Financial Services in the Twenty-First Century: The Present System and Future Developments in Fintech and Financial Innovation

This textbook covers financial systems and services, particularly focusing on present systems and future developments. Broken into three parts, Part One establishes the public institutional framework in which financial services are conducted, defines financial service systems, critically examines the link between finance, wealth and income inequality, and economic growth, challenges conventional paradigms about the raison d’être of financial institutions and markets, and considers the loss of US financial hegemony to emerging regional entities [BRICS]. Part Two focuses on financial innovation by explaining the impact of the following technologies: cryptography, FinTech, distributed ledger technology, and artificial intelligence. Part Three assesses to what extent financial innovation has disrupted legacy banking and the delivery of financial services, identifies the main obstacles to reconstructing the whole financial system based upon “first principles thinking”: Nation State regulation and incumbent interests of multi-national companies, and provides a cursory description of how the pandemic of COVID-19 may establish a “new normal” for the financial services industry. Combining rigorous detail alongside exercises and PowerPoint slides for each chapter, this textbook helps finance students understand the wide breadth of financial systems and speculates the forthcoming developments in the industry. A website to serve as a companion to the textbook is available here: www.johnjaburke.com.

About the Author

John JA Burke is a Professor in the Business School at RISEBA University, Latvia, and of counsel to Sayat Zholshy&Partners, Kazakhstan. Professor Burke started his career in the United States as an Appellate Attorney, arguing and appearing before the United States Supreme Court, the Appellate and District Courts of the Third Circuit, and NJ State Courts at all levels. He then served as Assistant Executive Director of the NJ Law Revision Commission [NJLRC] where he drafted Reports and Recommendations to the NJ Legislature for 25 years, while simultaneously consulting for LEXIS/NEXIS from 1998-2012. Professor Burke served as Advisor to the Ministry of Finance in Estonia to establish a securities market and depository from 1993-1995; was appointed Professor of Law at the Riga Graduate School of Law, Latvia, and then Rector from 2002-2007; he also served as Rector and Professor of Law at International University Audentes, Estonia, in 2007. He held the position of Professor of Law and Chair of the Law Department at KIMEP University, Kazakhstan from 2008-2014. He holds a PhD in International Law from the Université de Fribourg, Switzerland; a J.D. from the University of Seton Hall, School of Law, USA; and a B.A. from Columbia College, USA.