OVERVIEW

The course aims to provide students with the adequate tools to understand and critically analyze from the legal point of view the challenges that technological evolution entails for the financial sector, with the objective of acquiring useful skills in the future working environment. It will focus on the Italian and European law applicable to Fintech and, therefore, to financial services provided through the use of the most important, recent and continously evolving technologies, underlying the main legal issues and possible solutions. The entire course will be offered in English. 

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course aims to provide students with the adequate tools to understand and critically analyze from the legal point of view the challenges that technological evolution entails for the financial sector, with the objective of acquiring useful skills to apply in the future working environment. Students, after having refreshed the bases of banking regulation and studied investment services and financial markets laws (Italian financial markets code and relative Consob Regulations; main European Directives and Regulations in the financial law field), will apply such knowledge to the context of the main Fintech categories, delving into the most significant aspects. For each of the main Fintech applications, in fact, we will analyze the most relevant risks and benefits, legal issues raised, regulatory responses and doctrines, with special reference to the Italian and European regulatory framework, in addition to the main international principles and guidelines. Lectures providing explanations and commentary on the laws will be accompanied by the analysis of practical cases, judicial decisions and collective discussions and practical exercises, in order to allow students, not only to understand the topics discussed from a legal point of view but also to acquire the tools to navigate with confidence and at a professional level the new digital economy, applying legal rules and reasoning to practical cases and specific issues. The course will focus on the regulation of banking, payment services and financial markets and investment services but, also because of the multi-sectorial nature of the fintech sector and practical perspective of the course, it will adopt a multi-disciplinary approach, dealing therefore also with issues within insurance law, company and business law, competition law, private law and data protection, public law, international private law, ethics, law and economics. Experts from the sector will be invited to share their precious experience and knowledge.

TEACHING METHODS

Lessons (with active participation of students) and seminars (with presentations by students and by external experts). 

Students with disabilities are invited to contact the teacher.

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

Part I: first overview/background

• Banking sector, financial markets and insurance: general principles as regards regulation and supervision in Italy (Banca d’Italia, Consob, etc.) and at European level (Banking Union, European Supervisory Authorities, etc.)
  • Credit institutions, various financial services providers (Art. 106 TUB, PSPs/EMP, etc) (only briefly)
  • Investment firms, markets, institutional investors and collective investment vehicles (TUF, Consob Regulations; MiFID II/MiFIR, etc.): authorisation and requirements (prudential, organizational, etc.;), supervision
  • Insurance firms and reinsurance (only briefly)
  • AML/CT and other additional relevant laws
• Client protection
  • Protection of credit institutions’ clients
  • Investor protection

Part II: Fintech and financial regulation (general)

• Fintech and digital economy: overview
  • Overview of main features and elements.
  • Focus on banking, payment, financial markets sectors
• Fintech and the law
  • Main legal issues (legal classifications, applicable law, level-playing field, etc.).
  • Regulatory and supervisory context (national/EU/international) (Digital Finance Strategy).
  • New approaches (innovation hubs, sandbox, opt-in regimes, RegTech e SupTech, etc.)

Part II: Analysis of specific Fintech in relation to relevant financial regulation

• Platform economy
  • Digital platform in general and specifically in the financial sector. In particular, crowdfunding platforms
    • Lending-based crowdfunding
    • Investment-based crowdfunding
    • Invoice trading
    • Regulation on European Crowdfunding Service Providers for Business (1503/2020)
• Blockchain, virtual currencies and tokens
  • DLT and application in the financial sector
  • Smart contracts
  • Crypto-assets; Tokens, Initial Coin Offering e ulteriori declinazioni (Initial Security Offerings, Initial Exchange Offerings, etc.), Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (recent EU DLT pilot and MiCAR proposals).
• Artificial intelligence, big data
  • Main applications in the financial field and legal issues; main risks and benefits (data protection, fairness, transparency, accountability, algo-governance, etc.)
  • In particular, robo-advice and law on investment advice and individual portfolio management
  • Trading venues and high frequency trading
  • Insurtech (Pay-as-you go, automatic underwriting/payment, peer-to-peer insurance: briefly)
  • Price discrimination, creditworthiness assessment
• Fintech banks and authorisation
• Digital payments
  • banks, PSP/EMP, credit cards and fintech innovations: open banking and open finance. PSD 2 and third party providers
  • Cyber-security and ‘DORA’ proposal
• Big tech and financial services
  • Big tech entering the banking and payment sectors: main issues.
  • Banking-as-a-service, banking-as-a-platform, neo-bank; cloud computing, outsourcing
• New frontiers: Green fintech/sustainable digital finance

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

Textbook and recommended material will be specified soon on Aulaweb

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

Exam Board

EUGENIA MACCHIAVELLO (President)

CHRISTIAN MEZZANO

LUISA NENCI

CHIARA VALENTI

LESSONS

Class schedule

L'orario di tutti gli insegnamenti è consultabile all'indirizzo EasyAcademy.

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

Oral exam but active participation in class and presentations and comments at seminars will be taken into account for the final grade of students regularly attending classes. 

Exam schedule