On 22 May 2018, Dr Philipp Paech, a tenured Associate Professor in Financial Law and Regulation at LSE, gave a lecture entitled "In […] We Trust – Reflections on the Legal, Social and Moral Support from Barter to Bitcoin". The object and the addressee of trust in transactions has changed considerably during the last 100 or so years. During historic times, intrinsic value or trust allowed parties to transact. In the age of Bitcoin, none of this is needed any more. This evening talk will take the audience through the different stages of this development and ask, whether undisputable progressive efficiency gains that are made possible by technological advancement such as electronic money, or even Bitcoin, come at a price.
Dr. Paech joined LSE in 2010 and is now the Director of the LSE’s Law and Financial Markets Project. He is also Fellow and Visiting Professor at the Institute for Law and Finance in Frankfurt. Before joining the LSE, Dr. Paech spent many years at the heart of international legal and regulatory reform of the financial sector, working from 2007-2010 for the European Commission in Brussels at the Directorate for Financial Services, and from 2002-2006 for UNIDROIT in Rome. He holds a doctorate from the University of Bonn and obtained the Diploma of EU Studies from the University of Toulouse. He is a qualified lawyer admitted to the Bar of Frankfurt.
In London and Frankfurt, Dr. Paech teaches four different courses in financial law and financial regulation at Masters and Executive Level. As a former regulator, he teaches the international law of the financial markets from an academic as well as from a global policy viewpoint. His courses are highly popular amongst students and LSE recognised his strong engagement with teaching by awarding him the LSE Teaching Prize 2017-18.
His research concentrates on the antagonistic relationship between risk and liquidity, concentrating on legal risk management within financial institutions, and on the international compatibility of legal and regulatory regimes. Since 2016 he works mainly on global regulation of Fintech and Blockchain, which includes running a popular specialist blog on that subject.
Dr. Paech frequently undertakes significant consulting projects for the public sector, including for the UK’s Foreign Office, the ECB and the European Commission. The links to his websites are:
