Wharton FinTech Podcast

In our latest podcast, Keane Ehsani (WG ’20) is joined by Braden More, Executive Vice President and Head of Partnerships and Industry Relations at Wells Fargo. In this extensive interview, Braden dives into Wells Fargo’s tech enabled payment offerings and discusses Wells Fargo’s strategy for partnering with and investing in emerging fintech start-ups. We also cover U.S. payment adoption trends, how Wells Fargo is helping consumers manage their digital financial footprint, and Braden’s experience as co-founder of the Wells Fargo Startup Accelerator. Braden More leads business development, partnerships, and industry relations for Wells Fargo’s payments business. He and his team work across the consumer and commercial bank to grow Wells Fargo’s deposit and payment franchise by focusing on customers, partners, and regulators. Before assuming his current role in 2017, Braden was the head of payment strategy at Wells Fargo. He and his team worked across the enterprise to coordinate strategy, incubate new initiatives like Apple Pay, and represent Wells Fargo in the payments industry. He also cofounded the Wells Fargo Startup Accelerator, a venture capital program that mentors and invests in innovative companies. Braden graduated magna cum laude from Bowdoin College with a degree in government and legal studies. He earned his M.B.A. with distinction from NYU’s Stern School of Business and obtained a CPA license in New York. Wells Fargo Startup Accelerator (https://accelerator.wf.com/) Control Tower (https://www.wellsfargo.com/online-banking/manage-accounts/control-tower/) Greenhouse by Wells Fargo (https://www.wellsfargo.com/greenhouse/)

In our latest podcast, Peter Jankovsky (WG'20) is joined by Dan Westgarth, head of Revolut's North America expansion. Revolut is a UK challenger bank that launched in 2015 with the mission to build the world's first truly bank. Today, it supports customers in over 30 countries and has over 4M users. Podcast overview: * How Revolut thinks of a "stack of niches" in building its customer base and creating a ripple effect to grow to 4M+ users * Revolut's planned product expansion, including its new Perks program and wealth/trading product, and how it goes about launching new products * Revolut's plans for international expansion to create the world's first truly global bank * A comparison of the regulatory environment in North America and the UK/EU, and how this affects Revolut's business model * Plans for Revolut's launch in the US, challenges it has had to work through, and how it's adapting to the US consumer * Revolut's culture and what Revolut looks for in potential hires Dan Westgarth is the General Manager for North America at Revolut, currently responsible for local operations across North America. Before taking on his current role, Dan was part of the Revolut international launcher team, which collectively set up local businesses in 8+ international markets. Prior to that, as one of Revolut's early employees, Dan established several early partnerships and business critical deals within the partnerships and business development team which was based in Canary Wharf's Level39 FinTech hub and accelerator.

In our latest podcast, Christian Rolon (WG '19) is joined by Frank Rotman, one of the founding partners of QED Investors. QED Investors invests in early-stage Fintech companies based in the US, UK, and Latin America. Based in Virginia, QED was founded in 2008 by Rotman, Caribou Honig, and Nigel Morris (co-founder of Capital One). QED Investors has invested in Avant, AvidXchange, ClearScore, Credit Karma, Nubank, Remitly, and SoFi. Their exits include Braintree, Klarna, and Orchard. Frank Rotman is a founding partner of QED Investors. Frank's portfolio companies include Avant, Credit Karma, GreenSky, LendUp, Prosper and SoFi. Frank publishes his thoughts on Fintech on his personal blog Confessions of a Fintech Junkie. Frank began his career at Capital One as one of its earliest analysts. At Capital One, Frank spanned a number of roles across subprime and upmarket cards, focusing on managing Capital One's credit exposure and expanding new business lines. After leaving Capital One, Frank created a Student Lending company. Frank received his BS in Applied Mathematics and his MS in Systems Engineering, both from the University of Virginia.

In our latest podcast, Vivek Chauhan (Wharton MBA '19) chats with Michael Tae, Head of Strategy and M&A at Broadridge. Broadridge Financial Solutions, a $4 billion global fintech leader, provides investor communications and technology-driven solutions for broker-dealers, banks, mutual funds and corporate issuers globally. With over 50 years of experience, Broadridge's infrastructure underpins proxy voting services for over 90 percent of public companies and mutual funds in North America and processes more than $5 trillion in fixed income and equity trades per day. Broadridge is part of hyperledger project, a minority investor in the blockchain startup Digital Asset Holding, and has received an award for its blockchain initiatives. Michael is the head of strategy and M&A at Broadridge and leads strategy, acquisitions, partnerships, and other growth-related activities. He began his career at McKinsey where he provided consulting services to the financial services industry before moving to Merrill Lynch where he was the Vice President of their Financial Institutions Group. In 2009, at the height of the financial crisis, he moved to Washington, D.C., where he worked in the U.S. Department of Treasury's Office of Financial Stability as Director of Investments and Senior Policy Advisor. Most recently, he was the Senior Executive Vice President of Worldwide Services for Microstrategy. In this engaging podcast, Michael shares more about Broadridge's industry-leading initiatives using the blockchain technology for proxy voting and talks about opportunities and challenges in the adoption of blockchain technology in capital markets.

In our latest podcast, Keane Ehsani (WG ’20) and Peter Jankovsky (WG ’20) are joined by Brandon Krieg, the CEO and Co-Founder of StashInvest. In this extensive interview, Brandon dives into StashInvest’s offering as an enabler for consumer investing. We also cover Brandon’s experience at EdgeTrade, Knight Capital, and Macquarie, the process of founding Stash, and how Brandon sees disruptive innovation affecting financial services. StashInvest (https://www.stashinvest.com), one of the fastest growing consumer investing apps in the U.S., simplifies the financial services experience, offering education and opportunities that help improve the financial well-being of millions of people across the U.S. By breaking down barriers and building transparent, technology-driven products, Stash helps the 99% build smarter financial habits so they can confidently save more, grow savings, and enjoy life. Stash currently has over 3 million customers.  As Co-founder and CEO, Brandon’s core focus is finding new ways to harness technology to simplify the financial services industry and create opportunities for people of all demographics and financial backgrounds. He has over 20 years of experience in the FinTech industry, most notably as Co-founder of EdgeTrade, one of the first and largest electronic trade execution and software firms (later acquired by Knight Capital Group), and as Head of Electronic Execution at Macquarie Securities Group.

In our latest podcast, Christian Rolon (WG ’19) is joined by Mary-Catherine Lader, the Chief Operating Officer of Digital Wealth at BlackRock. In this expansive interview, Mary-Catherine dives into BlackRock’s digital strategy, technology as an enabler for asset management businesses, and how FinTech startups are partnering with incumbents and expanding their product lines to become the center of consumers’ financial lives. The BlackRock Digital Wealth Group provides software solutions to help retail advisors and institutional investors build better investment portfolios by leveraging the Aladdin operating system. BlackRock has made a number of investments in WealthTech startups and incumbents, including Acorns, Personal Capital, Scalable Capital, Envestnet, and iCapital Network. BlackRock also acquired the robo-advisor FutureAdvisor in 2015. BlackRock has nearly $6 trillion in assets under management, serving retail and institutional investors across the world. Mary-Catherine Lader is the Chief Operating Officer of Digital Wealth at BlackRock where she focuses on improving BlackRock’s product offerings for retail advisors and investors through partnerships, acquisitions, and internal projects. Prior to BlackRock, Mary-Catherine was the co-founder of hiWatson, a Fintech startup managing online benefits for independent contractors. Mary-Catherine also worked in Goldman Sachs’s Special Situations Group as an investment analyst focusing on clean energy. She was also on the Media team for the World Economic Forum. During business school, Mary-Catherine interned at Comcast Ventures. Mary-Catherine Lader received her JD/MBA from Harvard University, and her A.B. from Brown University.

Caroline Kremer (WG '19) speaks with Tom Fortin, the Chief Operating Officer and Managing Partner of iCapital Network. iCapital is an alternative investments technology platform that serves investors, fund managers, and financial advisors. iCapital's platform digitizes the subscription, reporting, and administrative aspects of alternative investments. Additionally, iCapital's platform provides private investment fund due diligence for high-net worth investors and financial advisors. iCapital was named to the 2019 Forbes Fintech 50 list. iCapital recently raised a round of funding from strategic investors including BlackRock, Blackstone, Carlyle Group, BNY Mellon, Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley, and UBS. Tom Fortin is the Chief Operating Officer at iCapital, responsible for the Administration, Investor Services and Technology departments. Prior to joining iCapital, Tom was a Managing Director at BlackRock from 2001–2017. He was most recently the Global Head of Retail Technology where he was responsible for the strategy, design, and development of BlackRock's retail sales enablement and digital distribution solutions. In addition he was a member of BlackRock's Global Operating Committee, Human Capital Committee and Enterprise Risk Management Committee. Prior to joining BlackRock in 2001, Tom spent ten years with Wall Street Systems in the design, development and implementation of a front-to-back integrated fixed income and FX trading system for global financial institutions. From 1988 to 1991, he traded FX and interest rate derivatives at Chemical Bank (now JP Morgan Chase) in New York. Through a joint engineering program, Tom earned a BS degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University and a BS degree in engineering from Providence College, and an MBA degree in Finance from New York University.

Jeff Leathers (WG ’19) interviews Lowell Putnam, the co-founder and CEO of Quovo, a financial data platform that provides companies with connectivity and insights for millions of consumer financial accounts across more than 14,000 different institutions. In January 2019, Quovo was acquired by Plaid. In this podcast, Lowell covers the recent acquisition, the current and future use cases for account connectivity, the regulatory environment, and his takeaways from his journey as a technology entrepreneur. Prior to founding Quovo, Lowell worked in the Investment Banking Division of Lehman Brothers/Barclays. At Lehman Brothers, Lowell worked in the Financial Institutions Group, specializing in consumer credit companies and structured finance transactions. Lowell has been named to the InvestmentNews 40 under 40 and WealthManagement.com Top Ten to Watch in 2016 lists. He serves on several advisory boards for technology companies and non-profits. Lowell attended Harvard College and lives in New York City with his wife, Brynn, and son, George.

Christian Rolon (WG '19) is joined by Jamie Finn, the co-founder and President of Securitize. Securitize is a platform for digitizing securities, facilitating the issuance of securities for assets including companies, funds, and other equity holdings. Founded in January 2018, Securitize has already helped a number of customers digitize their portfolios and assets on their platform. Securitize raised a Series A from investors including Coinbase Ventures, Ripple, and Blockchain Capital in November 2018. Jamie Finn is the co-founder and President of Securitize. Prior to Securitize, Jamie held leadership roles at helloNetwork, Zingy, Ericsson, Thumbplay, RingRing Media, Telefonica, Kontera, Sansa Security, AT&T, and Aki Technologies. Jamie has his Bachelor's degree from Babson College.

Christian Rolon (WG '19) is joined by Rex Salisbury, the founder of the Fintech Devs and PMs Meetup based in San Francisco. The Fintech Devs and PMs community has roughly 2,000 members, hosting monthly events highlighting many exciting Fintech firms in the Bay Area. Past Meetups have featured speakers from: a16z, Affirm, Branch, EarnIn, Plaid, SoFi, Wealthfront, and many others. Learn more at: https://www.fintechdevsandpms.com/. Rex Salisbury is the founder of the Fintech Devs and PMs Meetup in San Francisco. Rex is a product engineer at Checkr. Prior to Checkr, Rex worked at Sindeo as an engineer, and Merrill Lynch in investment banking on the real estate team. Rex has his BA in Economics and History from Davidson College.