The conversation around financial inclusion in Mexico is changing rapidly. It is no longer happening exclusively inside banks, financial apps, or traditional branches. Today, the real transformation is taking place in the most everyday — yet most powerful — moment of all: when someone tries to make a purchase.
Every checkout, every digital wallet, every installment payment option, and every successful delivery has become a new entry point into the financial system for millions of people across the region.
In our previous analysis, “The Shopping Cart as a Gateway to Financial Inclusion: What Hot Sale 2025 Is Telling the Financial Sector for 2026,” we explored how retail is consolidating itself as Mexico’s most powerful banking infrastructure and why Fintechs, retailers, and logistics operators need to work together to build the region’s new digital economy.
But the Hot Sale 2025 data also reveals something even deeper: the barriers that are still preventing that potential from fully materializing. Distrust, lack of access to payment methods, logistical challenges, and insufficient financing continue to leave millions of consumers with real purchase intent outside the system.
In this new environment, Fintechs, retailers, and logistics operators can no longer work independently. The next stage of growth for Latin America’s digital economy will depend on these industries’ ability to build integrated, accessible, and user-centric experiences.
Because the future of financial inclusion will not be defined solely within a financial institution. It will be defined in the shopping cart.
Let’s think about the implications:
1. Checkout is the new financial onboarding.
When a user makes their first payment with Mercado Pago during Hot Sale, they are not just buying a television — they are entering the financial system. Fintechs that understand this design products around the moment of purchase, not around the moment of account opening.
2. Access barriers can be solved through collaboration.
The 44% who did not participate due to “limitations and lack of access” includes people without cards, people who are afraid, and people without delivery logistics available in their area. No Fintech can solve this alone. No retailer can solve it alone. But together — through embedded finance products, in-store payment options for online purchases, and accessible BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) solutions — they can unlock this enormous volume of frustrated purchasing intent.
3. BNPL is the great enabler of higher average ticket sizes.
The study explicitly highlights financing tools and Buy Now, Pay Later as key drivers for increasing average purchase value in 2026. For retailers, this means more sales. For Fintechs, more financed users. For consumers, it means access to products that were previously out of immediate reach.
4. Trust is built at the point of sale.
The 17% who avoid purchasing due to fear and distrust will not be convinced by a marketing campaign. They will be convinced when a neighbor tells them their order arrived safely, that the return process was easy, and that their data was not stolen. Trust is built transaction by transaction — and retail is where that happens.
The Agenda FINNOSUMMIT 2026 Must Bring to the Table
The Hot Sale 2025 Pulse data allows us to define a concrete convergence agenda between the financial sector and retail.
Payments & Access
Omnichannel payments as the minimum standard.
Offering only debit and credit cards is no longer enough. Consumers demand wallets, BNPL, cash payments at retail chains, and installment payments without credit cards. Retailers that fail to offer these options are leaving sales on the table; Fintechs that fail to integrate into the retail ecosystem are missing the most efficient acquisition channel available.
Embedded financing throughout the customer journey.
Credit can no longer be something consumers apply for before shopping. It needs to appear precisely at the moment when a user is about to abandon their cart because the price exceeds their immediate budget.
Real Financial Inclusion
Wallets for the unbanked — not only for the already banked.
The success of Spin by Oxxo and Cashi is not a marketing accident. It is the result of understanding that financial inclusion requires physical access points, trusted community brands, and products that do not depend on traditional credit history requirements. What can the formal financial system learn from this model?
Logistics as a financial barrier.
The 26% who could not purchase more due to operational issues includes people without delivery services available in their area. Financial inclusion without logistics inclusion is incomplete. This is a space where retailers, Fintechs, and logistics operators must co-create solutions.
Trust & Security
Reducing friction without reducing security.
Fear of fraud and card cloning is real and legitimate. The industry’s response cannot simply be “trust us because we are formal institutions.” The answer must include biometric authentication, visible purchase protection, frictionless return processes, and proactive communication throughout every stage of the order journey.
An Invitation — Not Just a Conversation
At FINNOSUMMIT 2026, we believe the question is no longer whether the Fintech sector should collaborate with industries such as retail, insurance, and logistics. The real question is how to structure that collaboration so the benefits reach the millions of Latin Americans who have purchasing intent but still keep running into barriers.
Hot Sale 2025 showed us that those barriers are not made of concrete. They are made of distrust, lack of payment options, incomplete logistics, and inaccessible financing. And all of those barriers can be dismantled.
At FINNOSUMMIT 2026, we will bring together the builders capable of tearing them down: innovative Fintechs, retailers with massive reach, financial institutions with capital, and corporations with a vision for the future.
Because banking Latin America is not a philanthropic project. It is the largest untapped market in the Western Hemisphere — and retail is its gateway.
Does your company want to be part of this conversation?
FINNOSUMMIT 2026 is the place where Fintechs and retailers come together to build the business models that will define the next chapter of Latin America’s digital economy.