Kenya has made significant progress towards the realization of human development. Poverty rates at the national poverty line have declined from above 50 percent in the 1990s to below 40 percent in the 2020s, with significant improvement in welfare observed in both urban and rural areas. Innovative digital financial services have played an important role in improving welfare since their introduction in the mid-2000s. In particular, financial services offered through mobile money have had a transformative impact in increasing access to finance to previously excluded or underserved individuals, enabling immediate transfers and payments of money over long distances, increasing access to credit, and providing a secure savings instrument. This success has inspired the uptake of mobile money in many countries across the world. Today, there are over 1.6 billion registered mobile money accounts globally, carrying out over US$ 1.26 trillion in transactions annually.

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