In this chapter, the authors study how cryptotoken issuance, also referred to as initial coin offerings and security token offerings, may disrupt funding markets such as venture capital, crowdfunding, and private equity. The authors discuss the necessary infrastructure to support this new asset class. The authors analyze the market evolution...
The provision of retail payment services is complex with many participants engaging in a series of interrelated bilateral transactions and subject to large economies of scale and scope along with strong adoption, usage and network externalities. This makes sound public policy difficult. We focus on three types of market interventions...
Bolt and Chakravorti discuss different types of market interventions by public authorities in retail payment markets. They concentrate on three types of market interventions. First, they analyze the impact of removing pricing restrictions placed on merchants that prevent them from setting different prices based on the payment instrument used to...
Bolt and Chakravorti investigate the research on electronic payment systems. The rapid growth in the use of electronic payment instruments, especially payment cards, is a striking feature of most modern economies. Payment data indicate that strong scale economies exist for electronic payments. Payment costs will decrease through the consolidation of...
Bob Chakravorti discusses surcharging and honor-all-cards rules for payment cards. Generally, merchants charge the same price regardless of the type of payment instrument used to make purchases. In many jurisdictions, merchants are not allowed to add a surcharge for payment card transactions because of legal (some states in the U.S...
While payment card usage has increased dramatically, the stock of outstanding currency has not declined as rapidly. Amromin and Chakravorti analyze changes in cash demand for 13 advanced economies from 1988 to 2003 by separating cash into three denomination categories to disentangle its store of wealth and payment functions. Defining...
The proportion of retail, non-cash payments made electronically in the U.S. grew from 15% in 1979 to 40% in 2000. A recent Chicago Fed conference addressed the important question of whether today's payment networks can adequately support emerging payment technologies.
Credit cards provide benefits to consumers and merchants not provided by other payment instruments as evidenced by their explosive growth in the number and value of transactions over the last 20 years. Recently, credit card networks have come under scrutiny from regulators and antitrust authorities around the world. The costs...