NTU Providing Expert Advice to Government (2025)

CIEL's Contributions to Taiwan's Fintech and Financial Regulatory Reform (NATIONAL)

In 2025, CIEL (Center for Innovative Enterprise Law; 企業法制創新研究中心) faculty were invited by the Legislative Yuan, the Financial Supervisory Commission, and the Administration for Digital Industries to provide expert input on a wave of financial regulatory reforms reshaping Taiwan's digital economy—spanning virtual assets, third-party payments, financing companies, the FinTech regulatory sandbox, and financial holding company governance. Drawing on comparative legal research, CIEL faculty helped policymakers balance innovation, financial inclusion, and consumer protection, with several of their recommendations subsequently incorporated into official regulatory amendments.

Public Hearing on the Financing Companies Act
In May 2025, the Legislative Yuan held a public hearing on the proposed "Financing Companies Act." Professor Chao-Hung Chen (陳肇鴻), Deputy Director of CIEL, participated as a discussant and provided policy recommendations on the regulatory framework for financing and leasing companies. He emphasized the need to clarify policy objectives before creating new legislation and recommended strengthening existing laws and subordinate regulations in areas including interest rates, information disclosure, borrower suitability, and fair dealing, while avoiding unintended impacts on financial inclusion.

CIEL Participates in FSC Discussion on the Virtual Asset Service Act
In May 2025, Taiwan's Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) held a forum on the draft "Virtual Asset Service Act," bringing together representatives from government, industry, and academia. Professor Yueh-Ping Yang (楊岳平), Deputy Director of CIEL, was invited to represent the research team and joined officials, prosecutors, the Bankers Association, and virtual asset service providers in discussing key regulatory design issues, including stablecoin issuance and trading rules, the licensing of offshore virtual asset service providers, the applicability of the Act to DeFi, and financial institutions' entry into virtual asset and stablecoin businesses.

Deputy Director Yang Invited to Legislative Yuan Public Hearing on the Virtual Asset Service Act
In June 2025, Professor Yueh-Ping Yang, was invited by the Legislative Yuan's Finance Committee to testify at a public hearing on the draft "Virtual Asset Service Act," sharing legislative considerations on behalf of the FSC-commissioned research team. He explained that the draft law does not simply replicate any single jurisdiction's framework but draws on comparative approaches from the EU, Japan, Hong Kong, and South Korea, adapted to Taiwan's market. He further outlined the draft's strategy of regulating virtual asset service providers as financial institutions with criminal liability provisions, adopting a "regulate but not ban" stance on non-fiat-backed stablecoins, prioritizing lending services for oversight, and using a principles-based parent law supplemented by subordinate regulations to allow flexible, rolling adjustments as the industry evolves.

CIEL Deputy Director Yang Participates in Consultation on Proposed Amendments to Third-Party Payment Contracts
In July 2025, Professor Yueh-Ping Yang, was invited by Taiwan's Administration for Digital Industries to attend a consultation meeting on proposed amendments to the standard contract requirements for third-party payment services—the first major revision since the rules were introduced. He provided legal and practical recommendations on issues including the definition of third-party payment services, providers' refusal or delay of service, and requirements for collecting customers' identity verification information, aiming to strengthen consumer protection while keeping the rules aligned with industry practice.

CIEL Director Tseng and Deputy Director Yang Invited to FSC Public Hearing on Financial Holding Company Regulations
In July 2025, CIEL Director Wan-Ju Tseng (曾宛如) and Deputy Director Yueh-Ping Yang were invited by the FSC to a public hearing on proposed amendments to the "Regulations Governing Investments of a Financial Holding Company," offering academic and practical input on issues such as initial shareholding thresholds, conditions for hostile takeovers, tender offer disclosure requirements, and the role of the board and audit committee in investment decisions. Several of the recommendations raised at the hearing were subsequently incorporated into the amended regulations officially promulgated by the FSC on November 25, 2025.

Public Hearing on FinTech Regulatory Sandbox Reform
In August 2025, Professor Yueh-Ping Yang (楊岳平), was invited by Taiwan’s Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) to speak at a public hearing on proposed amendments to the “Financial Technology Development and Innovative Experimentation Act” (Regulatory Sandbox Act). He provided professional insights on regulatory sandbox applications, consultation mechanisms, pathways for scaling tested innovations into the market, and the scope of regulatory exemptions, contributing to policy discussions on a regulatory framework conducive to financial innovation.

 

NTU Faculty Engagement in Legislative Hearings (NATIONAL)

NTU faculty regularly provide expert advice to government by participating as invited scholars and subject-matter experts at Legislative Yuan public hearings across a wide range of standing committees, including Finance, Judiciary and Organic Laws, Education and Culture, Transportation, Social Welfare, and Interior. Drawing on their academic expertise, NTU professors present policy recommendations on issues spanning taxation, judicial transparency, AI governance, media pricing regulation, patient autonomy, juvenile justice reform, and administrative law, directly informing lawmakers' deliberations on national legislation.  

Providing Expert Advice to Government: Emergency Response to the Matai'an River Barrier Lake Disaster (REGIONAL)

In September 2025, an NTU-led team of scholars provided critical scientific advice to Taiwan's Ministry of Interior (內政部) during the emergency response to the Matai'an River barrier lake (landslide dam) crisis in Hualien.

Convened by former Minister of the Interior Hong-Yuan Lee (李鴻源) , the team was formed within a single day by Professor Ching-Yun You (游景雲), Chair of NTU's Department of Civil Engineering, who assembled five fellow experts from across three universities: NTU professors Guo-Hsin Yang (楊國鑫; seismic analysis), Tzu-Yin Chen (陳慈愔; hydrological modeling), and Yu-Ting Hsu (許聿廷; traffic evacuation planning), along with Associate Professor Chi-Yao Hung (洪啟耀) of National Chung Hsing University and Professor Chun-Hui Chang (張駿暉) of National Cheng Kung University (hydraulic analysis).

Working against the clock, the team analyzed limited early data, then incorporated digital elevation models (DEM) and hydraulic numerical terrain models (HyDEM) as they became available, delivering a full risk assessment and evacuation recommendation to the Ministry of Interior within two weeks.

Unlike other assessment teams, which assumed a clear-water outflow upon dam breach and factored in mitigation measures such as raised levees, NTU's team modeled a high-sediment, viscous debris flow and excluded uncertain mitigation effects from their projections—an approach that proved far closer to what actually occurred, correctly anticipating the collapse of the Matai'an River Bridge.

Based on the team's evidence, the Ministry of Interior revised its evacuation zone on September 21 to include Guangfu Township, Mingli Village, Fenglin Township, and areas along the lower Hualien River, raising the number of residents evacuated from roughly 700 to nearly 8,000.

When the barrier lake overflowed and breached on September 23, the team's predictions—including sediment depth and flow volume—closely matched actual conditions, helping to substantially reduce potential casualties and damage.


This case illustrates how NTU faculty can rapidly mobilize interdisciplinary, cross-institutional expertise to support time-critical government decision-making, translating specialized research in hydrology, seismology, and traffic planning into life-saving public policy action during a national disaster.



 

Providing Expert Advice to Local Government (LOCAL)

NTU faculty also contribute their expertise directly to Taipei City Government by serving on municipal advisory committees, providing evidence-based recommendations on climate policy, urban planning, and disaster risk reduction. These roles allow NTU scholars to translate academic research into actionable guidance for local governance.

Taipei City Climate Change Response Promotion Committee  臺北市氣候變遷因應推動會
Since 2025, Professor Pei-Te Chiueh (闕蓓德; Graduate Institute of Environmental Engineering), Professor Kuo-Tsang Huang (黃國倉; Department of Bioenvironmental Systems Engineering), and Professor Pei-Fen Lee (李培芬; Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology) have served as committee members of the Taipei City Climate Change Response Promotion Committee. Across the committee's first four meetings in 2025, they provided expert advice on the city's net-zero emissions targets, greenhouse gas reduction, and climate adaptation strategies, offering specific recommendations on building energy efficiency standards, monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) methods for measuring urban cooling effectiveness, sector-based carbon reduction allocation principles, and native plant restoration.

Taipei City Urban Planning Committee  臺北市都市計畫委員會
At the 829th meeting of the Taipei City Urban Planning Committee on July 24, 2025, Professor Shenglin Chang (張聖琳; Graduate Institute of Building and Planning) provided expert input on proposed amendments to building regulations for the Minsheng Community. Drawing on perspectives from urban development history and cultural landscape preservation, she recommended a cautious evaluation of how spatial transformation would affect the community's cultural landscape, and suggested applying AI simulation techniques to further assess development scenarios for the Minsheng Community.

Taipei City Disaster Prevention and Response Expert Advisory Committee  臺北市災害防救專家諮詢委員會
At the 44th committee meeting on June 18, 2025, Professor Jen-Yu Han (韓仁毓; Department of Civil Engineering) recommended incorporating smart disaster prevention and mitigation approaches into emerging development areas such as the Beitou-Shilin Science Park, and advocated for the area's designation as a national demonstration zone for disaster prevention technology industries. The committee formally tracked this recommendation, and at its 45th meeting on December 5, confirmed that the Fire Department and the Office of Disaster Prevention and Emergency Response would continue advancing the technology-based disaster prevention demonstration zone project—indicating that the recommendation had a substantive influence on the city government's policy direction.