Securities Law Commons^™

Disruptive Technology And Securities Regulation, Chris Brummer

Fordham Law Review

Nowhere has disruptive technology had a more profound impact than in financial services—and yet nowhere do academics and policymakers lack a coherent theory of the phenomenon more, much less a coherent set of regulatory prescriptions. Part of the challenge lies in the varied channels through which innovation upends market practices. Problems also lurk in the popular assumption that securities regulation operates against the backdrop of stable market gatekeepers like exchanges, broker-dealers, and clearing systems—a fact scenario increasingly out of sync in twenty-first-century capital markets.

This Article explains how technological innovation “disrupts” not only capital markets but also the exercise of …