Certificate in Law and Regulation of Inclusive Finance

They will be selected by the Course Director in cooperation with ADA. Applicants need to be able to demonstrate an interest in inclusive finance, for example through previous work experience or a Bachelor / Master’s thesis or other publication in the field.

Additional entry requirements include:

• English language proficiency (B2 level).
• Minimum Bachelor’s degree (180 ECTS) or equivalent degree (at least three academic years).

The ADA Chair in Financial Law (Inclusive Finance) at the University of Luxembourg’s Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance, together with Appui au Développement Autonome (ADA), a non-governmental organisation in inclusive finance, and the European Investment Bank Institute launched in 2017 the Certificate in Law and Regulation of Inclusive Finance

The European Investment Bank Institute is the philanthropic arm of the European Investment Bank Group with a specific outreach towards research and education. Entering its seventh year in 2023, the programme is aimed at regulators, intermediaries and other inclusive finance organisations.

Objectives of the course

The objective of the programme is to deepen the participants’ specific knowledge and skills in the field of inclusive finance law and regulation, with a focus on developing countries. In order to achieve this objective:

• Interactive courses are taught by European and international academics, practitioners from International Organisations and representatives of leading law and accountancy firms who promote discussions, argumentation and negotiation as an integral part of their teaching effort.
• Besides their participation in courses, participants will have the opportunity to work on case studies and will prepare oral presentations.

Moreover, participants will acquire intercultural competences, preparing them for work in international environments while also benefiting from a network of informal relations, useful for their future. It is also planned to facilitate networking among alumni through a semiformal alumni organisation, enabling participants to maintain these relations in the long-term.

Lectures include the following topics:

• financial law requirements for supervisory cooperation and funding non-European financial intermediaries;
• the organisational set-up of inclusive finance intermediaries from developed and developing countries, e.g. microfinance investment funds and the AIFMD; the role of the European Investment Bank Group;
• the influence of ethics and culture on financial intermediation;
• mobile banking and FinTech issues with regard to developing countries as well as the interaction between Luxembourg / Europe and developing countries;
• investor and client protection rules; and
• principles set up by inclusive finance governance initiatives, in particular the Principles for Responsible Investments (PRI).

The programme aims at ensuring awareness of the topic of law and regulation in the inclusive finance sector, enabling an exchange with regulators and financial intermediaries, and facilitating further academic and non-academic cooperation.

So far close to 160 professionals over 40 countries have benefited from the programme.

Participants will attend between 6 and 8 TU per day, divided into traditional lectures and workshops / case studies on inclusive finance topics with various partners from Luxembourg and from all over the world.
Workshops will be held from Monday to Friday in the first week and from Monday to Thursday in the second week.

The programme’s teaching staff brings together internal University of Luxembourg academics and external experts from other universities as well as practitioners, such as inclusive finance field workers, lawyers, accountants and representatives of inclusive finance
institutions.

Beyond the core staff, other experienced faculty from the following institutions will teach classes:

• ADA
• European Investment Bank Group staff
• Law and auditing firms with IF experience