@article{202886,
  keywords = {Mobile Money, Interoperability, Financial Inclusion, Africa},
  author = {Markus Brunnermeier and Nicola Limodio and Lorenzo Spadavecchia},
  title = {Mobile Money, Interoperability, and Financial Inclusion},
  abstract = {<p>This paper explores the tradeoff between competition and financial inclusion given\&nbsp;by the vertical integration between mobile network and money operators. Joining\&nbsp;novel data on mobile money fees built through the WayBack machine, with sources\&nbsp;on network coverage and financials, we examine the staggering across African operators\&nbsp;and countries of\&nbsp; platform interoperability {\textendash} a policy that promotes transactions\&nbsp;and competition across mobile money operators. Our findings show that interoperability\&nbsp;lowers mobile money fees\&nbsp; and reduces network coverage and mobile towers,\&nbsp;especially in rural and poor districts. Interoperability also results in a decline in\&nbsp;various survey metrics of financial inclusion.</p>
},
}