In looking at ways to bring financial services to the more than two billion people outside formal financial systems, often the focus has been on piecemeal efforts to improve specific elements such as product design, pricing, delivery, banking regulation, or consumer protection. A new report by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and McKinsey and Company, however, declares that the time has arrived to consider an entirely new framework for providing financial services and payment systems thanks to the phenomenal spread of digital communications