May 27, 2026
Building financial resilience: AXA's continuum
Strengthening the resilience of modest-income populations is essential to advancing global financial health. AXA has been actively contributing to closing the protection gap across both emerging and mature markets.
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AXA EssentiALL, AXA’s global inclusive insurance unit, partnered with CGAP, an action-oriented think tank focused on financial inclusion at the World Bank, to co-convene Insurance 4 ALL Day. The event, which featured a fireside chat with Her Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Financial Health, called on public and private sector leaders to champion inclusive policies and innovative partnerships, positioning insurance as a crucial tool for financial resilience.
Garance Wattez-Richard
CEO of AXA EssentiALL
Strengthening financial health is at the core of insurance. Vulnerability is not a situation; it is a risk. As prevention and protection risk experts, insurers have the legitimacy, experience and responsibility to contribute to global resilience and financial health.
Sophie Sirtaine
CGAP CEO & World Bank Group Global Director for Financial Services Sector
This co-convening took stock of one of the most pressing gaps in inclusive finance - inclusive insurance, and is a testament to what public-private collaboration can look like in practice: a shared commitment to putting insurance within the reach of those who need it most.
This event was also an opportunity to acknowledge AXA EssentiALL’s decade of commitment to inclusive insurance:
- As an Insurer: AXA is the only global insurer who strategically drives inclusive insurance across both emerging and mature markets, protecting over 20 million modest-income customers worldwide.
- As a Responsible Investor: As part of its commitment to financing community resilience, AXA reaffirmed its position as an anchor private sector investor in Quona Capital’s recent capital increase, in coalition with the European Investment Bank, Accion and other institutional partners. Through this partnership, AXA and its peers are mobilizing investment towards job creation, SME growth, women’s economic participation and expanded access to quality financial services for underserved people and enterprises in emerging markets.
- As a Thought Leader: AXA EssentiALL is collaborating with the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), a global research centre hosted at MIT, to foster independent insights and academic evidence on how inclusive insurance impacts people’s lives, their financial health, economic development, and poverty reduction. This collaboration resulted in a comprehensive literature review and the development of a joint research agenda, calling on the insurance industry to take action.
To better understand the impact of these initiatives, watch Customer Voices, a video series featuring authentic, self-recorded stories from modest-income clients around the world.
