The 2016 Financial Inclusion Insights team examined high-level numbers and dug deeper into the 2016 data, they identified several other important takeaways regarding the evolution of financial inclusion in Kenya:

Mobile money continues to lead other services at providing financial access and use cases, and is increasingly becoming a gateway to more advanced services, such as savings and credit, provided by banks that are linked to mobile money accounts on the backend. In 2016, mobile money access among adult Kenyans was 81 percent while bank access was only 31 percent. Similarly, 67 percent of adults were registered mobile money account holders while only 28 percent held accounts registered directly with a bank. Easy accessibility to mobile money points-of-service (PoS) relative to banking PoS locations has likely contributed to the success of mobile money. Almost 62 percent of Kenyans surveyed said they live within a kilometer of mobile money agents, while only 31 percent and 14 percent of Kenyan adults were within a kilometer of a banking agent and a bank branch, respectively.