Peter J. Ryan
Managing Director, Head of Digital Assets and International Policy, SIFMA
Dr. Peter Ryan is Managing Director, Head of Digital Assets and International Policy at the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA), where he also serves on the organization’s Management Committee. He leads SIFMA’s Digital Assets and International Policy Group, overseeing the organization’s work on digital assets, financial innovation, and international financial policy.
As head of SIFMA’s digital assets team, Dr. Ryan serves as staff advisor to SIFMA’s Digital Assets Committee, coordinating the organization’s policy, regulatory, and operational work related to tokenization, digital asset market structure, payment stablecoins and other forms of digital money, the prudential treatment of digital asset activities, and the integration of digital assets into the trading lifecycle. His work focuses on how regulatory frameworks can evolve to support innovation while maintaining core investor protections and market integrity.
Dr. Ryan oversees SIFMA’s international policy agenda, including the organization’s engagement with international policymakers and global standard-setting bodies such as the Financial Stability Board, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, and IOSCO, as well as coordination with SIFMA’s international affiliates, AFME and ASIFMA, and joint advocacy through the Global Financial Markets Association. His responsibilities include advocacy on the development and U.S. implementation of international financial standards, as well as issues affecting internationally headquartered financial institutions operating in the United States, spanning capital, liquidity, resolution, governance, and systemic risk.
Dr. Ryan has held a range of roles at SIFMA, including as Head of International Capital Markets and Strategic Initiatives, where he helped lead the organization’s advocacy on prudential issues and coordinated its work on emerging regulatory topics. He continues to contribute to SIFMA’s broader regulatory strategy on cross-cutting issues at the intersection of financial innovation and capital markets, including prudential regulation, non-bank financial intermediation, and Treasury market reform.
Before joining SIFMA in 2020, Dr. Ryan served as Head of U.S. Regulatory Policy at Credit Suisse, where he led U.S. regulatory strategy, policy development, and regulatory engagement across the firm’s banking, capital markets, and asset management businesses. He also served as Acting Head of U.S. Public Policy, coordinating the firm’s legislative advocacy and political activities. His earlier roles at Credit Suisse included Director, U.S. Regulatory Policy and Emerging Issues, and Vice President, Federal Regulatory Affairs. Earlier in his career, he was a senior policy advisor with the Financial Regulatory Reform Initiative at the Bipartisan Policy Center.
Dr. Ryan holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, where his research examined the development of global bank capital standards and derivatives policy. He also holds an M.Phil. in political science from Trinity College Dublin and a B.Sc. in government and public policy from University College Cork.