Sabrina Tharani
Analyst, Global Insights
Sabrina Tharani is an Analyst in the Global Insights group of MasterCard Worldwide. She is responsible for analyzing MasterCard and third-party research to support the development of market, consumer, and financial insights that can strengthen the performance of MasterCard and its customers worldwide. Ms. Tharani is based in Purchase, N.Y., and can be reached at sabrina_tharani@mastercard.com.
68 million people. 45 million social media accounts. 25 percent of U.S. households. $78 billion annual spend on financial services. These numbers represent the underbanked in the United States – those who are challenged financially, either due to a lack of access to financial services because of low or absent credit scores, or simply incomes
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Everyone in the world will have access to the Internet by 2020. At least that’s what Google’s Eric Schmidt thinks. “By the end of the decade” he says, “everyone on Earth will be connected.” The flurry of comments, tweets and columnist reactions to this declaration ranged from complete awe to complete anger. True, countries like
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The need for control seems to be driving news recently: Insights has explored the search for safety in the Bitcoin phenomenon and in eCommerce concerns. With U.S. consumer sentiment numbers at a nine-month low last month, it is no surprise that consumers are looking to regain a sense of power over both their spending strategies and
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A recent trip to Turkey put me in a trying situation: among hundreds of kebab stands and sweet baklava vendors, I had to decide if my craving to eat local outweighed the risk that comes with eating strange street food. Instinctively I walked away, but just 10 feet down, another small Turkish stand held the
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You hear the buzz about “showrooming” everywhere – I personally felt its silent presence at the NRF Show in January, and even at a small NYPAY Conference in Manhattan last month. Showrooming—or the idea that consumers use brick-and-mortar stores to examine merchandise and then purchase them online for less—is one of the biggest threats to
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Just eight short months after the Mobile Payments Readiness Index was released, the Global Insights team has already started to observe some markets making great strides on the path to widespread mobile payments adoption. South Korea in particular, which earned the sixth spot on the Index, has made significant progress in financial services and partnerships
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When talking about Gen Y consumers today, several significant themes are likely to emerge – like the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections, the rise and influence of social media and the inexplicable obsession with all things vampire. But there is one topic at the crux of all conversations – one that defined the tone of
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