certificate in digital money
TRANSCRIPT
CertifiCate in Digital Money
In partnership with
Digital payments in the spotlight
Digital payments is emerging strongly, breaking out from under the shadow of banking to form its own industry. Each new announcement brings with it unprecedented levels of innovation, especially in developing markets.
The number of deployments has expanded fast across developing economies, exceeding all expectations, and in the process creating career opportunities that if met with the right human capacity and skills will lead to successful businesses. the case for a new profession
Unlike the banking sector, which has long been recognized as a profession, supported by training and accreditation, there is no counterpart in the world of digital financial services. Training is fragmented and often proprietary to large providers.
Defining digital payments as a distinct profession is likely to help on the supply-side, by making this area attractive to promising graduates and staff members; and on the demand side by creating a standard skills set which assures employers of the knowledge base and over time, experience, of potential employees.
Building Capacity in Digital Payments
Professional development
The first step on this journey is training and certification, to this end we have developed the Certificate in Digital Money.
Passing students will graduate to the Digital Frontiers Institute professional network, where continued engagement and development will take place through interaction with industry peers, Faculty members and a host of industry experts.
3rd Floor, 113 Loop Street,
Cape Town,
South Africa, 8001
www.digitalfrontiersinstitute.org
@DFIdotOrg
the start
of your professional
journeywith the Digital
frontiers institute
Passing students will receive a Certificate in Digital Money from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University.
The Certificate in Digital Money covers all aspects of the digital payments and digital financial services ecosystem and value chain, beyond what one would normally find in a course on money and banking.
The Certificate in Digital Money
Course outcomes
By taking the course, students will have picked up a standard set of concepts and vocabulary that will allow them to participate in teams and exchange ideas with other professionals in the emerging digital finance and FinTech space.
While they may not become deep experts in all aspects of digital money, they will have developed mental maps that allow them to see how the various issues and solutions relate to each other.
Beyond the specific knowledge students will acquire, we hope that as they reflect on the experience of going through this course students may say things like: it opened my mind, it filled gaps in my knowledge, it gave me confidence, it enabled me to join the conversation.
This course is intended for professionals in the emerging digital payments and technology-enabled financial services space. It is suited for individuals wishing to develop recognized expertise and credentials, and become sherpas in the further development of opportunities within this space.
It is also an executive education vehicle for commercial and regulatory entities wishing to develop a stronger sense of profession around digital financial services to their employees and partners.
Who is this course for
Students must have completed undergraduate education from an accredited university, or minimum five years experience working in an organization operating in the broad digital payments or FinTech space.
eligibility requirements
The cost of the Certificate in Digital Money is $5000 per student.
Scholarships are available for individuals meeting certain criteria.
Cost of the course
The Certificate in Digital Money Course Syllabus
Teaching modules Key terms introduced Week 1:
introduction to digital money
• Course overview• What is money: origins, functions, varieties• Types of digital money• Payments vs. banking
• All the terms in the weekly topic titles• Means of payment, store of value, unit of account; reserved/backed currencies vs. fractional vs.
fiat money• Issuance & acceptance; bank money vs. e-money vs. crypto-currencies• Real-time & non-real time; credit vs. counterparty risk management
Week 2:
Mechanics of payments
• How transactions clear and settle• Interbank payments infrastructure and large-value
payment systems• Payment use cases• Retail payment process
• Clearing & settlement• CPMI• Settlement risk• LVPS, RTGS, SIPS, DNS, ACH
Week 3:
Payments ecosystem
• National payment systems • Managing risks• Business models• Healthy payment systems
• Inner core, Red books, designation, oversight, risks• General guidance on payment system development; healthy payment systems
Week 4:
Mobile-based innovations
• The front end: payment apps, virtual wallets• Agents: the “last mile” of cash• Non-bank issuers: e-money, pooled accounts• Stand-alone mobile money systems in developing
countries
• Network edge; assisted vs. self-service; user interface, usability; data management, big data• Cash in/cash out (CICO); hierarchical channel structure; a gent rebalancing, liquidity
management, super-agents• Magstripe vs. smart card with chip; swipe vs. dip card; near-field communications (NFC);
push vs. pull transactions; NFC, barcode stickers• Fixed vs. variable unit costs; pooled account, fiduciary trust; intermediation, asset transformation
Week 5: Customer perspectives
• Capturing customer pain points, needs, aspirations• Diversity of customer types and drivers• Changing customer behaviors• Field research methods
• Pain points of cash; customer segments & stages; three tensions: discipline vs. flexibility, privacy vs. social display, certainty vs. surprise
• Transaction pools: B2P, G2P, B2B, etc.; micropayments• Behavioral economics, heuristics, framing; cognitive biases; empowerment• Quantitatives vs. Qualitative studies, financial diaries
Week 6: Marketing approaches
• Marketing frameworks• Human-centered design • Brand building • Pricing digital money services
• Customer journey, product lifecycle, marketing levers: 4Ps• Human centered design
topic teaching modules Key terms introduced
The Certificate in Digital Money Course Syllabus
Teaching modules Key terms introduced Week 7:
technology &operational enablers
• Mobile channels & application environments• Identity• Data security• Fraud management
• Channel vs. user interface; USSD, SMS, STK, OTA, NFC, Bluetooth, app, HTML5• Identity, persona, credentials, tokens, authentication factors; anonymity vs. pseudonymity;
registration, KYC • Encryption, symmetric vs. public key encryption, digital signatures• Authorization, accounting; operational & technology risks; transaction thresholds, pattern
detection, customer profiling; risk-based policies
Week 8:
regulation
• Framing regulatory issues• Financial integrity• Fostering competition• Consumer protection
• GPFI principles; liability, scope, repudiation• Strong vs weak authentication; branchless banking • AML-CFT; FATF; new payment methods• Access; per se prohibition; dominance and abuse of dominance; competition treatment of
interchange fees
Week 9:
industrycollaboration
• Interoperability• Infrastructure sharing• Application programming interfaces (APIs)• Industry-wide initiatives
• Interconnection vs interoperability; levels; requirements; mandates• National switch; clearing models; utility operators • APIs• Codes of conduct
Week 10:
Disruption
• The battle of the majors: banks, telcos & retailers go head-to-head
• Infiltration by specialists: new online financial service models • Starting from scratch: new currencies & financial
architectures• The challenge of size: does winner take all?
• Co-opetition• Disintermediation; peer-to-peer lending, crowdfunding, online specialists (lenders & remitters),
price comparison sites, service aggregators• Decentralized, distributed, open ledgers; consensus protocols, voting, mining; chains of trust;
bitcoin, ripple• Network effects, winner takes all
Week 11: the internationalcontext
• How cross-border and cross-currency transactions work• International standards bodies & development
organizations • Success cases from developed countries• Tackling exclusion in developing countries
• Remittances, correspondent banks, SWIFT, • Principles vs standards (ISO20022, EMV, PCI-DSS); development support• HCE; Apple Pay; Octopus & Oyster cards• Financial inclusion; formal vs informal; Findex 2014 payment trends;
Week 12: the broad view
• Digital finance as a platform for financial inclusion• Are we going towards a cashless society?
• Co-opetition• Currency competition, cash-lite• Liquidity crunch, contagion, bandwagon effect, too-big-to-fail, irrational exuberance
topic teaching modules Key terms introduced
Dr. Ignacio Mas Executive Director Digital Frontiers Institute
Professor Kim Wilson Director, the fletcher leadership Program for financial inclusion, the Fletcher School, Tufts University
Professor J AkerAssociate Professor of Development Economics
Professor S BlockProfessor of International Economics
Professor K BurgessAssociate Professor of Political Economy
Professor B ChakravortiSenior Associate Dean, International Business & Finance and Executive Director, Institute for Business in the Global Context
Professor K JacobsenAssociate Research Professor, Acting Director of the Feinstein International Center
Professor L JacqueWalter B. Wriston Professor of International Finance & Banking, Academic Director of the Masters of International Business
Professor I JohnstoneProfessor of International Law
fletcher faculty:
Course Hosts:
Jamilah Welch associate Director, institute for Business in the global Context, The Fletcher School, tufts University
gavin Krugel Ceo Digital frontiers institute
Dr. David Porteous Chairman Digital frontiers institute
The Certificate in Digital Money Faculty
Professor D MazuranaAssociate Research Professor, Research Director at the Feinstein International Center at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy
Professor J SalacuseHenry J. Braker Professor of Law
Professor B SimoninProfessor of Marketing and International Business
Dean J StavridisDean of The Fletcher School, Charles Francis Adams / Raytheon Dean’s Chair
Professor I WardeAdjunct Professor of International Business
Professor K WilsonDirector, The Fletcher Leadership Program for Financial Inclusion
Teaching materials will consist of instructional videos, readings, and other multimedia items. The course will be split into 12 weekly modules, and each module will typically consist of four video lectures, readings, a case for discussion, which will be introduced by video, and a range of suggested multimedia clips available from other sources.
online teaching materials
Online courses will run quarterly, and each will take three months to complete. The first cohort begins in February.
Students will need to commit 4 - 5 hours per week for the course.
Course timings
Visit www.digitalfrontiersinstitute.org and click on apply button.
register before December 2015
How to apply
Our online teaching materials have been designed to incorporate a variety of formats and pedagogical styles.
Students can go through the materials flexibly to fit their schedules, but must engage weekly by viewing video lectures, answering questions on the course content or an assigned case, and actively participating in discussion groups with fellow students.
We will encourage these student discussion groups to meet face-to-face, under the sponsorship of a local organization, but we will form virtual discussion groups for those students that are not covered by any local discussion group.
Student pacing & participation
Your Journey through the Certificate in Digital Money
All Students will be required to view all course materials, complete purpose-designed online exercises, and participate in online (or, in some cases, face-to-face) discussion groups with fellow students.
Assessable exercises will seek a balance of: (i) demonstrating command over core concepts explained in the video lecture, (ii) applying these concepts through cases or scenarios, and (iii) fact-finding to understand how these concepts apply in their own country or environment.
At the end of the course, successful students will get a Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy, Tufts University certificate.
testing & certification
In the first four weeks we will examine the functioning of typical payments systems: interbank systems, card-based retail systems, mobile money systems, and international payment systems.
In the following four weeks we will examine basic enablers on the demand side (customer attitudes and marketing approaches), the technology (identity and security), and regulation.
In the final four weeks we will examine broader industry trends, in terms of industry collaboration (such as interoperability), disruptive forces (such as bank-telco competition or the rise of crypto-currencies), and inclusion.
Weekly learning activities
Digital Frontiers Institute (DFI) will equip a new generation of digital sherpas with the information, vision and skills to guide organisations and nations on the journey to create persistent digital relationships and identities for all citizens.
We believe that the new frontier of financial inclusion is the digitization of personal commerce. Our role in driving toward this outcome is to create capacity and develop skills that are applied to the digitization of economies and ultimately lead to deeper financial inclusion.
The Founders and Executive Directors of The Institute are David Porteous as Chairman, Gavin Krugel as CEO and Ignacio Mas as Executive Director. Based in Cape Town, South Africa, DFI is a not for profit initiative run as a project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
tHe HoMe
of finteCH
ProFeSSionalS
3rd Floor, 113 Loop Street, Cape Town, South
Africa, 8001
www.digitalfrontiersinstitute.org
@DFIdotOrg
V1
DFI has developed and is offering the first known on-line, university certified, training course in Digital Financial Services.
The Certificate in Digital Money course will cover all aspects of the digital payments and digital financial services ecosystem and value chain.
Courses will run quarterly and will take three months to complete. Course materials will consist of instructional videos, recommended readings, online exercises, and on- (and to the extent possible, off-) line discussion groups with fellow students.
DFI will monitor and extract learnings from new innovations, business models, country experiences, and applied innovations through an ongoing research program.
Practitioners and scholars are appointed as fellows to drive a research agenda led by the needs of the payments community and partners of the Institute. This research will be published within the community and for the wider public benefit.
As students graduate with the initial Certificate in Digital Money, they will join an online community for FinTech Professionals that will keep them informed about global developments in this space and exposed to the latest ideas.
Monthly webinars, discussion forums and access to a data repository of materials, including ongoing research and case studies, will continue to grow the knowledge base.
The online activities will also be complemented with physical meetings, including an annual global gathering with selected thought leaders, and local in-person discussion forums sponsored by affiliated organizations in each country.
DFI will manage technical assistance to projects that lead to the further digitisation of economies in selected emerging markets where there is a high demonstration potential.
As the first step, we will undertake a disciplined scenario development process in-country. Eligible public agencies (such as Ministry of Finance or the Central Bank) will then be able to access support from the Digital Frontier Technical Assistance Fund.
train & certify research through experience
Build a professional network Managing applied innovation