CAFRAL Research organized a joint conference with Indian School of Business in Mohali, India. The theme of the conference was on “The Impact of Digitisation on Households and Firms”. The keynote lecture was delivered by Prof. Manju Puri, J.B Fuqua Professor of Finance at Duke University; Editor of the Review of Financial Studies and the President at the Western Finance Association. Professor Puri presented her paper “Open Banking and Digital Payments: Implications for Credit Access” (co-authored with Nirupama Kulkarni from CAFRAL, Sashwat Alok and Pulak Ghosh). The paper uses India’s launch of an Open-Banking based public digital payment infrastructure (UPI) to answer if verifiable digital financial histories improve credit access. The paper shows several mechanisms at play: low-cost internet improves credit access, lenders weigh in digital histories, and digital payments with Open Banking effectively complement first-time bank accounts enabling access to formal credit. In addition to the keynote lecture, there were seven academic research paper presentations including one from a CAFRAL researcher.
The final program of the conference is below:
Paper Title
Presenter & Co-authors
Affiliation(s)
Discussant
FX at your fingertips: The effect of digital providers on the cost of remittance services
Narayan Bulusu (with Ingomar Krohn)
Bank of Canada
Sargam Gupta (IGIDR)
Can Cashless Payments Spur Economic Growth?
Tamanna S. Dubey (with Amiyatosh Purnanandam)
University of Michigan
Abhiman Das (IIM Ahmedabad)
Open Payment Systems and Retail Market Access
Nirupama Kulkarni (with Meghana Ayyagari, Yuxi [Lance] Cheng, Pulak Ghosh,)
Georgetown Univ., Univ. of Liverpool, IIM Bangalore, CAFRAL
Kriti Khanna (Plaksha University)
Financial Innovation, Labor Markets, and Wage Inequality: Evidence from Instant Payment Systems
Carlos Parra (with Jacelly Cespedes, Carlos Burga, Bernardo Ricca)
Univ. of Minnesota, Pontificia Univ. Católica de Chile, Insper
Pulak Ghosh (IIM Bangalore)
The Effect of Instant Payments on the Banking System: Liquidity Transformation and Risk-Taking
Yiming Ma (with, Rodrigo Gonzalez, Yao Zeng)
Central Bank of Brazil, Columbia Business School, Wharton (UPenn)
Nitin Vishen (IIM Bangalore)
CBDCs, Payment Firms, and Geopolitics
Jan Kiel (with Tobias Berg, Felix Martini, Manju Puri)
Goethe Univ., ISB, Frankfurt School of Finance, Duke Univ.
Anirudh Dhawan (IIM Bangalore)
The BigTech-Bank Lending Ecosystem
Ben Charoenwong (with Yiyao Wang)
SAIF, INSEAD
Vasudha Nukala (ISB)
Academic researchers in economics, finance, and related areas. Economists at policy making institutions, financial institutions, and regulatory organizations. Bankers and Central Bankers