Walter Cruttenden is a financial markets innovator, an active founder investor in growth companies that serve a social need - and passionate about history and astronomy.

Currently, Walter serves as Chairman of Acorns, a micro-investing company, which he co-founded with his son, Jeff Cruttenden, Jason Martell, and Mark Dru. Acorns is an app that enables people to save and invest in incredibly small increments, with high frequency, requiring little or no conscious effort. Walter also serves as CEO of Blast, a gamification company operating at the nexus of the Fintech and Game industries. Blast’s app features a new game dynamic that improves the financial outcome for both gamers and game companies alike.

In his early career, Cruttenden founded and served as CEO of two well-known investment banking and brokerage firms; Cruttenden Roth (now Roth Capital, active underwriters of emerging growth companies), and E*Offering, formerly the iBank arm of E*Trade Securities (since merged). As CEO, Walter led both companies through rapid growth and significant liquidity events. Walter also co-founded SRS Laboratories (since acquired by DTS), after buying the acoustic technology from Hughes, and developing it into an independent company. Cruttenden also founded one of the largest growth stock conferences in the US, now the Roth Conference.

When he is not engaged in Fintech, Walter acts as the Director of the Binary Research Institute in Newport Beach, California, which researches the cause and consequences of solar system motion. 

As part of his cosmological work Walter authored the book Lost Star of Myth and Time, the award-winning documentary film, The Great Year (narrated by James Earl Jones) and the children’s book, The Great Year Adventures: with Tommy the Time-Traveling Turtle.