Perceived mobile-money sufficiency and bank-based intermediation: Evidence from user-reported financial needs

This study examines whether mobile money is perceived as sufficient relative to a bank account using Global Findex 2024 microdata. It uses a new survey question that asks mobile money users whether their account meets all financial needs or whether they would still like to open a bank account. Based on more than 8,000 mobile money users across 33 economies, the analysis estimates country fixed-effects logit models with demographic, socioeconomic, digital-access, risk, and saving and borrowing behaviour, alongside heterogeneity by gender, rural-urban status, and income. About 59% of users report that mobile money is sufficient. Perceived mobile-money sufficiency is positively associated with being female, older, less-educated, and outside the workforce. By contrast, internet use, wrong-number transfer errors, fraud attempts, climate-shock exposure, and borrowing experience are negatively associated with perceived sufficiency. Saving through mobile money is one of the strongest positive correlates. The findings suggest that mobile money is more likely to be perceived as sufficient for selected banking functions, especially transfers, liquidity management, and basic saving, but less likely to be viewed as replacing the broader security, recourse, credit, and intermediation associated with formal banking.