Not missing a beat, the CEO of the telecom company, to the delight and sniggering of the crowd, responded by saying that telecom companies would allow banks to use their agent network the day the banks would allow them to set up kiosks in their branches to sell SIMs to bank customers. So when one of the participants asked why the commercial banks were not playing a greater role in financial inclusion and pursuing the lower end of the market, the bank CEO was quick to dish out their talking points, saying that the only way they could financially justify servicing the currently unbanked was if they were able to do it outside of the banks branches and leverage the agent networks and technology infrastructure (read USSD, more on that later) of the mobile telecom companies. What need do banks and telecom companies have to throw shade at each other? Well, the one point where the two find themselves in entanglement is achieving financial inclusion through branchless banking. Representatives from the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), including the then governor, World Bank officials, CEOs and presidents of leading commercial banks and telecom companies were all in attendance to talk about the progress towards achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in Pakistan.Īt one of the discussions, a casual but telling tiff emerged between the CEO of one of the largest banks in Pakistan and the CEO of a telco.
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In October 2017, the giants of Pakistan’s financial and policy scene met at the most expensive hotel in the federal capital for a conference on how best to help the country’s poor.