Mobile banking poised to take off in Vietnam’s rural areas

Vietnam’s rural population is still struggling with access to basic financial services. With the high mobile penetration rate, can mobile phones be a platform to address their needs? Yap Far Loon, Business Development Director, Telecommunications at Spire Research and Consulting, shared his insights on the untapped potential for mobile financial services to serve Vietnam’s rural population in The Saigon Times Daily.

According to a Spire report, an astounding 60 million people in Vietnam do not have access to basic financial services. Only 22% of the population – predominantly those residing in urban areas – have access to financial services.

Why are the rural areas being left out? Yap opined that high costs are the main reason. For instance, the cost of installation, maintenance, operation and location rental for Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) alone exceeds VND300 million annually. Moreover, as rural transaction volumes are low, economies of scale are limited, making it even more expensive for the financial service provider.

But Vietnam’s high mobile penetration rate has created the possibility of another platform – mobile devices – for accessing financial services. According to the Ministry of Information and Communications Statistics for December 2013, Vietnam has approximately 150 million telephone subscribers – of which 93% of them are mobile phone users. This implies a mobile penetration rate of over 100%. The 3G network in the country covers up to 20 million subscribers.

Hence, it is high time for service providers to tap into this market. In May 2014, online mobile service company mService joined hands with Vietcombank and VinaPhone to launch a mobile money transaction service known as MoMo. The account number for this service is the same as the customer’s mobile phone number, making the application user-friendly.

If initiatives like this succeed, we can expect mobile e-banking, e-payments and e-commerce to take off among Vietnam’s huge rural population. But to make that happen requires a high level of co-operation amongst financial institutions, mobile network operators and mobile payment processors.

https://www.spireresearch.com/newsroom/media/mobile-banking-poised-to-take-off-in-vietnams-rural-areas/

Comments

How will policies affect the construction industry?

- Mr. Japnit Singh, Senior Director, Singapore and India, Spire Research and Consulting India, as the world’s seventh largest country by area and second biggest by population, is one of the most dynamically growing, but largely untapped construction equipment markets. From 2013 to 2020, it is estimated to grow six times to a size of USD20 billion to USD25 billion. The Planning Commission, Government of India, jointly with the Indian construction industry has set up Construction Industry Development Council (CIDC) to take up activities for the development of the Indian construction industry. The Council, for the first time in the country, provides the impetus and organizational infrastructure to raise quality levels across the industry. This helps to secure wider appreciation of the interests of construction business by the government, industry and peer groups in society. CIDC is a change agent to accelerate a process of self-reform that should enable the industry to

Spire talks about strategic planning lessons from leading organizations in ASEAN

Spire was honored to participate in a seminar organized by Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) on 15th July, in Singapore. Japnit Singh, Deputy CEO of Spire Group, shared his insights on strategic planning lessons from leading organizations in ASEAN. Japnit discussed five steps of strategic planning, strategic priorities and tools used by leading organizations in ASEAN. The strategic planning process can be seen as consisting of five steps, distributed amongst different departments in the organization. These steps are defining the vision, gathering and analyzing data, strategy creation, planning resources & outcomes and finally evaluation and monitoring. An organization should formulate an overall vision for the future, gather and analyze all the available data and also consider all the available critical items of information while monitoring and evaluating key performance indicators (KPI). For Singapore-based firms, ASEAN continues to be the most popular

Ghana citizenships to boost economy

In November 2019, 126 African-Americans and Afro-Caribbean’s were granted citizenship, in a ceremony that marks 2019 as the Year of Return. 500,000 tourists are expected to visit Ghana during the Year of Return, a considerable increase from the 380,000 that visited in 2018. Visa on arrival for some and waive off of Visa charges have been introduced. The government also plans to invest in educated returnees to help boost the economy through employment. Is investment in human capital the way to boost Ghana’s economy? Read more: https://www.spireresearch.com/newsroom/spirethoughts/ghana-citizenships-to-boost-economy/

Digital banking in Singapore

What will be the impact of digital banks in Singapore? Leon Perera, Chief Executive Officer of Spire Research and Consulting, shared his insights in Business Times – Singapore. More and more countries worldwide are issuing full bank licenses to digital-only banks. The competition from digital banks is being seen as a favorable development for the consumer. Digital banks with fewer physical branches and Automated Teller Machines to maintain could incur lower costs that could be passed onto the consumer. However, Perera highlighted that non-bank players entering the regulated banking space would need to learn a great deal in terms of maintaining cyber- security and managing financial risks. To overcome these challenges, regulators should work closely with licensed digital banks while also helping digital-only banks domiciled in Singapore to grow regionally. Get more information : https://www.spireresearch.com/newsroom/media/digital-banking-in-singapore/

Educated Indian students not employment-ready, holistic learning is key say teachers

In mid-2015, Spire Research and Consulting collaborated with global education service provider Pearson for the third time, to conduct a survey of 5,387 teachers in schools and higher education institutes across 527 cities and towns in India. Through this survey, teachers voiced their opinions on the employability of Indian students and shared their suggestions to improve the situation. The Pearson-Spire survey revealed that, in the view of teachers, nearly 57% of students are educated but unfit for employment. Such unemployable students are found to be the highest in Haryana at 67% and the lowest in Uttar Pradesh at 49%. Teachers felt that the solution lay in increasing collaboration between educational institutions, in particular for course restructuring (75%) as well as merit-based internships (48%) for students. Teachers also highlighted the need for industry-based training (44%). Approximately 66% of the respondents felt that technology adoption with inclusion of s

The Knowledge to Decide

Search This Blog