companies possess 0-1% fees when evaluating cross-border remittances from deposit to withdrawal. This was compared to the World Bank’s “Remittance Prices Worldwide” database for sending $200 from the US to the respective countries using traditional finance institutions. Colombia possesses a fee of 3.5% ($7.08/$200), Kenya possesses a fee of 2.7% ($5.35/$200), and the Philippines possess a fee of 3.3% ($6.65/$200). No data was available for Argentina, therefore we assume Colombia can be a sufficient proxy. (Note: fees do not include network provider, bank, or foreign exchange fees)
PwC’s Global Artificial Intelligence Leader and US Trust Technology Leader, PwC US
David Linich
Sustainability Principal, PwC US
Gena Sullivan
Partner, PwC US
Kurt Fields
Director, Blockchain Lead, PwC Products and Technology, PwC US