Podcast
Buying a car, a house or a cryptocurrency has never been easier: with a simple click, digital banking has made financial operations accessible to everyone. But, while Fintech has become widespread, financial literacy does not seem to keep up the pace. This week Maria Demertzis and Nicholas Barrett are joined by Annamaria Lusardi, Denit Trust Endowed Chair of Economics and Accountancy from George Washington University School of Business to discuss financial literacy.
Past Event
How to ensure the safe use of digital payments and other technological innovations in the area of personal finance?
Past Event
Today banks are facing competition from non-bank firms whose core strategy is based on technological innovation - Big Tech and Fin Tech. What is in store for the future of banking?
Opinion
FinTech and Big Tech firms are both increasingly stepping on banks’ traditional turf. This column introduces the 22nd Geneva Report on the World Economy, which looks at the challenges generated by new technology-enabled entrants to the global banking industry and the public authorities that oversee it. It argues that to respond adequately to the FinTech/Big Tech challenge, authorities will need to raise their game and enter uncharted territories.
Policy Contribution
What is the economic potential and the risks of crypto assets? Regulators and supervisors have taken great interest in these new markets. This Policy Contribution is a version of a paper written at the request of the Austrian Presidency of the Council of the European Union for the informal ECOFIN meeting of EU finance ministers and central bank governors.
External Publication
Fintech has the potential to change financial intermediation structures substantially. It could disrupt existing financial intermediation with new business models empowered by intelligent algorithms, big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence.
Blog Post
Intel suffered only minimal pain in the stock market following revelations about the ‘Meltdown’ hardware vulnerability. But if the market won’t compel providers to ensure the safety of their hardware, what will?
Blog Post
The price of bitcoin has just passed $11,000. A year ago it was worth less than $800. Economists and commentators are thus increasingly concerned that this may be a bubble waiting to burst. We review recent opinions on the topic.
Policy Contribution
Fintech has the potential to change financial intermediation structures substantially. It could disrupt existing financial intermediation with new business models empowered by intelligent algorithms, big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence. Policymakers need to consider four questions urgently: Develop a European or national fintech market? What regulatory framework to pursue? Should supervision of fintech be exercised at the European level? What is the overall vision for the EU’s financial system?
Blog Post
While the activities using the peer-to-peer cryptocurrency Bitcoin swing between legal and illegal, the attention has been increasingly shifting to the technology underlying Bitcoin, known as blockchain. The mechanics and economics of Bitcoin have been reviewed in a previous Bruegel blogpost. In this blog review we explain, or at least attempt to, what blockchain is and whether it contains the extraordinary innovation potential that its proponents believe it to have, or perhaps such hype is oversold.
