Cryptocurrencies and Blockchains Conference
November
22-23
2019
Event Recap
The Becker Friedman Institute and the Macro Finance Research Program at the University of Chicago hosted the “Cryptocurrencies and Blockchains” conference on November 22-23, 2019.
The conference featured two high-level panels on Cryptocurrency and Regulation and Blockchain and Applications. Topics included the role of cryptocurrencies as a medium of exchange and in currency competition, examining the market structure of decentralized mining, initial coin offerings, economic uses and limits of the blockchain, central bank digital currency, privacy and regulation, algorithmic and game theoretical aspects of cryptocurrencies and blockchains as well as empirical contributions.
Photos
PANEL VIDEOS
Agenda
Friday, November 22, 2019
8:00 am - 9:00 am
Breakfast & Registration
9:00 am - 9:40 am
The ICO Paradox: Transactions Costs, Token Velocity, and Token Value
Anup Malani (Presenter), University of Chicago & NBER
Richard Holden, University of New South Wales
9:40 am - 10:20 am
The Role of Cryptographic tokens and ICOs in Fostering Platform Adoption
Hanna Halaburda (Presenter), New York University
Yannis Bakos, New York University
10:20 am - 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am - 11:20 am
CryptoMining: Energy Use and Local Impact
Matteo Benetton (Presenter), University of California, Berkeley
Giovanni Compiani, University of California, Berkeley
Adair Morse, University of California, Berkeley & NBER
11:20 am - 12:00 pm
An Examination of the Cryptocurrency Pump and Dump Ecosystem
Neil Gandal (Presenter), Tel Aviv University
JT Hamrick, University of Tulsa
Farhang Rouhi, University of New Mexico
Arghya Mukherjee, University of Tulsa
Amir Feder, Technion
Tyler Moore, University of Tulsa
Marie Vasek, University College London
12:00 pm - 12:30 pm
Lunch
12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
Cryptocurrency and Regulation Panel
Catherine Barrera, Prysm Group
Lars Peter Hansen (Moderator), University of Chicago
Tommaso Mancini-Griffoli, International Monetary Fund
1:30 pm - 1:50 pm
Break
1:50 pm - 2:30 pm
Economic Security of Decentralized Systems
Jacob Leshno (Presenter), University of Chicago
Rafael Pass, Cornell Tech
Elaine Shi, Cornell University
2:30 pm - 3:10 pm
Double-Spend Counter-Attacks: Threat of Retaliation in Proof-of-Work Systems
Daniel J. Moroz (Presenter), SEAS, Harvard University
Daniel J. Aronoff, MIT
James P. Lovejoy, MIT
Neha Narula, MIT
David C. Parkes, SEAS, Harvard University
3:10 pm - 3:30 pm
Break
3:30 pm - 4:10 pm
Cryptocurrencies, Currency Competition and the Impossible Trinity
Harald Uhlig (Presenter), University of Chicago
Pierpaolo Benigno, LUISS Guido Carli University
Linda Schilling, Ecole Polytechnique & CREST
4:10 pm - 4:50 pm
Common Risk Factors in Cryptocurrency
Yukun Liu (Presenter), Yale University
Aleh Tsyvinski, Yale University
Xi Wu, New York University
4:50 pm
Conference Adjourns
Keynote Dinner Speech
Stuart Haber & W. Scott Stornetta
Saturday, November 23, 2019
8:00 am - 9:00 am
Breakfast & Registration
9:00 am - 9:40 am
Should Central Banks Issue Digital Currency?
Todd Keister (Presenter), Rutgers University
Daniel Sanches, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
9:40 am - 10:20 am
Central Bank Digital Currency and Financial Intermediation
Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde (Presenter), University of Pennsylvania, NBER & CEPR
Daniel Sanches, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Linda Schilling, Ecole Polytechnique CREST
Harald Uhlig, University of Chicago
10:20 am - 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am - 11:20 am
Market Design for a Blockchain-Based Financial System
Ravi Jagadeesan (Presenter), Harvard University
Christian Catalini, Calibra, MIT & NBER
Scott Duke Kominers, Harvard University
11:20 am - 12:00 pm
Bitcoin: An Axiomatic Approach and an Impossibility Theorem
Philipp Strack (Presenter), Yale University
Jacob Leshno, University of Chicago
12:00 pm - 12:30 pm
Lunch
12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
Blockchain and Applications Panel
Zhiguo He (Moderator), University of Chicago
Frank Lu, Ping An OneConnect
Brendan Tobin, Provenance.io
1:30 pm - 1:50 pm
Break
1:50 pm - 2:30 pm
Flexible Byzantine Fault Tolerance
Dahlia Malkhi (Presenter), Calibra
Kartik Nayak, VMware Research & Duke University
Ling Ren, VMware Research & University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign