HISTORY - Our History in brief
IIEC (Italian International Economic Center) was born on the initiative of Paolo Savona of the LUISS Guido Carli University and Michele Fratianni of Indiana University with the aim of studying the functioning of the global market after the end of the Bretton Woods Agreement.
As known, this event was mainly caused by the development of the Eurodollar, a banking innovation that had expropriated the monetary sovereignty of the United States.
George Sutija of the International University of Miami asked to join the IIEC by creating the PACE (Permanent Advisor Committee on Eurodollars) which held two international conferences on monetary and banking issues, the proceedings of which were published by MacMillan.
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The IIEC founded the Open Economies Review, which Fratianni directed with mastery, to pass the direction after about 10 years to prof. George Tavlas of the Bank of Greece, elevating it among the Journals whose publications were considered for the evaluation of the performance H-index. The Open Economies Review is still published by the prestigious Springer, famous editor of international scientifical publications.
Towards the end of the last century, a new innovation burst onto the global market - derivatives.
The IIEC, allied with the Guido Carli Association of Rome and the Cesifin Alberto Predieri Foundation of Florence, devoted itself to examining the problem that would lead to the global financial crisis of 2008, giving rise to seven international Conferences curated by Iftekhar Hasan, Managing editor of the Journal of financial Stability, published in as many notebooks.
The development of cryptocurrencies, the third wave of innovation that exploded in global finance, prompted the creators of the IIEC to relaunch their activity, starting with a review of the monetary cycle which led to a more direct involvement of monetary policy in financial stability and the return of the inflation.
This latest research work has resulted in a book titled “Monetary Policy Normalization, One Hundred Years After Keynes' Tract on Monetary Reform”, published in 2023 by Springer, edited by Paolo Savona and Rainer Masera, on which subject matter experts collaborated and was supported by the Cesifin Alberto Predieri Foundation and Marconi University in Rome.
Available at this link: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-38708-1
The Italian International Economic Center
is a research center dedicated to the developments of Data Science
and AI case studies in the various fields of Economic Policies and Best Practices
MISSION
Our mission is to combine the potential of artificial intelligence to transform financial data analysis into forecasting, risk management, market sentiment analysis and financial fraud prevention models.
The forecasting models will be based on solid mathematical theories and advanced artificial intelligence techniques, which have already been tested to identify behavioral trends and structural composition of the financial and monetary market, providing precise information for choices to be made in an increasingly complex and volatile environment.
Financial risk management will use advanced IT tools, supported by high mathematics tools.
By exploiting AI (Artificial Intelligence) and advanced mathematical techniques, it is possible to assess financial risks more efficiently and accurately, allowing for timely preventive measures.
The market sentiment analysis must be conducted using sophisticated techniques and computer models to capture the moods of public opinion and investors.
Alternative data analysis, including satellite and geospatial, ESG, and social media, enables the formulation of increasingly efficient strategies.
Large language models can analyze vast amounts of unstructured data, to detect nuanced shifts in market sentiment.
Furthermore, these models can identify trends and sentiment changes more rapidly and comprehensively than traditional methods.
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​The IIEC has a staff of data scientists who have been implementing forecasting algorithms in various subjects for years (trends in stock market prices, raw material prices, qualitative analysis - at a scientific level - of biotech companies, analysis of financial fraud).
IIEC SCIENTIFICAL COMMITTEE
Rainer Masera
Economist and Academic
An Italian economist and academic, he holds a PhD in economics from Oxford University.
He holds an honorary degree in International and Diplomatic Sciences from the Faculty of Political Science at the University of Turin.
Without belonging to any political partiy, he was Minister of Budget and Economic Planning in the government led by Lamberto Dini from 1995 to 1996.
Mr Masera has held various positions in state and private institutions, including board member of the Bank for International Settlements, central director of the Bank of Italy, CEO and president of the Sanpaolo IMI Group and RFI SpA, and expert member of the board of the European Investment Bank. He is currently a faculty member at the Guglielmo Marconi University in Rome and dean of the business school.
Michele Fratianni
Indiana University
He is Professor Emeritus at the Kelley School of Business of Indiana University (Bloomington, Indiana) and Professor of Economics at the Università Politecnica delle Marche (Ancona, Italy). He has held contemporary positions at the Catholic University of Louvain (1974-1991), Marquette University (1995, Distinguished Professor of International Economics), Free University of Berlin (1995, Bundesbank Professor of International Monetary Economics), as well as visiting positions at the Catholic University of Milan (1985) and the University of Rome La Sapienza (1991). He has also worked in government and international organisations, such as the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers (1981-1982, Senior Staff Economist)
and the Commission of the European Communities (1976-1979, Economic Adviser), and has been a consultant to the Italian government (various ministries), the Bank of Italy, and the governments of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Vietnam on domestic and international monetary issues. He is the Founder and current member of the Board of Advisors of Open Economies Review, Editor of the Rivista Italiana degli Economisti, and member of the Editorial Board of the Review of International Organisations. Professor Fratianni's research interests include international monetary economics, international trade, international economic policy and monetary history.
George Tavlas
Alternate to the Governor of the Bank of Greece Governing Council of the European Central Bank, Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University
He is a Greek-American economist. He has served as Alternate to the Governor of the Bank of Greece for the European Central Bank since 2008. He is also a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University. Tavlas was the Director General of the Bank of Greece from 2010 to 2013, and a member of the General Council and the Monetary Policy Council of the Bank of Greece from 2013 to 2020.
He also acted as an advisor to the bank's governors during Greece's entry into the Eurozone and played a role in the management and resolution of the Greek government debt crisis. He began his career as an economist in the U.S.
Department of State, and was an advisor to the World Bank and the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development. Before joining the Bank of Greece, he served as Division Chief at the International Monetary Fund. In addition to his roles at the Bank of Greece, from 2016 to 2019, Tavlas served on the Supervisory Board of the Hellenic Corporation for Assets and Participations (HCAP), the Greek state sovereign wealth fund. During his tenure, he assisted in the creation and implementation of policies responsible for the privatisation of state assets in Greece and the supervision of the portfolio of Greek state assets. In 2023 he has published The Monetarists: The Making of the Chicago Monetary Tradition, 1927 to 1960 (published by the University of Chicago Press), illustrating a detailed history of the development of the economic school of thought Monetarism. He is currently member of the Governing Council of the European Central Bank.
Jan Kregel
Tailjn University
Kregel has been Professor of Finance and Development at Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia since 2006. He holds the position of Adjunct Professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS, where he co-directed the Bologna Centre in the late 1980s, and is a Visiting Professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. He is also a Senior Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College. Until 2007, he was Head of the Branch of Policy Analysis and Development in the Office of Financing for Development of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. Until 2004, he served as Senior Expert in International Finance and Macroeconomics at UNCTAD's New York Liaison Office, being its de facto Chief Economist.
For many years, he held the Chair of Political Economy at the University of Bologna. Kregel studied mainly atCambridge University (with Joan Robinson and Nicholas Kaldor) and Rutgers University (Ph.D. 1970 under Paul Davidson). He is a Life Fellow of the Royal Economic Society in London and in 2000 co-founded The Other Canon, a centre and network for research in heterodox economics, with principal founder and executive chairman Erik Reinert. Kregel is the programme director for the Master of Science in Economic Theory and Policy at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, a programme launched in 2014.
Donato Masciandaro
Full Professor of Economics at Bocconi University
He is Full Professor of Economics at Bocconi University, where he also assumed the role of Ettore Bocconi Department of Economics Liaison Officer of the SDA Bocconi School of Management since January 2017. Director of the Baffi Carefin Centre at Bocconi University, Masciandaro served as Director of the Ettore Bocconi Department of Economics and President of the Baffi Carefin Centre. He has extensive international experience, having worked as a visiting and advisor for institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank. His area of research includesmonetary and financial economics, focusing on central banking, financial regulation and illicit financial markets.
Masciandaro boasts an Impact Factor of 35 (June 2020), highlighting the considerable impact of his research in the field.
He is a member of prestigious international research networks such as RIDGE and the IRCCF, and has received major awards for his work, including the 2011 International Falcone and Borsellino Prize and the Saint Vincent Award in 1992, as well as the Bocconi Research Excellent Award in 2013. He was also a Visiting Scholar at the London School of Economics and Political Science, further underlining his international academic profile and excellence in the field of economics.
Giuseppe Italiano
LUISS University
He is Professor of Computer Science at the Luiss University, where he is also Director of the Master in Data Science and Management, the Master in Cybersecurity and the Master in Big Data and Management at the Luiss Business School. He has gained international experience as Visiting Professor at prestigious institutions such as Columbia University, the Université Paris-Sud, the Max-Planck-Institut fur Informatik in Saarbrücken and the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, as well as being a Visiting Scientist at AT&T Research Labs and Microsoft Research.
His research is predominantly focused on algorithms and in 2016 he was named a Fellow of the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science for his ‘fundamental contributions in the design and analysis of algorithms to solve theoretical and applied problems in graphs and large data sets, and for his role in establishing the field of algorithm engineering’. He has published over 300 scientific papers, advised major international companies and co-founded several technology start-ups. He has recently been appointed as member of the Italian Government commission on the application of algorithms to the editorial field, as the only technology expert. He is Dean of the newly established AI department at LUISS University.
IIEC ADVISORY BOARD
Antonio Simeone
Director LUISS Quantum AI Lab
Adjunct Professor at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome, teaching courses on ‘Data-Driven Models for Investment’, ‘Blockchain Technology & Fintech’, and ‘Fintech e Criptovalute’.
Founder of EUKLID LTD, CEO of Stoneprime US, a startup based in San Diego, California, utilizing Artificial Intelligence to invest in American biotech companies.
Founder and Director of the LUISS Quantum AI lab, a research laboratory dedicated to the application of Artificial Intelligence in financial analysis.
Founder since 2012 of the Luiss Bitcoin Lab - Discover Bitcoin, the first University observatory in Europe focused on the study of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies from a monetarist and financial perspective, utilizing AI (Genetic Algorithms and swarm intelligence).
Gianluca Teza
Distinguished PKS Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems
in Dresden (Germany).
PhD in Physics from the University of Padova.​
Formerly, Senior Postdoctoral Fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel.
Areas of expertise: Complex Systems, Statistical Mechanics, Anomalous Relaxation
Phenomena, Econophysics, Quantum Simulations.
Roberto Di Pietro
KAUST - King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
He is Full Professor in Computer Science at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia, living in the ME (Saudi, Qatar) since 2017. Prior to this, Dr. Di Pietro was the Global Head of Cybersecurity Research at Bell Labs (Alcatel-Lucent/Nokia), with a focus on strategic alignment between innovation, business, and research. His professional journey began in 1995 in the military sector as a senior technical officer within the Italian Ministry of Defense, where he served for a decade. His expertise has also been recognized through long-term consulting and institutional roles at international organizations, including the United Nations (New York – UN HQ), EUROJUST (The Hague), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA, Vienna), and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO, Geneva) and visiting renowned research institutions, such as: EURECOM, University of California Irvine, George Mason University.
He holds two master’s degrees—one in Computer Science and another in Informatics—from the University of Pisa. He also completed a two-year post-master’s specialization diploma in Operations Research and Strategic Decisions (focus on economics and game theory), followed by a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Roma “La Sapienza.”
He was elevated IEEE Fellow, ACM Distinguished Scientist as well as foreign member of Academia Europaea. He has founded a start-up (exited) and he is a board member of research organizations and start-ups. His research interests other than cybersecurity for critical infrastructures include Data Science and AI, with applications to On-line Social Networks, distributed ledger technologies, and cryptocurrencies.
James Hodson
Co-Founder and CEO of AI for Good Foundation (Affiliated ONU).
Manager, Founder of AI Research Group, 2010–2015 at Bloomberg Labs.
Scientific Consultant and CSO of Cognism.
Financial Data Science Association, Board of Directors.
Researcher, leader and entrepreneur in the fields of AI and Economics, with specific
focus on Sustainable Development, Global Information Flows, NLP and modelling
interactions in highly complex dynamic systems.
Paolo Sironi
Global Research Leader in Banking and Financial Markets at IBM, Institute for Business Value.
Founder of the German start-up Capitects, later acquired by IBM.
Headed the Quantitative Risk Management department at Banca Intesa Sanpaolo.
Author of books on digital transformation, quantitative finance and economics and keynote speaker at major international events.
Roberto Di Pietro
Monika Poettinger
PhD in Economic and Social History at Bocconi University, Milan.
Professor of economics, economic history and business administration at Bocconi University, the State University of Milan-Bicocca, the University of Florence and now Polimoda in Florence.
Manages the cultural association Opificio Toscano di Economia, Politica e Stor
Roberto Maiolino
Professor of Experimental Astrophysics at the Department of Physics, Cavendish Laboratory and at the Kavli Institute for Cosmology, University of Cambridge.
Honorary Professor at University College London.
Royal Society Research Professor.
Researcher in the area of galaxy formation and evolution and supermassive black holes.
Luigi Simeone
PhD in Engineering and Applied Mathematics at Southampton University.
Signal Processing Engineer at SIEMENS, developing projects for military, automotive and the Aero-space industries.
Chief Technology Officer at Moxoff Spa.
Guest speaker at LUISS University.
Member of SIMAI, Italian Society of Applied and Industrial Mathematics.
Kamran Usmani
35 years Trading & Leadership in Financial Markets.
Former CEO of UK FCA regulated Brokerage House.
Extensive business expertise and global network.
​Founder of MODELOMNI Technology Lab: Managing a Team of in-house Artificial Intelligence (AI) developers, mathematicians, engineers, UX experts.
Developed a blueprint for present and future Financial Market technologies.
Delivered to market a range of scalable Alpha Enhancing & Risk Management AI technologies.
Guest Speaker at LUISS University and Cambridge University.
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