Publications
Big Techs in Finance
Joint with Sebastian Doerr, Jon Frost and Leonardo Gambacorta
Book chapter, Oxford Handbook of Banking, 4th edition, 2025.
The design and adoption of fast payments
Joint with J Aurazo, C Franco, J Frost, P K Wilkens, A Kosse and C Velasquez
Journal of Payments Strategy & Systems, Vol. 18 (2024), no. 4, pp. 366-380(15).
Mobile payments and interoperability: Insights from the academic literature
Joint with Milo Bianchi, Matthieu Bouvard, Renato Gomes and Andrew Rhodes
Information Economics and Policy, Vol. 65 (2023), article 101068.
Working Papers
Joint with Inaki Aldasoro, Leonardo Gambacorta, Anton Korinek, Merlin Stein
Submitted, BIS working paper no. 1194, CEPR working paper no. 19181
At the core of the financial s ystem i s t he p rocessing a nd a ggregation o f vast amounts of information into price signals that coordinate participants in the economy. Throughout history, advances in information processing, from simple book-keeping to artificial intelligence (AI), have transformed the financial sector. We use this framing to analyse how generative AI (GenAI) and emerging AI agents as well as, more speculatively, artificial general intelligence will impact finance. We f ocus on f our functions o f the financial sy stem: financial intermediation, insurance, asset management, and payments. We also assess the implications of advances in AI for financial stability and prudential policy. Moreover, we investigate potential spillover effects of AI on the real economy, examining both an optimistic and a disruptive AI scenario. To address the transformative impact of advances in AI on the financial system, we propose a framework for upgrading financial regulation based on well-established general principles for AI governance.
Submitted, BIS working paper no. 1166, February 2024
Internet-based digitalisation has ushered in a wave of economic and financial development in emerging markets, but digital divides remain. Narrowing these divides requires an understanding the drivers of technology adoption. The paper develops a structural model of consumer demand and supply to understand the main drivers of adoption of an essential digital technology: smartphones. Through counterfactual simulations, the paper quantifies the role of growth in income and in income inequality, expansion of 4G network coverage, foreign entry, and improvements in device quality in expanding adoption. The paper also provides a counterfactual comparison of three pro-adoption policies: an ad-valorem tax reduction, a uniform subsidy and a targeted subsidy.
*Previously circulated as "Explaining Smartphone Adoption in India" and "Adoption of digital technologies: The case of smartphones in India"
Imitation of product characteristics in the mobile handset market
Joint with Debi Prasad Mohapatra
What is the value of an easily imitable technology? What are the economic incentives for innovation in the presence of widespread imitation? This paper studies the introduction of dual SIM handsets in the Indian mobile phone market and quantifies the value of this technology for consumers. We also quantify the impact on market outcomes of the quick imitation of this technology by competing firms. We find that the introduction of dual SIM handsets led to an increase in the consumer surplus between 3.1% to 8.9%, and an expansion in the total size of the market by 1.8% to 3.3%. While imitation reduced the innovator's profit substantially, it also made the technology much more affordable. In the absence of widespread imitation, consumer prices would have been 22% higher. Finally, we provide a lower-bound on the innovator's cost of protecting intellectual property in an emerging market. We find this lower bound to be as high as 12% of the innovator's observed profits ($ 29.5 million).
Work in Progress
Pricing in fast payment systems
Joint with Jose Aurazo, Holti Banka, Guillermo Rabadan and Nilima Ramateke
How does a demand driven floor really work?
Joint with Per-Asberg Sommar, Mathias Drehmann and Denise Hansson
Bank branch closures and the bank-firm relationship
Joint with Maddalena Galardo, Leonardo Gambacorta and Paolo Mistrulli
Short Term Cost of Cash and Mobile Financial Services : Evidence from a natural experiment in India
Joint with Helia Costa and Mauro Pisu