Chairperson's Letter
Dear IAFICO friends,
The International Academy of Financial Consumers (IAFICO) was founded in 2015 by Hongjoo Jung and a group of scholars who agree with its vision. Unlike traditional research methods in the financial field, IAFICO aims to investigate consumer issues across the financial fields of banking, securities, and insurance. This research method is widely recognized around the world as financial products in which insurance, banking, and securities are integrated are becoming increasingly popular.
As the new Chairman of IAFICO for a three-year term beginning in January 2023, I am going to carry on and further develop the efforts and successes of the pioneers.
Hongmu Lee
Professor, Waseda University
First, IAFICO publishes the International Review of Financial Consumers(IRFC), and we have asked Professor Sharon Tennyson at Cornell University, former editor of the Journal of Consumer Affairs, to serve as Editor-in-Chief of IRFC beginning July 2019. I will support Sharon Tennyson's work to ensure that IRFC gets solid prestige. IAFICO has also published two high-quality professional books on financial consumer issues through the Book Project. With both the Book Project and IRFC, IAFICO intends to deliver high quality research results to the world.
Second, IAFICO has hosted an annual conference, the Global Forum for Financial Consumers (GFFC), to disseminate the results of its members' research to the world and to strengthen interactions among members. The GFFC is scheduled to be held at Waseda University in Japan in 2023 and Cornell University in the United States in 2024. We hope to make this GFFC a substantial and continuing event.
Third, IAFICO has about 180 members from more than 20 countries. However, it is undeniable that there is a bias in the countries to which members belong and that they are not distributed in a balanced manner among the financial categories of insurance, banking, and securities. We would like to actively acquire new members so that we can conduct well-balanced research on each financial business category.
Rapid changes in the financial environment in the era of digital transformation have created many new challenges for financial consumer protection. In addition, the role of finance is also required to address environmental and poverty issues such as climate change and pollution, etc. IAFICO would like to work on proposals for solving new financial challenges and protecting financial consumers, and to encourage financial service providers to take action to solve these challenges. Furthermore, we wish to contribute to the inclusion of marginalized financial consumer groups and to increase the financial literacy of financial consumers with respect to financial services.
IAFICO sincerely hopes that by working together, all of our members can contribute to the protection of financial consumers from a global perspective by investigating these emerging issues and providing solutions.
I wish all our members good health and look forward to your further excellent research results.
Hongmu Lee
Chairperson, IAFICO