Centennial Speaker Series: Campbell R. Harvey on DeFi and the Future of Finance

Govern­ments bailed out the very institutions that let the economy down, spurring a serious rethink of our financial system. Does it make any sense that it takes two days to settle a stock transaction? Why do retailers, operating on razor-thin margins, have to pay 3% for every customer credit card swipe? Why does it take two days to transfer money from a bank account to a brokerage—or any other company? Why are savings rates minuscule or negative? Why is it so difficult for entrepreneurs to get financ­ing at traditional banks?

In DeFi and the Future of Finance, Campbell R. Harvey, Ashwin Ramachandran, and Joey Santoro introduce the new world of decen­tralized finance. The book argues that the current financial landscape is ripe for dis­ruption and we are seeing, in real time, the reinvention of finance.

Agenda
12 p.m.: Welcome Remarks: Sris Chatterjee, chair, Gabelli Center for Global Security Analysis

12:05 p.m.: Presentation: Campbell R. Harvey

12:45 p.m.: Audience Q&A

1 p.m.: Closing Remarks: Sris Chatterjee

About the Speaker
Harvey is a professor of finance at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He served as president of the American Finance Association in 2016. He serves as a partner and senior advisor at Research Affiliates LLC, overseeing more than $180 billion in client funds, as well as investment strategy adviser to the Man Group PLC, the world’s largest, publicly listed, global hedge fund provider.

Over the past seven years, Harvey has taught a course titled Innovation and Cryptoventures at Duke University. The course focuses on blockchain technology and decentralized finance. He also teaches Tech Driven Transformation of Business, as well as International Finance. He offers a Coursera called Blockchain Business Models,” and his book DeFi and the Future of Finance was released this fall. From 2006 to 2012, Harvey edited the Journal of Finance—the leading scientific journal in his field and one of the premier economics journals.

Harvey received the 2016 and 2015 Best Paper Awards from The Journal of Portfolio Management for his research on distinguishing luck from skill. He has also received eight Graham and Dodd Awards/Scrolls for excellence in financial writing from the CFA Institute. He has published more than 150 scholarly articles on topics spanning investment finance, emerging markets, corporate finance, behavioral finance, financial econometrics, and computer science.

Professor Harvey obtained his doctorate at the University of Chicago in business finance. He has served on the faculties of the Stockholm School of Economics, the Helsinki School of Economics, and the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago. He has also been a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, was awarded an honorary doctorate from Svenska Handelshögskolan in Helsinki, and is a fellow of the American Finance Association. Harvey is a founding director of the Duke-CFO Survey, a widely received quarterly survey that polls more 1,500 CFOs worldwide.

Copies of DeFi and the Future of Finance will be raffled off to attendees.

This event is co-sponsored with the CFA Society New York, the Gabelli Center for Global Security Analysis, and the Museum of American Finance.