Where Great Minds Converge: How Leeds Built a Consumer Finance Research Powerhouse

Since its founding in 2010, Leeds’ Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making (CFDM) has evolved into a world-renowned hub uniting scholars, policymakers and industry experts to solve global challenges.

When John Lynch, now a University of Colorado distinguished professor, joined the marketing faculty at CU Boulder in 2009, he and his colleagues envisioned an interdisciplinary center to harness CU’s excellence in decision-making. He founded the Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making (CFDM) at Leeds in 2010, and with Donald Lichtenstein, professor of marketing, he co-founded the Boulder Summer Conference on Consumer Financial Decision Making. At the time, research on this topic was limited and siloed across academic disciplines. “We had nobody in the school working in this area back then. I had written one paper before coming to CU,” Lynch recalled, “and then the finance group hired some people who by now are tenured and very influential people in the school. Today, we’re absolutely one of the best in the world on this topic.” CFDM is now renowned for its annual conference, interdisciplinary seminar series and acclaimed faculty.

An innovative conference

CFDM’s annual Boulder Summer Conference on Consumer Financial Decision Making unites global experts from fields ranging from finance to public health. The 2025 conference featured a keynote address from University of Texas at Austin Professor John M. Griffin about criminal networks carrying out online financial scams, and a roundtable discussion with Devesh Raval of the Federal Trade Commission and Amy Cutts, a former Equifax chief economist.

The conference’s plenary sessions merge research and industry expertise. Scholars present their research and leaders from the private or public sector synthesize their ideas. Asaf Bernstein, the co-director of the CFDM, stressed this model’s uniqueness. “There’s a lot of talk in academic circles and in universities about being interdisciplinary,” he said. “But I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a situation that is as true to that as the center and as the conference.”

All-star faculty

 

 Looking at the approach that my colleagues in other disciplines take helps to broaden the scope of my own work and think about different methods and approaches to research. 

Rodrigo Dias, assistant professor of marketing

CFDM faculty have published in top peer-reviewed journals and have been recognized for their impact on the work.

A 2019 paper by Bernstein, Assistant Professor of Finance Ryan Lewis and Pennsylvania State University professor Matthew Gustafson on rising sea levels’ effect on home costs was named to a 2020 Financial Times list of the business research papers with the most social impact.

Emily Gallagher, Arnold R. Weber Faculty Scholar and associate professor of finance, examines the impact of policy and natural disasters on consumer finance. Her work has appeared in outlets like MarketWatch, CityLab and National Public Radio. She has also worked with public policy researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. “A lot of my work is motivated by questions that policymakers are actively grappling with,” she said.

CFDM’s reputation attracts new research talent, such as Michael Gropper, assistant professor of finance, who joined Leeds in 2024. “The opportunity to interact and work with these incredible scholars is one I did not want to pass up,” he said of scholars like Bernstein and Gallagher.

The group has also had a significant influence on public policy. Lynch served on the Academic Research Council for the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and both Bernstein and Nicholas Reinholtz, assistant professor and RK Landmark Faculty Scholar, have served as advisors for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Interdisciplinary DNA

Through its series of internal and external seminars, CFDM encourages cross-discipline discussion. Rodrigo Dias, assistant professor of marketing, said sharing his work with finance and accounting researchers “fosters productivity.” “Looking at the approach that my colleagues in other disciplines take helps to broaden the scope of my own work and think about different methods and approaches to research,” he said.

Interdisciplinary collaboration is embedded in CFDM’s DNA. Gallagher pointed out that consumer finance requires insights from psychology, sociology and public health. 

“Because the questions are so grounded in people’s everyday lives, the research can have real impact, whether it’s informing regulation, designing better financial products or just helping people make more informed choices," she said. 

The CFDM model is the springboard for Leeds’ new Initiative for Global Business Impact and Citizen Well-Being, launched in fall 2025. Learn more about it. >>