About ITFG

ITFG is a Cyprus-registered non-profit studying the governance of digital financial systems: independent, citable, and free of commercial constraint.

Why ITFG exists

ITFG is a platform for knowledge sharing and cooperation at the intersection of technology, finance, and governance. It brings researchers, regulators, and practitioners together around rigorous, independent analysis of how digital financial systems are governed. That analysis is technically grounded, legally precise, free of commercial influence, and published for public benefit.

The past decade of digital finance has produced a body of analysis that is, in large part, analytically incomplete. The technical literature understands the architecture of the systems being built but treats their governance as an afterthought. The regulatory literature understands the legal frameworks but often engages with the underlying technology at a level of abstraction that makes the analysis imprecise. The policy literature connects the two but rarely with enough depth in either to be genuinely useful to the people who need it.

ITFG was founded in 2026 as a response to this gap, and to a specific observation about where European research on digital finance governance does and does not exist. Cyprus, the European Union’s most proportionally active regulated fintech jurisdiction, had no independent research institution at this intersection. The perspective of smaller member states with large, active, closely supervised fintech sectors, a perspective that is distinctive and underrepresented in European policy discourse, was not being articulated by any institution with the research independence to articulate it credibly.

The institute is established as a private company limited by guarantee: a legal structure that exists in Cyprus precisely for organisations whose purposes are public and non-commercial. Its constitutional documents prohibit lobbying and the representation of commercial interests. These are not policy choices that a future board might reverse; they are the legal foundation of the organisation.

The work begins from a single premise: that understanding how digital financial systems are and should be governed requires holding technology, finance, and governance in view simultaneously, with rigour, and without commercial constraint.

What we do

ITFG is a platform for knowledge sharing and cooperation. Research is the method: it produces the shared body of analysis that gives the cooperation substance, and it keeps the conversation grounded in evidence rather than assertion or interest.

ITFG produces and publishes research in five areas: the digitalization of regulatory and supervisory practice; the governance frameworks for digital financial services; artificial intelligence in financial services; the role of open standards and sovereign infrastructure in financial system governance; and the specific experience of smaller EU member states with disproportionately large regulated fintech sectors.

We publish research notes: short, citable analyses of specific regulatory or technical questions. Policy briefs: structured analyses addressed to specific legislative or regulatory developments, submitted as formal consultation responses where appropriate. Working papers: longer research documents circulating for academic comment and available through SSRN. Perspectives: analytical commentary on current developments. Event summaries: records of the roundtables and seminars ITFG convenes.

All publications are free to access and permanently archived at tfg.institute. We ask only that they are cited correctly when used.

We organise research roundtables, seminars, and workshops, initially small, invitation-based, and online, expanding to in-person events as the institution grows. We engage with public consultations from EU regulatory authorities and submit formal responses where our research supports a position.

We collaborate with academic researchers, regulatory professionals, and policy specialists, not as contracted advisers, but as independent researchers contributing to a body of work that serves the public interest.

What we do not do

These are not disclaimers. They are affirmative statements about the kind of institution ITFG is.

We do not lobby. ITFG does not seek to influence regulation in the direction of any commercial interest. We do not retain relationships with regulated entities for the purpose of advancing their positions in regulatory or legislative processes. Our constitutional documents prohibit this.

We do not represent industry. We are not a trade association, a professional body, or a chamber of commerce. We do not have dues-paying corporate members. Our research does not reflect the negotiated consensus of stakeholder groups.

We do not provide paid advice. We do not sell research to individual clients. We do not offer regulatory consultancy, compliance advice, or commercial advisory services. Our work is published for public benefit, not sold to paying clients.

We do not produce consensus documents. Our outputs reflect our researchers’ best analytical judgment, not the averaged views of interested parties or the positions of any funding source.

The organisation’s independence is structural. It is embedded in the founding documents, verifiable in the public register, and not dependent on the restraint of any individual or the goodwill of any funder.

ITFG is incorporated in Cyprus as a private company limited by guarantee without share capital, under The Companies Law, Cap. 113. This is the standard legal structure in Cyprus for non-profit organisations operating in the public interest.

The institute is registered with the Cyprus Registrar of Companies under number HE 498068. Its registered office is at Chrysanthou Mylona 1, Panayides Building, 2nd Floor, Office 1, 3030 Limassol, Cyprus.

In a company limited by guarantee, there are no shareholders and no share capital. Members undertake to contribute a defined amount, in ITFG’s case €1,000, to the assets of the company in the event of winding up. Any surplus funds are applied exclusively to the organisation’s objects; no dividend, gift, or distribution may be made to members. On dissolution, any remaining assets are transferred to an organisation with comparable objects.

This structure is chosen because it makes the non-profit character of the organisation legally binding rather than merely stated. The independence that ITFG claims is not a brand promise; it is a legal constraint on what the organisation can do with its resources and on whose behalf it can act.

The founding documents are public records and are available on request.

Founding membership

ITFG was established by Synthonyx Technologies Ltd, its first founding member. As a company limited by guarantee, ITFG is constituted around members rather than shareholders, and it is now building its founding membership: a small group of organisations and individuals committed to its objects and to the independence written into its constitution.

Leadership

ITFG’s work is led by Arjan van Eersel. His professional background spans software development, IT infrastructure, corporate services, token engineering, and financial regulation, including architecture-level work in the fintech and digital banking sector.

ITFG was created to be an institution that did not yet exist: one that can engage with the technical reality of digital financial systems and the legal and governance frameworks that govern them, from a position of genuine independence.