KARACHI: Banking and technology executives gathered in Karachi this week for the Future Banking Forum Karachi 2026, where speakers argued that artificial intelligence offers Pakistan's best chance at meaningful financial inclusion for its young, fast-growing population.
The forum, held at a local hotel, brought together chief banking, technology and risk officers to discuss the digital transformation of Pakistan's financial sector. Speakers said AI adoption is not optional for a country of roughly 250 million people with a median age of 23, framing the technology as central to both expanding access to banking services and advancing the country's broader development goals.
In a message to the forum, Pakistani-Saudi entrepreneur Muhammad Ghazali Aqeeq said he was optimistic that Pakistan's financial sector could make major advances given the country's capabilities in artificial intelligence.
Arif Siddique Khokhar, federated GRC advisor at TransVare Corporation, led a session on the digital transformation of audit, governance, risk and compliance functions in banking. He demonstrated the TransVare Federated GRC Platform, which links audit, risk, controls, compliance, incident-tracking and remediation processes within a single, traceable system.
The presentation also outlined secure and private AI tools designed to help banking teams draw faster insights from audit, governance and risk data while maintaining data control, governance standards and professional accountability, according to the forum.
Speakers pointed to AuditVare as an example of a solution built for internal audit functions in an AI-enabled era in Pakistan's financial sector. Its features include risk-based audit planning, workflow-driven audit engagements, evidence management, observation tracking, remediation follow-up and executive reporting. Combined with AI-generated insights, organizers said the platform is intended to help internal audit teams strengthen assurance work and give bank boards more timely visibility into risk.
Kashif Alam Khan, president of ISACA Karachi, along with members of the ISACA Karachi board, and Abdul Qadir, executive director of PwC's Technology and Cyber Risk practice, were among senior industry figures who voiced confidence in the growing role of AI-enabled internal audit within Pakistan's banking industry.
Pakistan's banking sector has undergone rapid change over the past decade under successive national strategies aimed at expanding access to formal financial services. Pakistan's financial sector was relatively well-regulated compared to other South Asian countries by 2011, but access to formal financial services remained among the lowest in the region at that time.
Only 16% of Pakistani adults had a bank account in 2015, but that figure rose to 64% by 2023 following two consecutive National Financial Inclusion Strategies implemented by the State Bank of Pakistan.
The central bank's third such strategy, covering 2024-28, aims to push account ownership to 75% and narrow the gender gap in account ownership to 25% by 2028. Despite the gains, disparities persist: only 14% of women had full-service financial accounts compared with 56% of men, and mobile phone ownership stood at 46% among women versus 82% among men in 2024.
More recent data suggest gaps remain even among account holders. As of December 2024, the State Bank of Pakistan reported nearly 96 million unique bank account holders, covering about 73% of the adult population. However, a national survey of nearly 6,722 adults found that only 35% considered themselves financially included, with just 14% of women reporting the same. The survey also found that roughly 9.5 trillion rupees remains outside the banking system in cash form, reflecting a continued preference for informal transactions.
Pakistan launched Raast, its instant digital payment system enabling real-time transfers, in 2021, part of a broader push toward digital financial infrastructure. The country's demographic profile, one of the youngest and fastest-growing populations in the world, has been cited repeatedly by policymakers and industry groups as both an opportunity and an urgency for expanding digital and AI-driven financial services.
