Finance and technology have moved in lockstep throughout history, from the abacus to the algorithm. But the increasing complexity of money matters, coupled with regulatory grey areas around emerging digital technologies, mean that lawyers have a growing role in shaping future financial systems.
“Shortening settlement cycles makes the market safer and more efficient,” says Katz. “The trading environment has been reduced to near perfection in terms of speed.” “It’s taken a long time to create that bifurcation between speculative activity [in products such as bitcoin] and productive activity in changing the underpinnings of the markets,” he says.
The use of a stablecoin which, by its centralised nature, can be tracked easily, offers chances for future work in the field, he adds. “One of the hardest things [in the digital assets space at the moment] is how mainstream financial services players are de-risking themselves from crypto-related businesses,” he says.