It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. That is pretty much how you could describe the environment for fintechs at the height of the pandemic. Some industries were booming while the world was reeling from the global pandemic. But in the fintech lending business, if you weren't involved in the PPP you were likely struggling. You would not think this was good timing to launch a working capital offering for small business.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Alek Koenig, the CEO and Co-Founder of Settle. They launched in the summer of 2020 with an accounts payable product paired with working capital. The business took off because they found an underserved niche in desperate need of capital: e-commerce businesses.

• The founding story of Settle.
• How they launched the company.
• Why launching at the height of the pandemic was fortuitous timing.
• How their core accounts payable software works.
• How the working capital offering integrates into this software.
• The maximum term they are financing today.
• How their underwriting process works.
• The range of interest rates they charge.
• How they are funding their working capital loans.
• What makes their AP software unique.
• Some of the brands they are working with today.
• How the movement towards embedded finance has made their life easier.
• How Alek's time at Affirm informs how he runs Settle today.
• How he built his Ukrainian team.
• The scale that Settle is at today.
• How they have navigated the downturn in fintech the last 12 to 18 months.
• His vision for Settle.

Connect with Alek on LinkedIn
Connect with Settle on LinkedIn

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Where fintech has had a dramatic impact already is in international payments. Sure, there is still work to do but there are companies out there today facilitating payments, often instantly, to people all around the world.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Charles Rosenblatt, the President of PayQuicker. What PayQuicker does is help companies pay their gig workers in 200+ countries and those workers can receive these funds instantly. They have been doing this for more than a decade.

In this podcast you will learn:

• What attracted Charles to the role at PayQuicker.
• What PayQuicker does exactly.
• The different geographies they operate in.
• The most common use cases for their payouts technology.
• What is exciting about their Payouts OS product.
• Why PayQuicker does not take possession of the money.
• The big value proposition for PayQuicker's clients.
• What they are doing in their partnership with Mastercard.
• How the end consumer receives their money.
• His view on crypto and stablecoins as a payments tool.
• How they partner with global banks.
• How they facilitate instant payouts.
• Why fraud is not a major problem for PayQuicker.
• What's next for PayQuicker.

Connect with Charles on LinkedIn
Connect with PayQuicker on LinkedIn

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When I first heard that QED Investors and BCG were putting together a report on the future of fintech I knew it was going to be good. I was not wrong. Never before have we seen an in-depth and rigorous analysis of where the industry is today and more importantly where we are headed.

The report is titled Global Fintech 2023: Reimagining the Future of Finance, and it provides a level of optimism that has been missing in fintech for the past 12-18 months. But this is not blind optimism, it is based on data and research, both qualitative and quantitative. The finished product is a seminal report that has been the talk of the industry for the last month and a half.

My next guests on the Fintech One-on-One podcast are Nigel Morris, the Co-Founder and Managing Partner at QED Investors and Rishi Varma, Managing Director and Senior Partner at the Boston Consulting Group. Nigel gave a presentation on this report at the recent Fintech Nexus USA event (video here) but in this interview, we delve deeply into the genesis of the report, some of its key findings, and what it means for the industry.

In this podcast you will learn:

• Why QED and BCG decided to come together to produce this report.
• The size of the financial services industry globally and fintech's part in it.
• The methodology they used to arrive at these global revenue numbers.
• A chronicle of the last three years in fintech.
• Where we are at today with equity funding in fintech by stage of company.
• The growth of fintech globally over the next 7 years and where this growth will come from.
• The eye-popping size that fintech is expected to be in 2030.
• What verticals within fintech will see the most growth.
• Why embracing financial inclusion has enormous potential.
• How and when will fintech become as profitable as the incumbents.
• The biggest risks to the growth of fintech.
• What is most exciting about the future of fintech.

Connect with Nigel on LinkedIn
Connect with Rishi on LinkedIn

Connect with QED on LinkedIn
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Investing in fintech companies is never dull. The last three-plus years have seen every type of investing environment there is. Are we edging toward a new normal? Probably not yet but investment demand could start to pick up within the next nine months.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One Podcast is Mark Fiorentino, a partner at Index Ventures. One thing that is really interesting about Mark is that he comes to venture investing from the operating side of fintech. And not just any fintech, he spent many years at Stripe. I interviewed Mark at Fintech Nexus USA in New York City last month.

In this podcast you will learn:

• Why he decided to make the jump from Stripe to venture capital.
• What specifically attracted him to Index Ventures.
• His investment thesis.
• How he has navigated the downturn in fintech the past year.
• What is different now in fintech than 2019.
• Why he likes investing in Latin America.
• The advice Mark has for his portfolio companies in navigating this challenging time.
• The areas of fintech that he is most bullish on.
• How active they have been as an investor this year.
• Why demand for equity from fintech founders is still down.
• Why there will be a boom in fintech M&A.
• How VCs are being more collaborative today.
• How they are building their network in Latin America.
• Why he believes in the future of AI.
• His thoughts on the funding environment for the next 18 months.

Connect with Mark on LinkedIn
Connect with Index Ventures on LinkedIn

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While the fintech lending space is maturing with a number of lenders achieving significant scale today, the longevity of most platforms goes back barely more than a decade. But there is one lender today that was already seven or eight years old during the financial crisis of 2008-09. I am not saying the turbulent times we are experiencing today are equivalent to what become known as the Global Financial Crisis, but there are important lessons that can be learned from companies that survived that time.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One Podcast is Al Crawford, the CEO and Co-Founder of BHG Financial. Al founded the company back in 2001 and has been the CEO and Chairman since that time. He has some very interesting lessons to share from running a fintech lender for more than 20 years. I interviewed Al at the recent Fintech Nexus USA event in New York City, where this session led off the Credit and Underwriting track.

In this podcast you will learn:

• Background on the founding of BHG back in 2001.
• The different lending verticals they operate in today.
• What makes their loan funding marketplace unique.
• The recent volume they have seen on their marketplace.
• What they are learning from their borrowers today.
• The lessons they learned from the 2008-09 financial crisis.
• How their bank partners have adjusted their credit boxes.
• How BHG is taking advantage of the pullback in originations from other lenders.
• Details of the ABS deal they closed just after the SVB blowup.
• How BHG runs their credit team.
• Where their borrower demand is coming from.
• How their credit and fraud team helps prevent loan stacking.
• The keys for lenders to survive in turbulent times like we are experiencing now.

Connect with Al on LinkedIn
Connect with BHG Financial on LinkedIn

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Last month at Fintech Nexus USA in New York City we announced that Fintech Nexus has acquired Fintech Blueprint, one of the leading fintech newsletters. It is led by Lex Sokolin, who is one of the great thinkers in our space, so I used the opportunity of being together in person to record an interview.

The latest episode of the Fintech One-on-One podcast is a discussion with Lex Sokolin (I last had him on the show two years ago) recorded in the podcast theater at the event. While we touch on the acquisition of Fintech Blueprint, most of the episode is spent discussing many of the hottest fintech topics of the day.

In this podcast you will learn:

• A description of his Fintech Blueprint newsletter
• Why he agreed to the partnership with Fintech Nexus.
• Some of the broader platform shifts he is tracking today in fintech.
• How Lex views decentralized finance in the context of today's risk-off environment.
• The two strategies that are bringing traditional finance and crypto together.
• His views on the government crackdown on crypto.
• The different regulatory climates in the US, UK, and Europe.
• How decentralized finance might impact the payments landscape.
• His vision for self-driving money and the role AI will play.
• The technologies Lex is looking at most closely over the next two to three years.

Connect with Lex on LinkedIn
Connect with Fintech Blueprint on LinkedIn

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There is no more hyped technology right now than Generative AI. But what does it really mean for financial services? What is the potential? And what about practical applications?

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Marco Argenti, the Chief Information Officer at Goldman Sachs. This interview was recorded at Fintech Nexus USA in New York City on May 10, Marco was actually our opening keynote speaker. And this ended up being the most talked-about session at the entire event. The keynote was titled, A Revolution of Knowledge: Generative AI, Data & Digital Transformation in Financial Services.

In this podcast you will learn:

• What Marco learned from his time at AWS.
• What is top of mind at Goldman Sachs when it comes to innovation today.
• Why he compares Generative AI to the advent of the printing press.
• The two ways to think about AI today.
• How AI can help bring internal company knowledge to new employees.
• How companies can turn their top performers into "superhumans".
• A practical example of how you can think about the ROI of AI.
• The primary opportunities Marco sees for Generative AI.
• The keys to Goldman's success in their Platform Solutions business.
• Why thinking of developers as their clients is key.

Connect with Marco on LinkedIn
Connect with Goldman Sachs on LinkedIn

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There is no hotter area in technology today than AI. We see articles in the press about it every day but in the fintech lending space using AI in underwriting is something that has been mainstream for some time.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Mike de Vere, the CEO of Zest AI. Zest are pioneers in the field of using AI for underwriting having been working on this for more than a decade (listen to my interview with the former CEO and founder of Zest, Douglas Merrill, here). 

In this podcast you will learn:

• What attracted Mike to Zest AI.
• How he describes Zest today.
• Some of the large lenders they work with.
• What Mike makes of the current AI craze.
• Where we are at today with explainable AI.
• How they are removing bias from underwriting models.
• Details of their different offerings.
• How they customize their offerings for lenders.
• How they use alternative data.
• How their models have improved over time.
• How quickly they can deploy a new credit model.
• What is involved in implementing Zest into a lender.
• Why they build models for new customers at no cost.
• The pushback they receive when talking with new customers.
• How lenders operationalize the Zest models.
• How Zest is engaging with the regulatory bodies in Washington and the states.
• What they are working on now that is most exciting.

Connect with Mike on LinkedIn
Connect with Zest AI on LinkedIn

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Given the environment we are in today I think it is important to hear from leading fintech venture capitalists to get their perspective on the state of fundraising and where the industry is going. This episode continues my semi-regular feature of leading VCs.

My next guest on the Fintech One-on-One podcast is Tricia Kemp, a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Oak HC/FT. We cover a lot of territory in this conversation and Tricia provides advice for fintech entrepreneurs throughout the interview.

In this podcast you will learn:

• The founding story of Oak HC/FT.
• Their investment thesis when it comes to fintech.
• Their favorite areas within fintech.
• Why they are stage-agnostic when it comes to writing checks.
• Their geographic focus.
• The total assets they have under management.
• How they invested capital over the last 18-24 months.
• How entrepreneurs should approach raising capital today.
• What the options are for those companies that are struggling.
• How fintech companies can position themselves for M&A today.
• Whether the IPO window will open up any time soon.
• Reflections from her Forbes article on DeFi from last year.
• The types of companies that are having a hard time today.
• How the payments space will evolve over the next few years.
• Why they are bullish on Latin America for fintech.
• What a normal funding environment will look like.
• The most exciting vertical in fintech right now.

Connect with Tricia on LinkedIn
Connect with Oak HC/FT on LinkedIn

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At this time every year, we do the Fintech Nexus USA preview show. Our big annual event is coming up next week on May 10-11. Tickets are still available, you can register here to receive 15% off (discount will be applied automatically).

On this episode of the Fintech One-on-One podcast, I chat with Todd Anderson, Chief Content Officer and Matt Murnane, Chief Experience Officer at Fintech Nexus. We go through all the different components of the show and how you can get the most out of your time there.

In this podcast you will learn:

• What the expo floor at the show will look like.
• How the content will work during the event.
• How people can get involved in one-on-one networking.
• Who gets into the VIP Meetings Lounge.
• Some of the unique experiences available to attendees.
• How the PitchIt contest will work.
• What our Women in Fintech program is all about.
• The different content topics that will be covered this year.
• The layout of the show.
• Highlights on the keynote stage.
• How the Awards Show will work this year.
• What is most exciting about the event.

Connect with Todd on LinkedIn
Connect with Matt on LinkedIn

Connect with Fintech One-on-One:

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