When the Platform Becomes the Bank: Embedded Finance, Artificial Intelligence, and the Politics of Inclusion in the Global South

Financial services across the Global South are being structurally reorganised. Embedded finance and artificial intelligence are dismantling the bank-as-destination model, inserting credit, payments and insurance into the ambient layer of digital commerce. Drawing on comparative evidence from Southeast Asia, Latin America and Africa, this article examines the structural drivers, regulatory architectures and investment implications of this transition. The central finding is that technology amplifies institutional quality: where governance is credible and public digital infrastructure is sound, embedded finance generates genuine inclusion; where it is absent, it deepens dependency.