The Money Awareness & Inclusion Awards Announce Global Winners - As Financial Literacy Becomes Ever More Important!
The MAIAs announced five winners from the USA, three from the UK, and many more from Kenya to Canada, Australia to El Salvador.
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM, May 29, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- As societies all over the world recognize the need for increasing financial education, the Money Awareness and Inclusion Awards is proud to announce the winners of the fifth annual MAIAs.
Said the MAIAs co-founder Michael Gilmore, “We've seen amazing growth since just last year, let alone our first ever awards in 2022. Total entries were up 12% on last year, but the improving quality meant we had 29% more finalists than last year, making selection of winners harder than ever. It's a great problem to have though, one our judges relished, and we are so happy to see the incredible work being done."
The MAIAs continues to find winners from all over the world. While the USA can celebrate more individual winners than any other country, five out of 17 total winners, the rest of the world was well represented too, from Kenya to Canada, Australia to El Salvador.
Kenya's KNEST program, helping self-employed workers and micro entrepreneurs understand and access pension schemes, won two categories, seeing off impressive competition in both non-profit categories for developing countries and underserved communities.
Three finalists became winners for the second time. Veronica Frisancho became a second-time winner of the Best Academic Paper prize looking at the long-term impacts of teaching about money in school. Daniel Ross's Financial Literacy Australia took the Best For Profit Project for Underserved Communities award for the second year running, while Braden Cobb's Kidz Economy returns to the winners' list after its 2024 success.
Elsewhere, an engaging interactive game put us in the loan shark's seat: NGPF's Shady Sam, which won best non-profit school-age education. By casting players as the predatory lender, the game teaches people to recognize those tactics in the real world. Best Book was won by Danish Khatri's "Ten Dollar Adventure", a choose-your-own adventure book that scored a unanimous win across all book judges (including the Library of Mistakes, which partnered on this prize).
The MAIAs, often referred to as "the Oscars of Financial Literacy" also awarded its first ever winner's award to a movie, "This Is Not Financial Advice", a documentary about the "modern gold rush" into speculative behavior driven by social media. At the opposite end of the spectrum, a project called "Second Chance Money Skills" by Texas A&M University, won the prize for Closing the Gender Gap by working with incarcerated women in Texas.
Other winners include:
- Munny Group from the UK, using AI to ensure that everyone can access a 1-on-1 money coach 24 hours a day, won Best Fintech
- Social Entrepreneurship Incubation by Fundacion Gloria Kriete is the MAIAs' first ever winner from El Salvador.
- Westbank, a group of high school students in Washington State, won Best Educator.
- The Best Adult Education prizes went to Credit Canada Gold’s Financial Coaching for non-profits, while the for-profit category was snagged by UK Savings Week, organised by the Building Society Association.
The MAIAs also announced winners for two categories that are often under-represented. RealXEducation by DigitLabs won best Blockchain Education Project, while Impact Investing Coffee Mornings Singapore won the Green Financial Literacy Prize. Scam Victim Alliance from Australia won the Best Anti-Scam project in just its second year.
"This really shows the range of ideas needed to help the world understand and handle money better," said Michael Gilmore. "From accessing pensions in Kenya to spotting loan-shark tactics in the USA, from movies to prison projects, and from the UK to El Salvador, MAIA winners are helping the world make money better."
Please visit ‘Winners 2026’ to view the complete list of award recipients, or watch the awards show video for more of the judge's comments on the winners.
About the MAIAs:
Founded by Michael Gilmore and Trudi Harris, the MAIAs were devised as the first global body aiming to solve the problem of weak financial literacy experienced all over the world, by finding and celebrating the best solutions aimed at ‘making money better’ for people. Contact michael@maiawards.org for more details
Michael Gilmore
The Money Awareness and Inclusion Awards
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MAIA Awards Show 2026
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