Financial and digital literacy in the age of fintech

In this event, we are joining forces with GFLEC, the Global Financial Literacy Excellence Centre at The George Washington University School of Business, in order to analyse the interlinks between financial and digital literacy in the era of fintech. Our objective is to discuss financial literacy as an important policy tool that can help promote individuals’ financial well-being and in the process also contribute to containing financial imbalances at the macro level.

As mobile payment tools and fintech become more popular among consumers, it is increasingly urgent to understand how technological change affects financial behaviour and indeed consumer vulnerability. According to two recent studies by GFLEC,  US Millennials who use mobile payments are at greater risk in terms of their financial well-being.  This result demonstrates that the digital availability of financial services needs to be accompanied by greater financial management skills. Our intention is to repeat this exercise for a number of European countries by collecting survey data. The aim is to understand whether European consumers run similar risks and how best to moderate them in order to ensure the safe use of digital payments and other technological innovations in the area of personal finance.

Our objective is to inform you about our initial thoughts on the issue and engage in a dialogue that will help us understand the European landscape in terms of fintech developments and how financial literacy can help promote its safe development. We are inviting a variety of stakeholders ranging from EU and National Ministry representatives, Central Banks, regulators, experts from the corporate world and industry associations academics as well as private foundations that have an active interest in the broad subject of financial well-being.

This event is open only to Bruegel’s members and select experts.