FAI Hires Interim Director

FAI is excited to announce Timothy Ogden has joined as Interim Director. Many of you know Tim from his involvement in microfinance, social entrepreneurship, philanthropy as a prolific blogger for Philanthropy Action, Stanford Social Innovation Review and Harvard Business Review and, of course, for FAI. Others know him as a cofounder of Sona Partners and his work developing more than a dozen business books and other thought leadership publications. What you may not know about him is that he's held titles from "Laborer" in construction to "Research Associate" in the IT industry to "Chief Knowledge Officer" of a philanthropy advisory firm. Suffice it to say that he’s a true renaissance man and we’re thrilled that he has joined us!

Tim will help FAI continue to push forward with our research agenda, launch our forthcoming portal on savings and other areas of financials services, cultivate our relationships and partnerships with others in the field and help set our sights on the future. You'll be seeing Tim's handiwork on the blog more often and well as in several forthcoming focus notes and a couple of books over the next year.

October 13, 2026

Financial Access Initiative

The Swarm Edition

Editor’s Note: I’m going to assume that you are seeing plenty of AI content (news and papers, not AI slop, though I’m sure you’re getting plenty of that too) from other sources, so I’m trying to think hard about the marginal value that the faiV can provide. As far as I’ve gotten so far: a) make sure that directly AI-related content does not take up more than 2 of the 5 items, and b) try to focus specifically on the cybersecurity issue for financial inclusion. Beyond that, I’m open to feedback on the value you get from the faiV in relation to AI to help guide us in the future. On a different note, I’ll be making a brief cameo appearance at the e-MFP Inclusive Finance Conference to moderate the opening plenary. If you haven’t registered, do so and I hope to see you there! - Tim Ogden

October 6, 2026

Laura Freschi

Rereading Michael Kremer

Ten years ago, FAI managing director Tim Ogden published Experimental Conversations, a collection of interviews with economists and other people who critique, promote, and use randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in development economics. One of the interviewees was Michael Kremer, a pioneer of the movement, now a Nobel laureate, and recently appointed Chief Economist of the World Bank.

August 13, 2026

The Massive DDoS Edition

Editor's Note:

If you were hoping that the faiV would be a pleasant distraction from the overwhelming flow of AI-related content, sorry. For the record, the faiV had “ai” built in before Anthropic existed. And a housekeeping note: we’ve finally jumped ship from Mailchimp to NYU’s mailing platform—I guess if you’re reading this it’s been a seamless transition and if you’re not, well, you’re not. Feedback on the faiV’s content and format and delivery methods is always welcome, just drop me an email.

- Tim Ogden

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