David Birch

David Birch serves as a Senior Research Fellow at King's Business School, King's College London, affiliated with the Qatar Centre for Global Banking & Finance. He is also a Digital Fellow at the University of Exeter Business School's DIGIT Lab. His career spans decades in digital financial services innovation.

His research focuses on the convergence of digital identity and digital money systems. Key areas include the societal impact of cashless economies, programmable digital currencies, and the geopolitical implications of competing digital currency systems. He argues that technological evolution is returning money to community-based systems while adding unprecedented intelligence and traceability.

Birch's work emphasizes how mobile technology, social networks, and biometrics will enable corporations and communities to issue their own 'digital fiat' currencies. His analysis of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) versus private digital currencies frames current developments as a 'Currency Cold War' with significant implications for global financial power structures.

His advisory roles include Non-Executive Chairman of Digiseq Ltd and board positions at Tillo, PaymentWorks, Au10tix, and YourSafe. He is Honorary President of EEMA (European e-ID Association) and contributes regularly to Forbes and Financial World.