LIN  WILLIAM  CONG

Lin William Cong is the President’s Chair Professor in Finance, Computing and Data Science at Nanyang Technological University, with joint appointments at Nanyang Business School (Associate Dean and Professor in the Banking and Finance Division) and the College of Computing and Data Science (Professor in Data Science and AI Divisions). Prior to joining NTU, he served as the Rudd Family Endowed Chair Professor of Management and Finance, and faculty director for the FinTech initiative at Cornell University, and on the Finance faculty at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. He is also an Editor at the Management Science, an editorial board member for multiple leading academic and practitioner journals, a Research Associate (senior research fellow) at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), a Research Fellow at the European Centre of Economic Policy Research (CEPR), and a senior fellow and founding track director (“Tech, Digital Markets and AI”) at the Asian Bureau of Finance and Economic Research (ABFER), a faculty scientist at the Initiative for Cryptocurrencies & Contracts (IC3), the founding director of Center of AI for Social Science at Shenzhen Loop Area Institute (SLAI), and a lead founder of multiple international research forums (www.CBER-Forum.org and www.ABFR-Forum.org). He is also a member of multiple professional organizations such as the American Economic Association, European Finance Association, and the Econometric Society. 

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Cong’s research spans financial economics, information economics, AI, FinTech, digital economy, and entrepreneurship, and has been featured in Bloomberg, CNN, the Economist, Washington Post, etc. With coauthors from interdisciplinary fields, he has pioneered AI for finance and social science, generative modeling for economics, information design in finance, and has laid the foundations of tokenomics (covering categorization of tokens, cryptocurrency pricing, central bank digital currencies/payment systems, and optimal token monetary policy design), analyzed centralization issues and dynamic incentives in blockchains and DeFi, and developed data analytics for detecting market manipulation and better FinTech regulation, among others. His coauthors and he were among the earliest to point the environmental harm of mining pools, wash trading on unregulated crypto exchanges, the problem of vertical integration in CeFi that underlies the FTX collapse, and the lack of financial infrastructure in onchain ecosystems. He is one of the most published and cited FinTech researchers in the world and was ranked as a top 5 young economist by IDEA. He also ranks the 6th highest for theory citations among all Finance Theory Group members who graduated after 2000. His research has been recognized with over 100 conference best paper prizes and competitive grants, including the inaugural Empire AI Compute grants, Best Paper Prize at Management Science, CBER-Circle Insight Prize, China International Conference of Finance Best Paper Award, and Exponential Science Award.

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Cong was formerly a Kauffman Foundation Junior Faculty Fellow, a Ripple’s UBRI Educator Awardee, a Poets & Quants 40 under 40 World Best Business School Professor, a 2022 Top 10 Quant Professor, a George Shultz Scholar at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research,  and a doctoral fellow at the Stanford Institute for Innovation in Developing Economies. He has also taught, or guest lectured at other universities such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, and Wharton, and advised leading investment and FinTech firms including a16z (ad hoc), Amino Capital, Ansatz Capital, Ava Labs, Blackrock, Citi, Chainlink (inaugural senior economic advisor), DataYes, HoloBit (Chief Scientist), and Modular Asset management. In addition, he has been consulted regarding FinTech regulation and prominent litigation cases, by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, FBI agents, and New York State Office of the Attorney General, among others,  and has advise government and regulatory agencies such as the Asset Management Association of China, Bank of Canada, Department of Justice, Department of the Treasury, and the New York State Department of Financial Services. For his expertise and original work, Prof. Cong has been a highly sought-after keynote speaker or panelist at various industry events, research conferences, and policy forums. He has spoken and taught at hundreds of world-renowned universities, venture funds, investment and trading shops, and government agencies such as Alibaba, IMF, Monetary Authority of Singapore, and federal reserve banks.

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Cong earned a Ph.D. in Finance and a MS in Statistics from Stanford University, where he served as the president of Ph.D. students association, received the Asian American Award for Graduate Leadership, and was recognized with the Lieberman Fellowship for outstanding contributions in research, teaching, and university service. He also holds dual degrees from Harvard University where he graduated summa cum laude and top in the Physics department (perfect GPA for major courses), with an A.M. in Physics, an A.B. in Math & Physics, a minor in Economics, and a language citation in French. Cong is a native of Shenyang, China, and has lived in Canada and Singapore, as well as in the United States for over 20 years, and has sojourned in Hong Kong, Japan and the UK. Cong enjoys Chinese calligraphy, reading, sports, fitness, guitar, as well as learning French and Japanese. He is also passionate about education, China-U.S. relations, technology innovations, and integrating fundamental valuation, quantitative trading, and digital technology in investments and financial services.