The Digital Currency Revolution

Lourdes Casanova is the Gail and Roberto Cañizares Director of the Cañizares Center for Emerging Markets and a Senior Lecturer at Cornell University’s Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management. Formerly of the strategy department at INSEAD, Dr. Casanova specializes in international business with a focus on Latin America and multinationals from emerging markets.

In 2014 and 2015, Dr. Casanova was named one of the 50 most influential Iberoamerican intellectuals by Esglobal. She is a member of the board of directors of Boyce Thompson Institute.

Dr. Casanova is a Fulbright Scholar who holds a Ph.D. from Universidad de Barcelona and an M.A. from the University of Southern California.

Dr. Mark Mobius is synonymous with emerging and frontier markets, investing with a reputation as one of the most successful and influential money managers over the past 30 years. He is Chairman of Mobius Emerging Opportunities Fund.

Dr. Mobius is widely known as a pioneer in emerging market investing. In 1987, he was appointed by Sir John Templeton to run one of the world’s first emerging market funds. Dr. Mobius went on to spend more than three decades at Franklin Templeton Investments, most recently as Executive Chairman of the Templeton Emerging Markets Group. Under his leadership, the group’s assets under management grew from US$100 million to a whopping US$50 billion with the successful launches of numerous investment funds focused on Asia, Latin America, Africa, and Eastern Europe.

Dr. Mobius has also contributed to developing international policies for emerging markets. He served on the World Bank’s Global Corporate Governance Forum as a member of the Private Sector Advisory Group and as co-chairman of its Investor Responsibility Task Force in 1999.

Dr. Mobius has won numerous industry awards and has authored 13 books, including “The Inflation Myth” and “The Wonderful World of Deflation,” which has gained international acclaim. In October 2022, World Economic Forum selected the book as one of the five must-read books on inflation. Dr. Mobius earned his Ph.D in Economics and Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1964. He has also studied at Boston University, University of Wisconsin, Syracuse University, Kyoto University, and the University of New Mexico.

John Ninia is the co-founder, along with Mark Mobius, of Mobius Investments, a global investment firm specializing in emerging and frontier markets. Mr. Ninia plays a central role in shaping the firm’s macroeconomic outlook, investment strategy, and thematic research, with a particular focus on technology, energy, and financial systems in developing economies. He integrates deep fundamental analysis with the strategic use of derivatives to optimize portfolio performance, hedge risk, and capture high-conviction opportunities in complex market environments.

Mr. Ninia began his academic career as a Hunter R. Rawlings III Research Scholar at Cornell University. While conducting research at Cornell’s SC Johnson College of Business and the Emerging Markets Institute, he focused on the evolution of mobile payment platforms in Asia. His early work on China’s digital payment systems catalyzed his longstanding interest in the transformative potential of digital finance, including central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).

Mr. Ninia’s decision to relocate to Dubai during the COVID-19 pandemic marked a turning point in his professional development, immersing him in one of the world’s most dynamic fintech ecosystems. From this global hub, he has led investment research across Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East, examining how digital infrastructure, monetary innovation, and regulatory frameworks influence capital markets. These experiences have informed his nuanced perspective on how CBDCs can reinforce — or disrupt — financial inclusion, monetary sovereignty, and cross-border settlement systems.

Informed by both on-the-ground exposure and institutional investment experience, Mr. Ninia’s work continues to explore how central banks, investors, and innovators navigate the complex trade-offs at the core of digital monetary transformation.

Sharwari Pandit read law at the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), and graduated with Honours from its B.A., LL.B program in 2017. During this time, she served as an Editor of the Socio-Legal Review and the Deputy Chief Editor of the National Law School of India Review from 2016 to 2017, which has been cited by the Supreme Court of India on multiple occasions.

Ms. Pandit’s research at this time focused on issues related to regulation of emerging technologies and has contributed to academic publications such as “March of the Law” (Vol. 10) and “Cyber Crime Laws” (Handbook Vol. 1). In 2017, she was also nominated by the National Law School of India to undertake an academic term at Queen Mary University of London.

Ms. Pandit started her career with Unilever as a Fellow in their legacy Unilever Future Leadership Program, focusing on India and Singapore during her training. From 2018, Ms. Pandit practiced law as an in-house legal counsel specializing in technology and privacy laws at Unilever, where she also supported advocacy and regulatory policy efforts for the Asia Pacific region in the field of e-commerce, data privacy, and anti-counterfeiting regulations. This included engagement with the government of India and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI).

In 2023, Ms. Pandit graduated with a Forte Fellowship from the Cornell Johnson Graduate School of Management with a Master’s in Business Administration. During this time, she also served as a Fellow at the Emerging Markets Institute. Ms. Pandit’s research on central bank digital currencies, transformative digital payment systems and financial inclusion in emerging markets has been published by The Diplomat and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), among others.

Ms. Pandit is currently a management consultant at McKinsey & Company in Washington, D.C. During her tenure, she has advised leading global banks, financial institutions and Fortune 500 technology companies on issues related to risk and regulatory practices, digital strategy, and financial growth.