Conference date
21 Sep 2026

Location
The Shard London UK

Description
The Gillmore Centre for Financial Technology at Warwick Business School at the University of Warwick invites submissions from all areas related to DeFi and Digital Currencies, including, but not limited to:

▪ DeFi Protocols: optimal design, governance and market efficiency
▪ Lending and Borrowing Protocols: collateralisation, liquidation mechanisms and systemic risk
▪ Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs): AMM mechanisms, liquidity provision, and price discovery
▪ Blockchain Economics: mechanism design, security, and welfare
▪ Stablecoins and CBDCs: financial stability, macroeconomic, and political economy implications
▪ Digital Money and Payments: innovation in wholesale and retail systems
▪ Tokenisation of real-world assets: regulatory, valuation and market structure implications
▪ Traditional and Decentralized Finance Interaction: integration, competition and hybrid protocols
▪ Digital Finance and Inclusion: development, welfare and access

We encourage both theoretical and empirical contributions.

2026 Keynote Speaker - Campbell Harvey - Fuqua School of Business, Duke University

The conference will be held in person at Warwick Business School at the Shard, London 21 September 2026.

In addition, we will co-host “Decentralized Finance and Digital Assets Industry Summit” in partnership with the Briger Family Digital Finance Lab at Columbia Business School and Palliora. The Summit will bring together academics and practitioners to explore the development in digital assets, fintech and DeFi landscape. It is scheduled for 22 September 2026 at the Shard.

SUBMISSION DETAILS: The deadline for submissions is 31 May 2026. Papers for submission should be uploaded here (https://app.oxfordabstracts.com/auth?redirect=/stages/82019/submitter) as a PDF with the filename beginning with the last name of the submitting author. A submission fee of £45 should be paid using the following link: https://www.wbs.ac.uk/events/view/9423. Please include the payment confirmation number when uploading the paper. Submission fee waivers will be granted upon request for authors with exceptional circumstances. Authors of accepted papers will be notified in mid-July.

INTERESTED PARTICIPANTS: If you wish to attend the conference without submitting a paper, please email gillmorecentre@wbs.ac.uk to express your interest. A registration link will be shared at a later date.

ACADEMIC PROGRAMME COMMITTEE: Joseph Abadi, Toni Ahnert, Yackolley Amoussou-Guenou, Bruno Biais, Andrea Barbon, Ka Kei Chan, James Chapman, Irem Erten, Rod Garratt, Maxi Guennewig, Benjamin Hemingway, Wenqian Huang, Olga Klein, Roman Kozhan, Alfred Lehar, Jiasun Li, Katya Malinova, Simon Mayer, Alistair Milne, Cyril Monnet, Maarten van Oordt, Andreas Park, Julien Prat, Fahad Saleh, Bazil Sansom, David Skeie, Ruslan Sverchkov, Katrin Tinn, Ganesh Viswanath-Natraj, Kathy Yuan, Zhengge Zhou, Marius Zoican.

CONFERENCE ORGANISING COMMITTEE: Vicki Belt, Matt Hanmer, Kate Higton, Olga Klein, David Skeie, Roman Kozhan, Ruslan Sverchkov, Ganesh Viswanath Natraj, Bazil Sansom, Ka Kei Chan and Jiao Liu.

FURTHER INFORMATION: If you have any additional comments or questions, email gillmorecentre@wbs.ac.uk. The 2025 conference programme can be found at https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/wbs/subjects/finance/gillmore/annualconference2025agenda/

Additional Information
Here is the link to register - https://www.wbs.ac.uk/events/view/9423