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The Future of Digital Payments Debated at Bocconi

, by Barbara Orlando
On September 25 and 26, 2025 an international conference sponsored by CEPR, ECB, Review of Finance and Bocconi is taking place. A call for papers to join the academic debate on CBDC, digital assets and digital capital markets

Milan is going to be the core of the international debate on the evolution of payment systems and digital financial markets: on September 25 and 26, 2025, Bocconi University will host the conference "The Future of Payments-CBDC, Digital Assets and Digital Capital Markets", co-organized with the European Central Bank (ECB), CEPR and Review of Finance.

The meeting will bring together economists, policy makers and practitioners to reflect on the transformative role of digital currencies, new payment infrastructures and evolving capital markets. The event, which will consist of keynote speeches, policy panels and academic sessions, will feature Piero Cipollone, ECB Executive Board member and chair of the Task Force on the Digital Euro, who will deliver the keynote lecture.

"The digitization of money and markets poses unprecedented challenges that require sound theoretical and empirical understanding to guide regulatory decisions," explains Elena Carletti, Dean for Research at Bocconi and Director of the CEPR Banking and Corporate Finance Program. "This is why we promote a dialogue between academia and institutions, aimed at developing useful and rigorous knowledge."

As an aside to the conference, a call for papers has been launched to select academic contributions that will be discussed during the event and published in a special issue of the Review of Finance. Interested parties can submit a proposal or an early version of the paper by July 21, 2025 via the platform accessible at https://revfin.org/.

"The initiative aims to foster cutting-edge research exploring the economic, regulatory and strategic implications of digital currencies, decentralized infrastructures and new market models," stresses Claudio Tebaldi, director of Bocconi's Baffi Fintech Lab. "We want to provide a space for solid analysis for a more integrated, transparent and resilient financial future."

Topics of interest include Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), interoperability of cross-border payments, digital sovereignty, the roles of stablecoins and DeFi, and the emerging architecture of tokenized markets. Selected proposals will enter a two-stage process, including a second submission conference in 2026 and final publication after peer review.

For more information, please contact conference manager Elena Suragni at: fintechlab@unibocconi.it

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