so I run a research company and I spend
my days thinking about how to make our
financial lives better not just mine or
my families or my clients but the
financial lives of those people the
billions of people who don’t have access
to a bank account or any kind of savings
or any money management really and I’m
constantly frustrated that we don’t
understand the true value of doing
something as simple as going cashless we
don’t really appreciate the
possibilities that open up to us if we
got rid of our bank notes our coins of
physical wallets and purses and instead
use something really available to us on
a regular basis our mobile phones and
they talk about this to my friends
family clients who are bankers and
investors and governments I think don’t
get it they just don’t understand how an
individual person going cashless has the
power to change the world which is what
all of us want to do so I can explain
this in two ways I can explain this as
me a geeky researcher with insights
logic and data about the huge economic
benefits and the efficiency and the cost
savings we can get especially with banks
and governments but to me there’s a more
compelling way to explain this to them
it is the stories of comfort
inconvenience that can really help us
make sense of
huge phenomenon so the first story I’m
going to tell you is from a home country
India where my family lives that was
there a few weeks ago and I was with my
family and my sister was ordering food
for all of us so she was sitting there
on the bed with her baby in one hand and
she has her mobile phone on the other
hand which she always has with her it’s
like an extension of her and she’s
typing away while we are chatting about
what we would like to eat that day and
she’s done ordering our food and about a
couple of minutes so I was curious
I asked her what app did he use I didn’t
know we had apps in this tiny town in
the middle of nowhere and she said oh we
don’t have an app I just used what’s up
I don’t know if anyone in this room has
ever used whatsapp to order food but
it’s a completely new concept to me I
didn’t get it I asked her what did you
do on what sir to offer your food and
she showed me this so here she is
chatting with the restaurant talking
about the food she would like to have
where she would like to have it ordered
the whole thing is done in about three
minutes by the way very quick but the
most fascinating thing to me here is
that she has moved money from her mobile
virtual wallet into the virtual wallet
of the restaurant now we need to think
about it again there’s no cash involved
and not just that there’s no physical
transaction at all there’s no credit
card no debit card there’s no money
going through the wires it’s a pure
subtraction and addition it’s pure
mathematics it’s completely virtual and
this is a powerful concept if you think
about it and India is a really
fascinating example of what happens when
a country goes cassius it has about 1.2
billion mobile phones in the country
about 220 million smart
phones and technology is readily
available to do these kind of stuff and
one fine evening in November the
government decided that they would
devalue two of the largest currency
denominations in the country so people
had a choice they could either get the
new currency by standing in lines for
hours or days in front of banks branches
and cash machines or instead they could
download this mobile wallet and make
transactions right away so the largest
brand of mobile wallet in the country
had 20 million customers before this
happened and in one day they had the
next day they had 56 million customers
so that’s what we are talking about true
transformation and all the people who
took mobile wallets today they don’t use
cash anymore okay there’s no need to and
I come from a beach town and I hear now
that the fishermen who go out fishing in
the early hours of the morning start
selling their fish them even before they
reach the shore they start using mobile
phones whose coverage extends all the
way into the sea to sell the fish get
the payments and the fish is given away
the moment you arrive on the beach so
that’s fresh fish for you right there
India is a great example of how
technology and the consumers and the
government have been together willing to
accept going cashless as a strategy and
it’s worked really well for them and the
convenience store is just one side of it
there are millions of people have
benefited who have never had bank
accounts who can make transactions today
now the next story I’m going to tell you
is about a small agricultural town in
Colombia called
concepción a small town about 4,500
people and one of the biggest problems
in conception
crying people had to travel by bus from
concepción to Medellin the next largest
city in Colombia to buy the supplies for
education for different needs but they
would be armed robberies on the way if
you’re carrying cash it’s most likely to
be taken away so they had a real problem
they couldn’t walk into a cash machine
and withdraw cash safely that so the
government decided that we’re going to
try a pilot program of going cashless so
what they did was they took a bottom-up
approach they did not get rid of cash
machines and credit cards and debit
cards in one day but instead they
converted the cash machines into points
where you could load your mobile wallets
where you could learn how to make mobile
transactions and you could actually
transfer money virtually to your friends
family and businesses and they ran
training programs in schools so it was a
very gradual approach with the help of
the leading banks in that town and a
mobile operator of course Davi Plata who
all came together to make this happen
this happened three years ago and today
90% of businesses in concepción handle
only digital transactions crime has come
down to the point which has never been
seen before in the history of conception
and this program is now being piloted
across Colombia then now people are not
worried about taking that bus right to
Medellin for their regular needs all
they need to do is load money into the
virtual wallet get on the bus once they
get too many they can use the money from
the wallet download it as cash if they
wanted to but they don’t need to it’s a
fascinating story if you look at it and
the third story I’m gonna tell you is
about a lastly cash free country today’s
Sweden I used to live in Sweden
a long time ago and I had this huge
stash of currency coins and no notes
from that time which I never used and
when I went back a couple of years ago
to meet my friends and colleagues
I took the stash with me because I
really wanted to get rid of them but you
know what I still have that stashed with
me because they refuse to accept cash so
the cafe is like this they have signs
saying we are completely cash free we
don’t take cash anymore and the coins I
had with me they completely devalued
they don’t exist anymore there are no
more coins in Sweden so Sweden today has
about two percent of the economic value
in cash based transactions in fact I was
told that if you walk in a cash machine
and withdraw a large sum of money the
police are called on you because why
would you want cash unless you’re a
criminal so with just 2 percent of the
transactions in cash today they’re going
to be completely cash free in about five
years
so it became a fascinating example of
what’s happening in different parts of
the world and the UK is a strange
situation that way in that we all have
smartphones we love technology Londoners
and other cities in the UK are really
great technological hubs for developing
new technology for taking it to market
for consumers willing to test it but for
some reason we are still cash based in
that 50% of the transactions happening
in the UK are made with cash if you’re
not using cash we are using credit cards
and debit cards and the new innovative
technology like contactless cards and
Oyster cult’s but we are so far away
from the virtual wallet concept today
and the Bank of England interestingly is
having a debate about how to manufacture
the new 20-pound notes they’re
considering various options and there’s
a whole lot of debate going on about the
manufacturing process so we need to
remember the cost of cash right so if
the cost of cash includes the cost of
printing notes manufacturing them
discussions like this and the security
around transportation the whole cost of
transporting money from the bank to bank
the government to banks and small
businesses having to carry cash at the
end of the day the untaxed wealth for
example Sweden found that they had eight
billion dollars of untaxed wealth that
could come back to them if they were in
cashless so that was one of the primary
drivers for them so in the UK that
opportunity is there but for some reason
it is heavily and firmly a cash based
society and culture now why are some
countries really good at and some
countries struggling with it
so I use a framework to understand this
so there are two axis I look at so on
one hand you have the consumer
acceptance score which tells you whether
the consumer is or the population are
willing to accept and try out new
technologies this includes the use of
smartphones internet the propensity for
shopping online and on the other hand
you have the digital business evolution
score which tells you if you as a
consumer is supported by businesses and
the government to actually go cash free
so this includes the government policies
the regulations and of course
infrastructure available to the
businesses like point-of-sale machines
you could be on a virgin’ train and you
cannot buy food or drinks on it
there’s no point of sale machine on a
train so it’s a combination of these two
factors in my opinion that drives a
cashless society and you can see some of
the countries I spoke about India Sweden
Mexico Colombia Kenya and Nigeria and
Turkey as a country is in fact one of
the best examples of her population
willing to accept and use digital
technologies and for some reason the
second country is Somaliland I haven’t
figured out why and you can see that the
UK’s not too bad with the consumer
acceptance but we are still struggling
on the the government side but we also
need to remember that the journey is
that concepción took and Sweden took
they do have certain problems as well so
there are two paths you can take to go
cashless so the pub that conceptual took
and Sweden is taking is very much a
linear part in that they converted cash
to credit cards and then debit cards
digital payment apps PayPal things like
that and then ultimately they launched
an app in Sweden they call it swish so
it’s a very very linear journey that we
have seen with these two countries but
if you look at the other part that India
has taken and other countries in Africa
like Kenya Nigeria etcetera they have
taken in the exponential path which
means they have completely gone around
the cycle of credit cards and debit
cards or any physical device for
transformation and they have gone from
cash to virtual wallets almost directly
and as you can see that is highly
disruptive that mode will help you
achieve cash listeners in a much much
faster way and notice that this actually
creates an ecosystem so this will sit
within the ecosystem of mobile networks
the identity
program of the country the welfare
program the corporate incentives program
so it actually creates an ecosystem the
moment your virtual and one of the best
things that can happen is that we can
provide basic services healthcare
education through this ecosystem which
has created banking opportunities and I
could say banking but it’s actually
financial movement opportunities for
people in India and Africa that’s about
80 percent of the population of the
individual countries to access those
services without ever having a bank
account that’s truly transformational so
going cashless has the power to
transform our lives and and the economy
and the world
imagine a world where he used really
available physical devices your mobile
phone your household appliances to make
the transactions almost invisible for
you you don’t even think about the
payment you’re making for example you’d
be walking on the street and it starts
raining and it you bus stops right there
for you or your washing machine realizes
that your washing powder is finished and
it orders it for you from Amazon it’s
happening right now or you are a busy
working mother or on a treadmill and you
can order your groceries while you are
doing two things at once us as busy
working mothers always – or you could be
a government having billions of dollars
in excess cash available to spend on
health universities hospitals schools
welfare aid development and imagine a
world where small business owners know
exactly how much cash they have at any
given point of time and that money is
already in their bank account and
imagine that world where children
learned that cash is not the most
important thing there are much better
ways to
deal with life on a day-to-day basis
which is already happening so the next
time you take out your physical wallet
or purse I employee you stop have a
think and think about whether you can
make the same transaction with your
mobile phone thank you
[Applause]
my days thinking about how to make our
financial lives better not just mine or
my families or my clients but the
financial lives of those people the
billions of people who don’t have access
to a bank account or any kind of savings
or any money management really and I’m
constantly frustrated that we don’t
understand the true value of doing
something as simple as going cashless we
don’t really appreciate the
possibilities that open up to us if we
got rid of our bank notes our coins of
physical wallets and purses and instead
use something really available to us on
a regular basis our mobile phones and
they talk about this to my friends
family clients who are bankers and
investors and governments I think don’t
get it they just don’t understand how an
individual person going cashless has the
power to change the world which is what
all of us want to do so I can explain
this in two ways I can explain this as
me a geeky researcher with insights
logic and data about the huge economic
benefits and the efficiency and the cost
savings we can get especially with banks
and governments but to me there’s a more
compelling way to explain this to them
it is the stories of comfort
inconvenience that can really help us
make sense of
huge phenomenon so the first story I’m
going to tell you is from a home country
India where my family lives that was
there a few weeks ago and I was with my
family and my sister was ordering food
for all of us so she was sitting there
on the bed with her baby in one hand and
she has her mobile phone on the other
hand which she always has with her it’s
like an extension of her and she’s
typing away while we are chatting about
what we would like to eat that day and
she’s done ordering our food and about a
couple of minutes so I was curious
I asked her what app did he use I didn’t
know we had apps in this tiny town in
the middle of nowhere and she said oh we
don’t have an app I just used what’s up
I don’t know if anyone in this room has
ever used whatsapp to order food but
it’s a completely new concept to me I
didn’t get it I asked her what did you
do on what sir to offer your food and
she showed me this so here she is
chatting with the restaurant talking
about the food she would like to have
where she would like to have it ordered
the whole thing is done in about three
minutes by the way very quick but the
most fascinating thing to me here is
that she has moved money from her mobile
virtual wallet into the virtual wallet
of the restaurant now we need to think
about it again there’s no cash involved
and not just that there’s no physical
transaction at all there’s no credit
card no debit card there’s no money
going through the wires it’s a pure
subtraction and addition it’s pure
mathematics it’s completely virtual and
this is a powerful concept if you think
about it and India is a really
fascinating example of what happens when
a country goes cassius it has about 1.2
billion mobile phones in the country
about 220 million smart
phones and technology is readily
available to do these kind of stuff and
one fine evening in November the
government decided that they would
devalue two of the largest currency
denominations in the country so people
had a choice they could either get the
new currency by standing in lines for
hours or days in front of banks branches
and cash machines or instead they could
download this mobile wallet and make
transactions right away so the largest
brand of mobile wallet in the country
had 20 million customers before this
happened and in one day they had the
next day they had 56 million customers
so that’s what we are talking about true
transformation and all the people who
took mobile wallets today they don’t use
cash anymore okay there’s no need to and
I come from a beach town and I hear now
that the fishermen who go out fishing in
the early hours of the morning start
selling their fish them even before they
reach the shore they start using mobile
phones whose coverage extends all the
way into the sea to sell the fish get
the payments and the fish is given away
the moment you arrive on the beach so
that’s fresh fish for you right there
India is a great example of how
technology and the consumers and the
government have been together willing to
accept going cashless as a strategy and
it’s worked really well for them and the
convenience store is just one side of it
there are millions of people have
benefited who have never had bank
accounts who can make transactions today
now the next story I’m going to tell you
is about a small agricultural town in
Colombia called
concepción a small town about 4,500
people and one of the biggest problems
in conception
crying people had to travel by bus from
concepción to Medellin the next largest
city in Colombia to buy the supplies for
education for different needs but they
would be armed robberies on the way if
you’re carrying cash it’s most likely to
be taken away so they had a real problem
they couldn’t walk into a cash machine
and withdraw cash safely that so the
government decided that we’re going to
try a pilot program of going cashless so
what they did was they took a bottom-up
approach they did not get rid of cash
machines and credit cards and debit
cards in one day but instead they
converted the cash machines into points
where you could load your mobile wallets
where you could learn how to make mobile
transactions and you could actually
transfer money virtually to your friends
family and businesses and they ran
training programs in schools so it was a
very gradual approach with the help of
the leading banks in that town and a
mobile operator of course Davi Plata who
all came together to make this happen
this happened three years ago and today
90% of businesses in concepción handle
only digital transactions crime has come
down to the point which has never been
seen before in the history of conception
and this program is now being piloted
across Colombia then now people are not
worried about taking that bus right to
Medellin for their regular needs all
they need to do is load money into the
virtual wallet get on the bus once they
get too many they can use the money from
the wallet download it as cash if they
wanted to but they don’t need to it’s a
fascinating story if you look at it and
the third story I’m gonna tell you is
about a lastly cash free country today’s
Sweden I used to live in Sweden
a long time ago and I had this huge
stash of currency coins and no notes
from that time which I never used and
when I went back a couple of years ago
to meet my friends and colleagues
I took the stash with me because I
really wanted to get rid of them but you
know what I still have that stashed with
me because they refuse to accept cash so
the cafe is like this they have signs
saying we are completely cash free we
don’t take cash anymore and the coins I
had with me they completely devalued
they don’t exist anymore there are no
more coins in Sweden so Sweden today has
about two percent of the economic value
in cash based transactions in fact I was
told that if you walk in a cash machine
and withdraw a large sum of money the
police are called on you because why
would you want cash unless you’re a
criminal so with just 2 percent of the
transactions in cash today they’re going
to be completely cash free in about five
years
so it became a fascinating example of
what’s happening in different parts of
the world and the UK is a strange
situation that way in that we all have
smartphones we love technology Londoners
and other cities in the UK are really
great technological hubs for developing
new technology for taking it to market
for consumers willing to test it but for
some reason we are still cash based in
that 50% of the transactions happening
in the UK are made with cash if you’re
not using cash we are using credit cards
and debit cards and the new innovative
technology like contactless cards and
Oyster cult’s but we are so far away
from the virtual wallet concept today
and the Bank of England interestingly is
having a debate about how to manufacture
the new 20-pound notes they’re
considering various options and there’s
a whole lot of debate going on about the
manufacturing process so we need to
remember the cost of cash right so if
the cost of cash includes the cost of
printing notes manufacturing them
discussions like this and the security
around transportation the whole cost of
transporting money from the bank to bank
the government to banks and small
businesses having to carry cash at the
end of the day the untaxed wealth for
example Sweden found that they had eight
billion dollars of untaxed wealth that
could come back to them if they were in
cashless so that was one of the primary
drivers for them so in the UK that
opportunity is there but for some reason
it is heavily and firmly a cash based
society and culture now why are some
countries really good at and some
countries struggling with it
so I use a framework to understand this
so there are two axis I look at so on
one hand you have the consumer
acceptance score which tells you whether
the consumer is or the population are
willing to accept and try out new
technologies this includes the use of
smartphones internet the propensity for
shopping online and on the other hand
you have the digital business evolution
score which tells you if you as a
consumer is supported by businesses and
the government to actually go cash free
so this includes the government policies
the regulations and of course
infrastructure available to the
businesses like point-of-sale machines
you could be on a virgin’ train and you
cannot buy food or drinks on it
there’s no point of sale machine on a
train so it’s a combination of these two
factors in my opinion that drives a
cashless society and you can see some of
the countries I spoke about India Sweden
Mexico Colombia Kenya and Nigeria and
Turkey as a country is in fact one of
the best examples of her population
willing to accept and use digital
technologies and for some reason the
second country is Somaliland I haven’t
figured out why and you can see that the
UK’s not too bad with the consumer
acceptance but we are still struggling
on the the government side but we also
need to remember that the journey is
that concepción took and Sweden took
they do have certain problems as well so
there are two paths you can take to go
cashless so the pub that conceptual took
and Sweden is taking is very much a
linear part in that they converted cash
to credit cards and then debit cards
digital payment apps PayPal things like
that and then ultimately they launched
an app in Sweden they call it swish so
it’s a very very linear journey that we
have seen with these two countries but
if you look at the other part that India
has taken and other countries in Africa
like Kenya Nigeria etcetera they have
taken in the exponential path which
means they have completely gone around
the cycle of credit cards and debit
cards or any physical device for
transformation and they have gone from
cash to virtual wallets almost directly
and as you can see that is highly
disruptive that mode will help you
achieve cash listeners in a much much
faster way and notice that this actually
creates an ecosystem so this will sit
within the ecosystem of mobile networks
the identity
program of the country the welfare
program the corporate incentives program
so it actually creates an ecosystem the
moment your virtual and one of the best
things that can happen is that we can
provide basic services healthcare
education through this ecosystem which
has created banking opportunities and I
could say banking but it’s actually
financial movement opportunities for
people in India and Africa that’s about
80 percent of the population of the
individual countries to access those
services without ever having a bank
account that’s truly transformational so
going cashless has the power to
transform our lives and and the economy
and the world
imagine a world where he used really
available physical devices your mobile
phone your household appliances to make
the transactions almost invisible for
you you don’t even think about the
payment you’re making for example you’d
be walking on the street and it starts
raining and it you bus stops right there
for you or your washing machine realizes
that your washing powder is finished and
it orders it for you from Amazon it’s
happening right now or you are a busy
working mother or on a treadmill and you
can order your groceries while you are
doing two things at once us as busy
working mothers always – or you could be
a government having billions of dollars
in excess cash available to spend on
health universities hospitals schools
welfare aid development and imagine a
world where small business owners know
exactly how much cash they have at any
given point of time and that money is
already in their bank account and
imagine that world where children
learned that cash is not the most
important thing there are much better
ways to
deal with life on a day-to-day basis
which is already happening so the next
time you take out your physical wallet
or purse I employee you stop have a
think and think about whether you can
make the same transaction with your
mobile phone thank you
[Applause]
Please follow and like us: