Women’s World Banking Announces 2023 Fintech Innovation Challenge To Elevate Fintechs With New Solutions To Close The Gender Gap In Financial Services

Women’s World Banking has announced the 2023 Fintech Innovation Challenge, a global competition to highlight and advance solutions to close the gender gap through digital financial services. Now in its fourth year and the only women-centered fintechs competition, the Challenge will provide a platform for later stage fintechs working to address the persistent challenges in serving the low-income women’s market.

According to the latest Global Findex Report, the number of women adopting digital financial services has risen dramatically since 2017, with the gender gap dropping from 9 per cent to 6 per cent in key emerging markets. But despite these advances, 742 million women are still excluded from the formal financial sector, and women are 31 per cent more likely than men to have an inactive bank account.

Digital financial services can serve as an on-ramp for low-income women to adopt and use a large suite of formal financial products and services, expanding women’s choices and their financial and economic resilience and empowerment. Low-income women represent a large, untapped market opportunity for digital financial services providers, particularly fintechs leveraging technology to close the gender gap in financial services.

“To achieve the promise of inclusive growth for the global economy, women need equal access to financial products, services, skills and technology,” said President and CEO of Women’s World Banking, Mary Ellen Iskenderian. “Fintechs are uniquely positioned to help close the digital financial services gap because they have the ability to provide products and services differently and can efficiently meet the needs of low-income women in ways that traditional financial services providers can’t or won’t.”