Financial institutions process payments, check a potential borrower’s past experiences with credit and evaluate the suitability of a security interested to be used for a loan. Consumers pay bills, buy houses, and save for retirement – all of these formal financial transactions rely on a foundation of institutions, information, technologies, and rules and standards which enable financial intermediation. These underlying systems of financial infrastructure are analyzed in a new report "Financial Infrastructure: Building Access Through Transparent and Stable Financial Systems" drawing on efforts of the World Bank Group in payment and securities settlement systems, remittances, credit reporting, and secured transactions/collateral registries, with recommendations for reform to make the system more efficient and reliable reducing costs and increasing access to financial services. - Financial infrastructure touches at least every 5th person in emerging markets. Today, credit bureaus cover 390 million people, remittances over 700 million and payment systems 1 billion. In financial terms, bureaus support nearly $800 billion worth of credit and the value of remittances reached $328 billion in 2008.
- Efficient financial infrastructure allows for cost reductions of up to 75% or more in transactions costs for credit evaluations, collaterizing loans, remittances and payments.
- Improvements in financial infrastructure have the potential to enable access to financial services for half the population in emerging markets in the next 10 years.
| Related Content Event  Financial Infrastructure Week 2011: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, March 14-17, 2010.
Publication General Principles for Credit Reporting. (PDF) Financial Infrastructure: Building Access Through Transparent and Stable Financial Systems. (PDF) Press Release Our Work in Financial Infrastructure:
Web sites Collateral Registries / Secured Lending Corporate Governance Credit Bureaus Payment & Securities Settlement Systems Remittances |
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