I am a co-founder, Executive Director, and former Chairman of Monerium, where I proposed the original concept and helped build the company as the first globally regulated institution to issue fiat currency directly on public blockchains - aka stablecoins.
My work focuses on stablecoins, on-chain liquidity, tokenized credit, and the restructuring of foreign exchange, payments, and deposits.
I was appointed by Parliament to serve on the Supervisory Board of the Central Bank of Iceland from 2013 to 2017, later as Chairman. Later I was appointed by the Prime Minister on advising on lifting capital controls — a successful case study later cited by the IMF. I most recently advised the Ministry of Finance on residential mortgage market reform (final report, January 2025).
My research on tokenization and monetary systems has been presented at Oxford Saïd Business School with the Bank of England. My work includes the most-read paper ever in the Journal of Applied Economics and a mathematical model published in the Proceedings of the IEEE, recognised in The Best Writing on Mathematics.
After the financial crisis, I worked with InDefence, and co-founded Advice and contributed to the Icesave referendums rejecting the socialization of private banking losses — a decision later upheld by the EFTA Court as legally correct.
I previously led Klak, led and co-founded Mentis and Netskil (both later acquired by banks), led and founded Seed Forum Iceland and Seed Forum USA.
I hold a PhD in Economics and an MSc in Engineering, have taught financial engineering and MBA courses, and am an Executive Fellow at King’s College London and affiliate member of the Qatar Centre for Global Banking and Finance.
I write for Forbes, comment and publish op-eds in e.g. the Financial Times, Euronews, and CoinDesk.
Jon Helgi Egilsson