No abstract

Despite an emerging international consensus on principles of AI governance, lawmakers have so far failed to translate those principles into regulations in the financial sector. Perhaps, in order to remain competitive in the global race for AI supremacy without being typecast as stifling innovation, typically cautious financial regulators are unusually allowing the introduction of experimental AI technology into the financial sector, with few controls on the unprecedented risks to consumers and financial stability. Once an unregulated AI software causes serious economic harm, a public and regulatory backlash would lead to over-regulation that could harm innovation of this potentially beneficial technology. Artificial intelligence is rapidly influencing the financial sector with innumerable potential benefits, such as enhancing financial services and improving regulatory compliance. This article argues that the best way to encourage a sustainable future in AI innovation in the financial sector is to support a proactive regulatory approach prior to any financial harm occurring. This proactive approach should implement rational regulations that embody jurisdiction-specific rules in line with carefully construed international principles.

Trade finance helps businesses deal with abnormal cash flows whilst managing counterparty risk and enhancing confidence in commercial transactions. It also allows parties to overcome trust barriers that may inhibit commercial activity in both a domestic and international commercial context. Globally, particularly among micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), there exists a significant and widening unmet demand for documentary finance. Securing trade finance is laborious and time-consuming. For MSMEs, the trade finance application process alone, can be an insurmountable barrier that usually ends in rejection. By its nature, trade finance arrangements engage with decentralized stakeholders and diffused information sources across supply chains. Issuers and underwriters of trade finance instruments are required to draw on disparate elements of information, not merely during the application phase, but indeed throughout the life of a transaction. Blockchain technology is similarly decentralized and can capture information in a secure, transparent and immutable manner potentially improving and reinvigorating the trade finance space. As Qatar embarks on a strategy of widening its economic base away from a singular reliance on the hydrocarbon fuel sector, the introduction of blockchain technology holds the potential to overcome the transactional friction associated with trade finance. A more efficient and accessible trade finance sector will ultimately enhance the competitiveness of MSMEs whilst simultaneously fostering the growing FinTech sector in Qatar.

Despite the economic importance of trade finance in commercial trade, the fundamentals of trade finance have not dramatically changed for centuries. Most of the transactions continue to be largely paper-based and counterparties still face many of the same risks, obstacles and challenges they did when the Spanish empire ruled the seas. The use of blockchain can address many of these inefficiencies and reduce the friction encountered by sme s using trade finance arrangements to access global markets. This article sets out the main advantages of using blockchain-based trade finance solutions in order to explore the legal developments in a cross section of six jurisdictions with differing approaches (USA, UK, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Qatar). The paper concludes that legal reforms have an important role in assisting the introduction of blockchain into trade finance. Moreover, such an introduction will greatly benefit the economic prospects of sme s seeking to reach transnational markets.

Blockchain is the underlying technology upon which cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin are built. Cryptocurrencies have received significant attention in recent years. This focus has obscured the real technical innovation in data storage and retention – that of the so-called ‘blockchain’ digital architecture. Blockchain – also known as ‘distributed ledger technology’ (DLT) – has the potential to change much more than the realm of conventional financial services. The ability to transfer, store and record non-fungible bits of information is an important technical accomplishment that brings the economic dynamics of supply and demand to the digital sphere. This article examines how DLT is (and may in the future) influence the world of Islamic finance. We argue that blockchain has the ability to mediate and harmonise differing shariacompliance regimes thus opening up a single digital market for Islamic financial products and services. Fintech, Blockchain, Distributed Ledger Technology, Islamic Finance, Shariah-compliance, Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, OneGram, Financial inclusion, Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).