Mongolia leapt from 2% to 58% paying utilities by phone
Adults 15+ who made a utility payment using a mobile phone, %, 2014 vs 2024.
- 1. Mexico, not China, now sells America the most goods
- 2. China's ASEAN trade is now almost double its US trade
- 3. Central banks now hold more gold than Treasuries or euros
- 4. China now pays the world mostly in yuan
- 5. Migrants now send home four times all foreign aid
- 6. Tether now holds more US Treasuries than the UAE
- 7. Developing countries' interest bill has nearly tripled since 2010
- 8. America's duty-free parcels grew almost tenfold in nine years
- 9. Poles edge past the Japanese in income per person
- 10. In dollars, Nigeria's economy has more than halved since 2014
- 11. Argentina's monthly inflation fell from 25.5% to 1.9%
- 12. Guyana now produces more per person than America
- 13. Mexico's factories now outproduce Britain's and France's
- 14. Ukraine received four times the aid of any other country
- 15. The UAE sold more goods abroad than France in 2025
- 16. Singapore now draws twice as much foreign investment as China
- 17. The EU now buys more US gas than Russian gas
- 18. Malaysia again sells more to America than to China
- 19. 22 governments now owe more than a year's national output
- 20. Brazil mines 93% of the world's niobium
- 21. More Vietnamese now work in industry than on farms
- 22. Money sent home to Guatemala nearly quadrupled in ten years
- 23. In purchasing power, Russia's economy is now bigger than Japan's
- 24. Indonesia set to use more palm oil than it exports
- 25. Factories now make more of Cambodia's economy than China's
- 26. China now buys more from Brazil than from Germany
- 27. Kazakhstan now sells Russia more than Germany does
- 28. China fell to third among America's suppliers in 2025
- 29. Colombians abroad now send home more than foreigners invest
- 30. 72 countries now pay China more than it lends them
- 31. Pakistan rose to first place in Chinese energy finance
- 32. America overtook China as Taiwan's biggest export market
- 33. Mongolia's coal exports hit a record 90 million tonnes
- 34. Viet Nam's ports now handle more containers than Japan's
- 35. Money sent home now tops half of Tajikistan's economy
- 36. Liberia overtook Panama as the biggest flag by ship capacity
- 37. Pakistan passed India in tech's share of services exports
- 38. Mongolia leapt from 2% to 58% paying utilities by phone
- 39. Smaller currencies' share of world reserves has more than doubled
- 40. Nickel made Indonesia the world's fifth-biggest iron and steel exporter
Mongolian adults paying a utility bill by phone: 2.0% in 2014, 57.7% in 2024.
Mongolia passed Kenya, the home of mobile money, between the 2017 and 2021 surveys and stayed ahead.
Mongolia's rate is four times the low- and middle-income average of 14.1%, and the highest of the 90 economies with 2024 data.
the numbers & method
| 2014 (%) | 2024 (%) | |
|---|---|---|
| Mongolia | 2.0 | 57.7 |
| Kenya | 18.6 | 49.1 |
| Kazakhstan | 0.2 | 43.1 |
| Brazil | 0.8 | 40.4 |
| Kyrgyz Republic | 0.0 | 38.6 |
| Thailand | 0.8 | 34.8 |
| Senegal | 0.9 | 32.2 |
| Uganda | 6.1 | 25.1 |
| Tanzania | 5.0 | 22.7 |
| Ghana | 1.6 | 16.9 |
| Low & middle income | 0.8 | 14.1 |
| India | 0.2 | 9.5 |
Claim types Fact · Estimate
World Bank Global Findex Database 2025 (survey waves 2014, 2017, 2021 and 2024), series fin31b 'Made a utility payment: using a mobile phone (% age 15+)', World Bank API source 28 (series last updated 14 Oct 2026); same values held in the progrss vault (source wb-more-databases, indicator WB.FDX.fin31b). Share of ALL adults 15+, not only of those who pay utility bills (the conditional series fin31b.s gives Mongolia 77.5% of bill payers in 2024). 2014 → 2024: Mongolia 1.96 → 57.70; Kenya 18.56 → 49.06; Kazakhstan 0.15 → 43.12; Brazil 0.80 → 40.45; Kyrgyz Republic 0 → 38.62; Thailand 0.78 → 34.81; Senegal 0.90 → 32.18; Uganda 6.07 → 25.11; Tanzania 5.01 → 22.69; Ghana 1.60 → 16.91; India 0.18 → 9.47; low- and middle-income economies 0.79 → 14.09. Mongolia by wave: 2014 2.0, 2017 10.7, 2021 32.6, 2024 57.7; Kenya 18.6, 37.1, 30.4, 49.1 (Mongolia first ahead in 2021). Derived by progrss: 57.70 ÷ 1.96 = 29.5×; 57.70 ÷ 14.09 = 4.1×; Mongolia ranks first of the 90 economies with a 2024 value for fin31b (Kenya second). The 2024 wave omits most high-income economies, so this is not a world ranking. China is not charted: it has no 2024 value for this series and its 2021 value is 0.0, which looks like a questionnaire break. Broader series fin26a 'Used a mobile phone or the internet to pay bills (% age 15+)', 2024 (no 2014 value): China 74.3, Poland 63.1, Ukraine 57.0, Mongolia 55.4, Kenya 55.0 of 98 economies, so on that measure Mongolia is fourth and level with Kenya; Mongolia's fin26a sits below its fin31b because the two come from different questions, so they are not nested. Rank claims on this plate are for fin31b (utility bills: water, electricity, trash) only. Survey estimates with sampling error. Licence: CC BY 4.0 (Findex series metadata 'License_Type: CC BY-4.0'; commercial use allowed with attribution 'World Bank, Global Findex Database').
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