Topic: Digital Currencies and the Future of Money

Speaker: Fiona van Echelpoel, Deputy Director General, Market Infrastructure & Payments, European Central Bank    

Presentation: 

The pace and reach of digitalisation has increased in recent years, expanding to all aspects of our personal and professional lives, including the area of currencies and money. For instance, we no longer need to visit physical bank branches to transfer money and our use of cash as a means of payment is declining, even if it remains more steady as a store of value. The future of money is increasingly digital and while central banks generally are committed to retaining physical notes and coins, they are also exploring possibilities to issue digital forms of cash – so-called central bank digital currencies.  

In her presentation, she will provide an update on digital currencies and reflect on trends and developments impacting the future of money, serving as a backdrop for what she hopes will be an interactive exchange. 

Speaker's bio:
Fiona van Echelpoel is Deputy Director General in the Directorate General Market Infrastructure and Payments (DGMIP) of the ECB since January 2018. She has a broad background in central banking, having worked in a number of functions in the market infrastructure and market operations areas of the ECB since its establishment in 1998 and previously for its forerunner the European Monetary Institute (EMI); prior to that she worked at the Central Bank of Ireland. She represents the ECB in various European fora and chairs the ESCB CCP Working Group, co-chairs the TARGET2-Securities Cooperative Arrangement and the European Forum on the Security of Retail Payments (SecuRePay) as well as being chair of the ECB’s Internal Crypto Assets Task Force. She also represents the ECB in a number of international groups, including the standard setting bodies of CPMI IOSCO, and co-chairs the CPMI IOSCO Implementation Monitoring Standing Group. She holds a degree in Economics and Politics from University College Dublin.