Technology Adoption and Leapfrogging: Racing for Mobile Payments

• 成果类型: Article; Early Access
• 署名作者: Han, Pengfei; Wang, Zhu
• 署名单位: Peking University; Federal Reserve System - USA; Federal Reserve Bank - Richmond
• 刊物名称: MANAGEMENT SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0025-1909
• DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.2025.00781
• 发表日期: 2026
• 关键词: digital payments; FinTech; financial development

摘要

Mobile payments are reshaping the global payment landscape with some developing economies leapfrogging advanced economies in adoption. We build and estimate a dynamic model of sequential payment innovations-progressing from cash to card to mobile-to explain this pattern. The model matches cross-country payment technology adoption patterns and shows how advanced economies' early success in adopting card payments dampens subsequent mobile payment adoption. Extending the framework to a two-sided market with price coherence, we show that payment externalities justify policy intervention: Promoting mobile payment adoption and usage (e.g., via subsidies or price differentiation) enhances welfare, especially in developing economies.