The Global Findex Database is a demand-side survey on financial inclusion run by the World Bank every three years to track how adults around the world access and use financial services. The latest survey findings released in 2025 are based on information collected from 1.45 lakh adults across 141 countries.

In India, almost 90% of women have ownership to a formal bank account, as reported in the 2025 Findex findings. This is an improvement from the 78% women with a bank account, as revealed from the 2021 Findex data. Further, there has been a decline in the inactive accounts for Indian women — in 2021, 32% women had inactive accounts and, by 2025, this had fallen to 18%. Account ownership is an important step for advancing women’s economic status and can potentially facilitate access to formal-sector financial services. However, does increase in account ownership alone lead to increased access to and use of financial services and does it translate into financial outcomes that women seek in their lives?

One such outcome is increased financial resilience or the ability to absorb financial shocks such as income loss or health crises and recover from it. The Findex data reports positive news as more women can come up with emergency funds to meet financial distress compared to a decade back. But, almost 3 out 4 women........

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