Penetration of fintech applications in SEA to reach 84% in 2023

Fintech apps have increased their rate of penetration in Southeast Asia by 3.3 times over the last five years. In 2023, it is to grow by another 2 p.p. , as forecasted by the analytical centre of Robocash Group.

By the end of 2022, the total number of unique FinTech users in Southeast Asia reached 420.5 million people. This is a 3.5% (+14.4 million) increase compared to the year prior.

The penetration of fintech services in the region had experienced a significant boost. At the end of 2022, total penetration reached 81.8%, with the e-commerce sector holding the most weight at 56.6%.

By the end of 2023, the penetration rate of fintech users is expected to increase from 81.8% to 83.7%. That said, some changes are anticipated in their overall distribution in the SEA. The share of e-Commerce users may increase from 56.6% in December 2022 to 58.3% in December 2023. Meanwhile, the share of Digital Investments will decrease from 1.7% to 0.4%. Notably, strong growth awaits the Payments & Transfers sector – from 2.97% to 5.49%.

Robocash Group analysts comment: “It is worth noting that this is a market assessment under normal circumstances. In addition, the state and regulatory measures present an important factor affecting the fintech market in the SEA. However, the Southeast Asia fintech market remains one of the most dynamically developing in the world. The region continues to attract the attention of global players and investors, and this trend will continue in the coming years.”

*The analysis is based on data on the population aged 15+ in Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Cambodia, Philippines, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar, Brunei.

In total, 2442 mobile financial applications in Southeast Asia (IOS and Android) were analysed. The monthly data from 2018 to 2022 was collected from the data.ai service. The target indicator was the number of active users at the end of each month.