Panel: Blockchain and Cryptocurren­cies

Abstracts

Rainer Böhme, Universität Innsbruck - "Principles of Cryptocurrencies"
Cryptocurrencies have brought distributed systems into the radar of economists, and economic arguments into the design of technical protocols. I will discuss selected principles of decentralized systems through an economic lens, thereby arguing that some notion of money is needed to keep the systems stable. In other words, virtual currency in not just one, but THE application of blockchain-based systems. Knowing the principles helps us to navigate the design space of recent technical developments (alternatives to proof-of-work, "off-chain" payment channels, increased privacy), which I briefly sketch. It further allows us to reason about transition dynamics, which raise questions of competition, governance, and amenability to regulation. These topics host a wealth of problems of potential interest to economic researchers.

Wolfgang K. Härdle, HU Berlin – "Understanding Cryptocurrencies"
Cryptocurrencies refer to a type of digital cash that use distributed ledger - or blockchain technology - to provide secure transactions. These currencies are generally misunderstood. While initially dismissed as fads or bubbles, many large central banks are considering launching their own version of national cryptocurrencies. In contrast to most data in financial economics, there is a plethora of detailed (free) data on the history of every transaction for the cryptocurrency complex. Further, there is little empirically-oriented research on this new asset class. This is an extraordinary research opportunity for academia. We provide a starting point by giving an insight into cryptocurrency mechanisms and detailing summary statistics and focusing on potential future research avenues in financial economics

CV's der Referenten

Rainer Böhme ist Professor für Security and Privacy am Department of Computer Science der Universität Innsbruck und Leiter des dortigen Security and Privacy Labs. Zuvor war er u.a. Postdoctoral Fellow in der Networking and Security Group am International Computer Science Institute, Berkeley, California und Assistant Professor am Institut für Wirtschaftsinformatik der Universität Münster. Die Forschung von Rainer Böhme ist interdisziplinär ausgerichtet und beschäftigt sich mit Digital Forensics, Virtual Currencies, Economics of Information Security und Cyber Insurances. Sein im Journal of Economic Perspectives erschienener Beitrag "Bitcoin: Economics, technology, and governance" zählt bei Google Scholar über 400 Zitate. 

Wolfgang K. Härdle ist Leiter des Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz Lehrstuhls für Statistik der Fakultät Wirtschaftswissenschaften der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Er ist Koordinator des "Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk". Seine aktuelle Forschung befasst sich vorallem mit der statistischen Analyse von Risiken an den Finanzmärkten. Im Handelsblatt Ranking der VWL Forscher gehört er zu den Top 1% nach Lebensleistung. Google Scholar zählt über 30.000 Zitate.