The note is divided into three parts. Part One provides a conceptual framework for understanding labor market dynamics and market failures typical of platform work. It then summarizes regulatory responses to these failures based on a review of regulations from middle- and high-income countries....

This paper examines Paraguay’s vulnerability to the European Union’s Regulation on Deforestation-Free Products. Drawing on trade data, customs firm-level data, and high-resolution geospatial analysis, it assesses exposure at the country, firm, and geographic levels. The results show that...

This paper examines the rise of fintech lending in Indonesia, using a dataset of more than 139,000 individual credit records representative of the full spectrum of consumer loans in the country. The analysis reveals that fintech lending has become deeply embedded in Indonesia’s financial...

Entrepreneurs are often at the forefront of developing green technologies, circular economy models, and social enterprises. In addition, the European Union Regulation on sustainable investment aims to redirect capital flows toward environmentally sustainable activities. This paper aims to...

Stablecoins are rapidly expanding as money-like assets for payments, trading, settlement, and cross-border transfer. In response, policymakers are moving quickly to develop new regulatory frameworks to safeguard the monetary and financial system. This article develops a forward-looking,...

This paper investigates the relationship between institutional and regulatory quality, and high-tech sector investment. Using data from 25 European Union (EU) countries from 2004 to 2019 (extended to 2023 for artificial intelligence-specific analyses), the study examines how institutional...

Fusion energy, the energy that powers the stars, is now almost within our grasp. Most recent timelines agree on the second half of the 2030s for the realisation of a Fusion Energy pilot plant. For this clean, virtually carbon-neutral energy source to contribute to the mitigation of the climate...

We illustrate the coordination problem in the provision of distinctive architectural design that arises from design externalities within a quantitative model. To quantify the model, we conduct a quantitative review of a growing literature concerned with the costs and benefits of distinctive...

This paper argues that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has outlived the economic and technological conditions that justified its creation. The monopolistic telephone and spectrumscarcity environments of 1934 have been replaced by dynamic, intermodal competition across broadband,...

Decentralised Finance (DeFi) emerged in 2021 as a fast-growing crypto segment, attracting policymakers' attention due to its innovative approach of delivering financial services without relying on centralised intermediaries. This paper assesses DeFi governance arrangements for regulating and...

This study examines how geographic distance to Vietnam's centralized securities regulator-the State Securities Commission (SSC)-influences firm-level stock price crash risk. In emerging markets characterized by weak governance, corruption, and political connections, distance can erode monitoring...

Over the past years, governments have made substantial progress in tobacco control through higher taxes, advertising bans, and public smoking restrictions. Yet, in many advanced economies, smoking rates have stopped falling despite these strong measures. This stagnation suggests that traditional...

This paper introduces the concept of the superplatform to analyse and regulate Google's online advertising ecosystem. As the operator of the world's largest ad exchanges, Google often escapes regulatory oversight and scholarly scrutiny. The superplatform is conceptualised as an integrated...

Global agencies such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) play a central role in internet governance, developing the rules, guidelines, and procedures that shape both the...

Consumer consent regulation is the cornerstone of modern data privacy regulation such as the European GDPR and the Californian CCPA. By ensuring that consumers can reject any harmful data collection, the regulation seems an effective tool for protecting consumers against price discrimination. By...

Government by regulation structures how constitutional democracies normally operate. Legislatures and executive agencies enact formal rules that govern conduct, embodying the ideal of government by laws rather than by individuals. Yet regulators also govern through threats of regulation. When...

Political debates, campaigns, and advertising increasingly take place on online platforms. However, research on election communication has been significantly hampered as formerly accessible data sources have been withdrawn or commercialised. With the implementation of the EU Digital Services Act...

The discussion on Artificial Intelligence (AI) often centers around its impact on productivity, but macroeconomic evidence for Europe remains scarce. Using the Acemoglu (2024) approach we simulate the medium-term impact of AI adoption on total factor productivity for 31 European countries. We...

We illustrate the coordination problem in the provision of distinctive architectural design that arises from design externalities within a quantitative model. To quantify the model, we conduct a quantitative review of a growing literature concerned with the costs and benefits of distinctive...

Minimum standard regulations for energy-using durables have long been suspected of having hidden costs: quality improvements in the regulated dimension reduce quality in other dimensions. We substantiate this claim for the U.S. clothes washer market, which has become a notorious example of the...

The promise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in residential energy is consumer empowerment, yet without appropriate governance the emerging reality may be its opposite. As households become data producers, behavioural subjects, and operational assets within intelligent electricity networks, a...

This study reviews the literature on the impacts of Certificate-of-Need (CON) laws, which require the approval of states' health planning agencies for health care providers to engage in regulated actions such as opening or expanding facilities or purchasing equipment. Economic theory suggests...

Over the past decades, a growing body of research has examined the structural and behavioral barriers that hinder firms from adopting cost-effective technologies to improve energy efficiency. In this paper, we draw on firm-level data from the EIB Investment Survey combined with energy efficiency...

This thesis operationalises the European Health Data Space (EHDS) notion of a Secure Processing Environment (SPE) by translating technology-neutral regulatory obligations into implementable and testable platform requirements. Following a Design Science Research approach, it introduces a...

This paper studies a continuous-time regulatory problem in which a firm holds persistent private information about demand and is subject to a flow limited-liability constraint. The regulator regulates prices through a dynamic mechanism that ensures truthful reporting of the evolving type....

This study investigates the role of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance in reshaping the relationship between financial constraints and green innovation among Chinese listed firms from 2010 to 2023. We examine the double-edged sword hypothesis that financial constraints...

The Building Regulatory Capacity Assessment (BRCA) is a methodology to help countries, and cities assess their building and land use regulatory framework and identify opportunities for priority reforms and improvements. This is a pressing issue, as in many countries, rapid urbanization is...

At the request of the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA), the Monetary and Capital Markets Department (MCM) conducted a mission to review and strengthen Bhutan’s fintech regulatory sandbox (RS) framework. The mission was held from August 25 to September 2, 2025, in Thimphu, Bhutan and...

This report summarizes the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) technical assistance mission to the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA), focused on reviewing and strengthening the fintech regulatory sandbox (RS) framework. The mission, conducted from August 25 to September 2, 2025, assessed...

The paper synthesizes global experiences and key lessons in the regulation and supervision of cyber risk in the financial sector. It draws on the IMF’s financial stability surveillance and technical assistance work. It underscores the increasing frequency and complexity of cyber threats. These...

Do firms uniformly oppose regulations that increase production costs, or might industry leaders strategically support stricter standards as a competitive tool? We identify a specific mechanism through which large firms strategically support regulations to enhance their competitive position....

We study how sustainability disclosure regulation affects mutual fund flows and portfolio choices, accounting for investor heterogeneity. Guided by a model of ESG investing under uncertainty, we exploit the introduction of the European Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) as a...

I study how third-party firms respond when a platform owner enters its own marketplace, analyzing Apple's entries into App Store submarkets from 2016-2021. Using text embeddings to define markets and a staggered difference-in-differences design, I find that Apple's entry deters new competitors...

Higher temperatures can increase substance abuse and exacerbate its physiological effects on the human body, raising the risk of violent behavior. Using administrative crime records and daily temperatures in the United States between 1991 and 2023, we show that two public policies regulating...

We illustrate the coordination problem in the provision of distinctive architectural design that arises from design externalities within a quantitative model. To quantify the model, we conduct a quantitative review of a growing literature concerned with the costs and benefits of distinctive...