Between 2010, the first year the Barometer was published, and 2014, over 700 million people became bank account holders with a financial institution or users of a mobile money account, reducing the number of unbanked adults today to 2 billion. This is the conclusion of the World Bank’s new Global Findex survey, published in April 2015.

Even if the challenge remains huge, the progress made over the last 5 years has been substantial and microfinance has played an important role in this, especially amongst the most vulnerable populations, amongst women, in rural areas and in the least advanced countries.

The Global Findex also shows that digital finance and the implementation of new distribution channels using mobile and internet telecommunications are playing an increasingly important role in responding to the challenge of access for all to financial services. In this light, the 2015 Microfinance Barometer offers you an overview of this ongoing (r)evolution.