Financial Gap and Investment Barriers

In today's world, access to financial services remains a far-reaching challenge.

The traditional centralized financial system, constrained by geography, identity, policies, credit systems, and high costs, inherently excludes a large number of the "unbanked" or "underbanked."

According to World Bank data from 2024, approximately 1.3 billion adults worldwide (21% of the adult population) still lack access to basic banking services, such as deposit accounts, credit, and insurance. This situation is particularly severe in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, where over 40% of the rural population is completely outside the formal financial system.

Even more prominent are the high barriers to cross-border payments and investments:

🌐 The average cross-border remittance fee is as high as 6.2%, exceeding 12% in some low- and middle-income countries.

💰 Stocks of top global companies (such as US stocks) present multiple obstacles for investors in developing countries, including account opening, capital outflow, and tax filing.

📉 The traditional credit rating system excludes approximately 3.5 billion "financially invisible individuals" who lack a credit history, exacerbating wealth inequality and class stratification.

The combined effect of this lack of basic financial services and barriers to investment in core global assets has further exacerbated the inequality in global wealth distribution.