Cryptocurrency Special Issue (Published in 2023)

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Review of Corporate Finance

Special Issue on Cryptocurrencies

 

Handling Editor:

Prof Shaen Corbet, Dublin City University

 

Overview

The debate surrounding the valuation of cryptocurrency products has in recent times generated much hostility. Evidence suggests that cryptocurrencies were used in a flight-to-safety during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic (Corbet et al., 2020), providing validation that they could perhaps present a purpose that is not centralised on speculation. Recent substantial growth of institutional investment has added an air of validation that has underpinned continued cryptocurrency price inflation throughout 2021. Such observations appear to support a continued raison d'être for cryptocurrencies as an investment asset. However, while proponents of price appreciation continue to aim “to the moon”, realistic concerns have begun to emerge about the presence of a substantiative asset price bubble, with particular alarm being raised about the manner in which social media influencers and well-known online discussion forums have amassed and coordinated in an attempt to manipulate pricing (Corbet et al., 2021). To date, none of these investors presented particular concern as to legal repercussions, largely due to the opaque legislative position of these digital assets. Such fears of asset price bubbles have been reinforced by a number of key signals, such as the large number of entrants with no previous technological experience entering the market, and the very fact that a meme coin, marketed by a Shibu Ina, that is decentralised, fully anonymous, independently mined, and largely underpinned by sentiment, has increased in market capitalisation to almost $100 billion.

It has caused significant alarm that such assets have inflated so dramatically, however, there have been many innovations throughout cryptocurrency and fintech products in recent years (Allen, Gu, and Jagtiani, 2021), which will act as potential research areas in this special issue, due to their inherent non-speculatively driven societal improvements. While the behaviour of meme coins has generated much sectoral distrust, the projects being developed by a number of international central banks are observed as a potential watershed moment in finance, with a number of CBDC’s being observed as progressive, ground-breaking experiments with positive early indications as to future viability. However, cross-border valuation and trade remain significant challenges to progress. The advancements of products such as Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), smart contracts and stablecoins have also been observed to be progressive. With such technological advancement, also exists the threat of significant, lucrative cybercriminality and fraud relating to cryptocurrency, both internally and externally. The role of policy-makers and regulators is also observed as a key theme within this special issue, to which its purpose is to encourage theoretical and empirical contributions on cryptocurrencies with a focus on their impact on investors, exchanges, regulators, policy-makers and key international stakeholders.

 

 

Possible Research Areas

A partial list of topics that will represent core themes to this special issue include, but are not limited to the following:

 

 

References

Allen, Franklin, Xian Gu, & Julapa Jagtiani, 2021. "A Survey of Fintech Research and Policy Discussion" Review of Corporate Finance 1, forthcoming

Corbet, S., Hou, Y. G., Hu, Y., Larkin, C., & Oxley, L. (2020). Any port in a storm: Cryptocurrency safe-havens during the COVID-19 pandemic. Economics Letters, 194, 109377.

Corbet, S., Hou, Y. G., Hu, Y., & Oxley, L. (2020). We Reddit in a Forum: The Influence of Messaging Boards on Firm Stability (January 31, 2021). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3776445  

 

Paper Submission Procedure

Please submit your paper to shaen.corbet@dcu.ie. The deadline of submission is the 31st of October 2021.




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