Given their widespread presence in rural and poor areas, post offices can play a leading role in advancing financial inclusion. Yet little is known about the type of clients that post offices reach through their financial service offerings as compared with clients of traditional financial...

This paper compares the raising of external equity capital from private equity investors via private investments in public equity (PIPEs) and seasoned equity offerings (SEOs) using a sample of 456 PIPEs and 1,910 SEOs drawn from nine Asian countries. Consistent with the idea that insiders...

This paper documents and analyzes gender differences in the use of financial services using individual-level data from 98 developing countries. The data, drawn from the Global Financial Inclusion (Global Findex) database, highlight the existence of significant gender gaps in ownership of...

The Global Financial Inclusion (Global Findex) database, launched by the World Bank in 2011, provides comparable indicators showing how people around the world save, borrow, make payments, and manage risk. The 2014 edition of the database reveals that 62 percent of adults worldwide have an...

This paper reviews evidence on the benefits and challenges faced by governments migrating from cash to digital (electronic) government-to-person (G2P) payments. When supported by an appropriate consumer financial protection framework, digital payments enable confidential and convenient financial...

Why do some firms raise equity capital from a small number of "private” investors (e.g. Private Investment in Public Equities–PIPE), while other firms do so from a large number of small investors (e.g. Seasoned Equity Offering–SEO)? Recent studies list market timing, asymmetric...

Given their widespread presence in rural and poor areas, post offices can play a leading role in advancing financial inclusion. Yet little is known about the type of clients that post offices reach through their financial service offerings as compared with clients of traditional financial...

This paper compares the raising of external equity capital from private equity investors via private investments in public equity (PIPEs) and seasoned equity offerings (SEOs) using a sample of 456 PIPEs and 1,910 SEOs drawn from nine Asian countries. Consistent with the idea that insiders...

This paper summarizes financial inclusion across Africa. First, it provides a brief overview of the African financial sector landscape. Second, it uses the Global Financial Inclusion Indicators (Global Findex) database to characterize adults in Africa that use formal and informal financial...