Since the inception of Bitcoin in 2009, cryptoassets and decentralised finance (DeFi) have become a multi-trillion-dollar industry, with a growing number of users, entrepreneurs, investment funds and institutional investors all over the world. This has led to understandably high levels of attention from scholars, the media, and policymakers, but much of the writing on decentralised finance is polarised or polemical.

In contrast, this book provides a balanced, scholarly and sober assessment of broad questions about the very existence and purposes of decentralised finance. Drawing largely on the Austrian school of economics, particularly the ideas of Hayek and Lachmann, the book explores the stated aims of proponents of decentralised finance, particularly the goals of having decentralised governance and financial inclusion in an anonymous environment with low entry and exit barriers. Prioritising the theoretical and political aspects of decentralised finance over the financial or technological, the book considers whether these aims are realistic and whether decentralised finance can complement or substitute traditional financial mechanisms ('TradFi').

This book will be of valuable reading for economists, political scientists and policymakers, who are engaging with these key issues around cryptocurrencies and decentralised finance.

Loïc Sauce is an Associate Professor of Economics at ISTEC Business School in Paris. After obtaining his PhD in economics in 2010 from Nice Sophia-Antipolis University, he did his postdoctoral studies at New York University. He first heard about Bitcoin back in 2012. Since then, he has been fascinated with the innovativeness and vision of the crypto-ecosystem and decentralised finance that provide innovative financial services and reshape how individuals and organisations communicate, exchange, interact, and make collective decisions in the digital world. His current research focuses on decentralised finance, financial innovation, Austrian economics, and the history of economic thought.