eXponential Finance

Mami Kato is the Head of Public Relations and Communications at Revolut Japan, and the spokesperson for the business. Mami has over 15 years of experience as a corporate and financial communications professional. She worked at Japan’s largest PR firm and at a European strategic communications advisory company, where she mainly engaged in long-term corporate communications for the Fortune's most admired companies in the B2C and B2B space.

For those in FinTech, Revolut does not need an introduction. Founded in 2015 in London, it had initially focused on the European market, and then successively established a presence in the US, Singapore, Australia and Japan, where it officially launched in 2019.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Heikki Vänttinen is Co-Founder at API3, a collaborative project to deliver traditional API services to smart contract platforms in a decentralized and trust-minimized way. It is governed by a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), its code is open source and its operations are completely transparent.

In November, API3 announced the closing of their seed investment round with Placeholder, Pantera Capital, Accomplice, CoinFund, Digital Currency Group and Hashed participating, among others. API3 has raised $3 million in exchange for 10 million API3 tokens, representing 10% of the total supply.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Chris Thomas is the Head of Digital Assets at Swissquote Bank. Prior to joining the firm, Chris has combined his financial expertise with his passion for entrepreneurship as Head of European Innovation at Fidelity Investments, before successfully founding an institutional crypto-asset custodian.

Swissquote Bank specialises in online financial and trading services. Based in Geneva, it is the first FINMA-regulated Swiss bank to offer crypto trading, custody and ‘crypto-asset’ equity certificates for retail clients and global institutions

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Tuhina Singh is the Co-Founder & CEO of Propine, a graduate from Singapore’s unique Entrepreneur First accelerator program, and the first native digital asset custodian regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) through the Capital Markets Services (CMS) License.

Propine is building a safe, regulated, and certified future for digital securities with the support and partnerships of reputed private, quasi-governmental and governmental organizations to create an ecosystem of trust, quality and compliance.

Propine is positioned to become the first independent digital securities custodian in a highly regulated environment. With the Capital Market Services License in the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s regulatory sandbox, Propine is leading the way towards a new world of possibilities for institutional investors.

Besides custody, Propine provides end-to-end securities services including but not limited to entitlement checks, facilitating settlement, facilitating corporate actions, asset servicing, investor reporting, cap table management, statutory reconciliations and regulatory reporting.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Ricky Lee is the Founder & CEO of sync, and previously the creative mind behind the customer experience at Lloyds Banking Group and Revolut.

sync is looking to lead the way in Smart Open Banking, allowing users to instantly open a current account in British Pounds or Euros in minutes and to provide them with the ability to open up more than 30 other currency accounts. Users are able to exchange currencies between their accounts at the best rates and transfer money worldwide at unbeatable rates.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Kim Schumacher is a Lecturer in Sustainable Finance and ESG at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. His research focuses on ESG data and impact metrics, sustainable finance frameworks, green bonds, natural capital valuation, ecosystem services, renewable energy project development, and climate-related risk disclosure.

Kim is the creator and course director for Japan's very first graduate-level course on Sustainable Finance and ESG, part of the Graduate major in Global Engineering for Development, Environment and Society.

In addition, he is an Honorary Research Associate at the School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford.

Kim is a Chartered Environmentalist and sits on the ISO Technical Committees on Sustainable Finance and Environmental Management. He is also is a member of the Technical Working Groups of the Climate Disclosure Standards Board, the Climate Bonds Initiative, the ICMA Green Bond Principles, and the Green Finance Network Japan.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Graham Rodford is Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Archax, an institutional-grade exchange for trading asset-backed tokens (digital securities, security tokens, etc.) based in London. Founded by experts from the financial markets and backed by an accomplished advisory board, Archax offers a credible bridge between the blockchain world and the traditional investment space.

The Archax team is used to working in highly regulated markets and has a deep understanding of the blockchain landscape and tokenisation too – as well as a vision of how to evolve them and open up digital assets to institutions in a transparent manner.

An exchange designed specifically for institutions, and built using existing, proven, resilient, scalable, high-performance exchange infrastructure, hosted in top-tier datacentre space, and integrated into the existing institutional trading workflow, Archax was the first digital asset exchange to obtain an FCA license and plans to launch toward the end of the first quarter in 2021.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Aaron Friedland & Ran Sommer, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Operations, respectively, are the Co-Founders of Simbi Foundation, a research-led startup designed to provide support for underserved and refugee communities who face challenges accessing quality education. Identifying lack of electricity, resources, and technology as principal barriers, Simbi Foundation was founded in 2015 to collaborate with partner communities in Uganda and create solar-powered, digital education initiatives. Simbi Foundation's stated goal is the deployment of enough self-sustaining classrooms, "Brightboxes", over the coming 10 years to address the needs of 3.5 million learners.

This is the second podcast episode produced in co-operation with the Mohammed Bin Rashid Initiative for Global Prosperity's Global Maker Challenge, a startup competition seeking out the best young companies supporting inclusive and sustainable development across four categories: (1) Innovation for Peace & Justice, (2) Sustainable & Healthy Food for All, (3) Innovation for Inclusive Trade, and (4) Climate Change. Simbi Foundation won the competition in the category Peace & Justice.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Christopher Scheidel is a Co-Founder & the Chief Information Officer at Transaction Insights, where he is looking to provide financial services and insurance firms with a unique and powerful way to identify and navigate market changes.

In a world where rapid technological change makes building lasting strategies difficult, “Starting with Why” can be a powerful tool for anchoring an IT strategy. Learn how utilizing Simon Sinek’s leadership paradigm helped one Japanese IT organization create a focal point in a sea of ever evolving strategic imperatives, and how our guest adjusted the proven principles when joining a startup.

Christopher is a father, international Fortune 100 CIO, entrepreneur, and musician who enjoys finding solutions to complex problems in the finance and insurance industries.

Most recently as Chief Information Officer and Vice President of MassMutual’s Japan subsidiary, Christopher strengthened its IT organization culminating in a successful acquisition with Japan’s largest life insurer.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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Nicholas Smith, Japan Strategist at CLSA in Tokyo, shares his perspectives on the Japanese markets, how foreigners have left just as profit growth was accelerating, why the Bank of Japan ETF buying spree has had little effect, and warns against underestimating Suga-san as Prime Minister. 

Note: Any comments referencing the markets are made as of the recording on Tuesday, November 10, around 2pm JST. 

Nicholas has ranked #1 for Japan strategy in Asiamoney’s Brokers Poll eight years running, since 2013. Nicholas has been in Japan since 1987, and has been covering Japanese equities since 1990. He first came to Japan as British Universities and Royal Navy & Royal Marines judo champion, before joining Jardine Fleming Securities in the tumult of 1990. During his 10 years there, he ranked #1 in the chemicals & oil sector and was head of the global oil & chemicals team. He then worked for four years in hedge funds, making investments across all sectors. Nicholas joined CLSA in 2011.

Produced in collaboration with Tokyo FinTech. If you have an interesting story to share with our audience, and would like to appear on the podcast, please contact us via [email protected]

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