"Buckle up because...the cuffs are off."

In this conversation, Nik Milanović interviews Mike Cagney, co-founder and CEO of Figure, discussing the company's recent IPO, its innovative product Democratized Prime, and the implications of the Genius Act on capital markets. Cagney shares insights on the evolution of Figure, the role of blockchain in financial services, and the potential for decentralized finance (DeFi) to disrupt traditional banking models. The discussion highlights the importance of regulatory changes and the future landscape of financial markets as they adapt to new technologies.

00:00 Introduction to Figure and Mike Cagney

04:23 Understanding Figure's Corporate Structure

05:57 Inspiration Behind Figure's Founding

11:37 The Value of Decentralized Finance (DeFi)

14:31 The Genius Act and Its Implications

26:27 The Future of Banking and Capital Markets

31:55 Democratized Prime: A New Lending Paradigm

46:16 The Role of Blockchain in Future Financial Systems

This podcast is brought to you by Figure, the platform to Earn and Borrow.

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They have the lowest rates in the industry at 8.91%, allowing you to access instant cash or buy more Bitcoin without triggering a tax event. Your BTC collateral is protected by decentralized MPC custody. You can always see your BTC ownership in your FM account and verify holdings in your personal BTC vault on chain.

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DisclaimerFigure Lending LLC dba Figure. Equal Opportunity Lender. NMLS 1717824. Terms and conditions apply. Visit figure.com for more information.

Figure Markets Credit LLC. 650 S. Tryon Street, 8th Floor, Charlotte, NC 28202. (888) 926-6259. NMLS ID 2559612. Terms and conditions apply. Visit figuremarkets.com/borrow for more information.

In today’s episode, Ryan Zauk sits down with Kate Earle Jensen, Head of Americas for Anthropic. Kate joined Anthropic in 2023 after 8 years helping scale GTM at Stripe.

Over the last 2 years, she has had a front row seat to the AI revolution at one of the fastest-growing companies in history. In this episode, Kate dives into how Claude is being used by major enterprises to revolutionize their businesses, the state of Anthropic’s products and MCP, why they built in the application layer for financial services, what key blockers remain for enterprise adoption, why AI’s market size allows them to approach partnerships in a unique way, transitioning from Stripe to Anthropic, why siblings make great leadership teams, and much more.

Takeaways: The AI market is unquantifiably large, which helps you play non-zero sum games in GTM, partnerships, and product. It helps breed greater collaboration because you know there is more than enough revenue opportunity to share. Hackathons, though not new, have proven to be one of the best sources of discovering novel AI applications in the enterprise. We host them internally and encourage our clients to do host them to get employees experimenting and uncover the art of the possible.Financial Services + Healthcare are proving to be the best industries for AI. They have huge data sets, antiquated technology systems, and manual workflows that make them prime candidates. AI is only as good as the quality of data and context that you feed it. It is as important as anything you choose, which is why MCP became so popular. Siblings often make the best cofounding teams. The Collisons and Amodeis both have very strong working styles that allow them to be brutally honest with each other while not breaking relationships.

Hello fintech friends,

Last week, I sat down with Doug Rickett, the founder and CEO of Payjoy.

If you work in fintech and you don't know Payjoy, well, you should. The company's tagline is "finance for the next billion." And they're well on their way: As of 2025 they have brought 3 billion dollars in credit to 16 million customers, doubling in the last two years while remaining strongly profitable and sustainable for the long term.

PayJoy is a mission-first financial service provider dedicated to helping under-served customers in emerging markets to achieve financial stability and success.

They lend through their patented technology that turns a smartphone into digital collateral. Their cutting-edge machine learning, data science, and anti-fraud AI allow them to offer the lowest cost and qualify the most customers in the industry.

This year, the company celebrates its 10th anniversary, with projected 2025 revenue of over $650 million and $110 million in profit.

Doug and I discussed how his time at Stanford Business School led him to Africa to manage logistics – an area he admits he knew nothing about – for solar lighting company D.light, and how that in-turn inspired him to found Payjoy in 2015. It's one of the most fascinating CEO stories that I've heard in fintech. Well worth listening to his whole journey from start to finish.

Enjoy!

This episode dives deep into the evolution of blockchain-powered lending and marketplaces in the FinTech sector, with guest Michael Tannenbaum, whose career has spanned senior roles at SoFi, Brex, and now Figure.

Host Julie Verhage-Greenberg and Michael discuss how Figure’s vision—originally designed as one company with a strong blockchain backbone—has matured amidst regulatory and market shifts.

Check out Figure Markets here: figuremarkets.onelink.me/Plnq/TWIF

This episode is brought to you by Figure Markets, the platform to Earn and Borrow.

Democratized Prime lets you earn 9% by lending your money against real-world assets like home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) which only banks were able to do prior. Lend like a bank!

Need liquidity without selling your crypto? Figure offers Crypto-Backed Loans, allowing you to borrow against your Bitcoin or Ethereum with 12-month terms and no prepayment penalties. They have the lowest rates in the industry at 8.91%, allowing you to access instant cash or buy more Bitcoin without triggering a tax event.Unlock your crypto’s potential today.

Download their app and start earning your 9% today or taking out your Bitcoin-backed loan at industry low rates!

DISCLOSURES: The 9% rate referenced is not guaranteed and subject to change as new offers are placed. Democratized Prime uses a Dutch auction method for its borrowers/lenders. There is an inherent risk due to interest rate volatility in a Dutch auction interest rates in the auction may rise rapidly. At the time of acceptance, your loan may be filled with a different or higher interest rate than offered at the time of selection. The interest rate is only fixed at the time of loan approval and not at the time of loan acceptance.

Figure Lending LLC dba Figure. Equal Opportunity Lender.NMLS 1717824. Terms and conditions apply. Visit figure.com for more information.

Figure Markets Credit LLC. 650 S. Tryon Street, 8th Floor, Charlotte, NC 28202. (888) 926-6259. NMLS ID 2559612. Terms and conditions apply. Visit figuremarkets.com/borrow for more information.

This week, Nik Milanovic sits down with Sandeep Pyapali, Founder and CEO of Mesta, a global cross-border payment network combining traditional rails with stablecoin systems.

Mesta allows sending USD and stablecoins in over 50 currencies, cutting international payment costs by over 50%. Pyapali, with 17 years in payments – including Uber's $100 billion payment network – founded Mesta in 2024.

Pyapali emphasized the importance of stablecoins for efficient international payments and predicts the growth of non-USD stablecoins. Mesta aims to disrupt traditional Fiat-to-Fiat payments with blockchain technology. Pyapali's vision for Mesta was informed not only by his time building payments systems at Uber but also by his international travel on a sabbatical afterwards, and the difficulty of converting currencies for international payments.

You can learn more about what they're building at mesta.xyz

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While stablecoins are one of our favorite topics to discuss, it's important to note that this episode was sponsored by Mesta.

Welcome back to This Week in Fintech and another episode of the Fintech OGs! Today, I’m joined by two incredible voices who have helped shape the future of financial technology from both the founder and investor perspective.

First up, Jillian Williams, co-founder of Field Ventures, a new seed-stage fund focused on vertical software and fintech. Jillian has spent her career investing in the sector, from Anthemis to Cowboy Ventures, and now building her own firm.

Joining her is Dimitri Dadiomov, co-founder of Modern Treasury. After serving as CEO for the first seven years, Dimitri recently shifted into the President role to focus on product innovation while continuing to drive one of the most important infrastructure companies in fintech.

Together, we cover how fintech has evolved from the early days of Lending Club and marketplace lending, to today’s rebundling wave and AI-driven change. We talk about the future of money movement, risk and compliance, embedded financial products, and where they see the biggest opportunities ahead.

Huge thanks to ⁠Persona⁠ for sponsoring today's episode! Persona is the adaptable identity platform helping businesses fight fraud, meet compliance requirements, and build trust from the very first interaction. Check them out at ⁠withpersona.com/thisweekinfintech⁠. 

This week, I sat down with Eli Wachs, the Co-Founder and CEO of Footprint, a company building the identity infrastructure of the internet.

It was a far-reaching conversation – Eli's an interesting guy – and we touched on everything from his deep-dives into identity in the Stanford library to working with economist Raj Chetty to philosophy and what it means to be authentic to yourself.

Footprint provides automated onboarding that solves identity, security, fraud, and auth in 5 lines of code, building the identity layer to the internet.

The company offers end-to-end onboarding solutions, including verification, storage, and re-authentication, aiming to create a centralized database of good actors. They emphasize reducing false negatives and improving conversion and compliance. Eli talked with me a bit about Footprint's unique approach using device fingerprinting and vaulting to enhance security and portability.

We covered some recent product launches, including bank-linking and their new decision engine. Eli also discussed the company's evolution from a KYC point solution to a broader identity network built around preventing identity theft and fraud in any online situation, from buying a house to joining a community.

You can find Footprint online at onefootprint.com

Welcome back to another episode of Fintech OGs with This Week In Fintech!

Today, I’m joined by two incredible founders who have each redefined their corner of the financial world:

• Jack Zhang, Co-founder & CEO of Airwallex, the global payments and banking platform powering 150,000+ businesses

• Leif Abraham, Co-founder & Co-CEO of Public, the next-gen investing platform helping the top 20% of millennials build long-term wealth

In this episode, we explore their journeys from coffee shops and olive oil to building billion-dollar fintechs, why they both value first principles thinking over traditional industry experience, and their candid takes on hot topics like stablecoins, AI in finance, and tokenized assets.

They share career highs, the lows of early struggles, and the unconventional advice they’d give to anyone starting in fintech today.

Huge thanks to Persona for sponsoring today's episode! Persona is the adaptable identity platform helping businesses fight fraud, meet compliance requirements, and build trust from the very first interaction. Check them out at withpersona.com/thisweekinfintech.

Nik sits down for 10 minutes with Coinbase CFO Alesia Haas to talk about the company's 2025 performance and where they are headed.

Overview

• Coinbase is at inflection point, with strong Q2 performance including custody volumes and derivatives trading hitting all-time highs, and the USDC market cap exceeding $60 billion.
• Stablecoin revenue of $332 million in Q2 represents 12% growth quarter-over-quarter, driven by market cap expansion via Circle collaboration.
• GENIUS Act signed into law enables Coinbase to lead the $30 trillion B2B cross-border payments market, targeting financial revolution in the US.
• Payment APIs launched with Shopify; Coinbase business account product in development with a waitlist of thousands of businesses.
• Acquisition of Deribit for $2.9 billion positions Coinbase to enter the options trading market, capturing a significant share of global derivatives trading.
• Newly launched perpetual futures contracts have seen week-over-week volume doubling, aligning trading hours with crypto spot market.
• User base expanding beyond retail to include payment-focused users and institutional traders seeking hedging and leveraged exposure.
• New Base app in beta testing, alongside the launch of Coinbase One Basic service tier to enhance user offerings.
• USDC payments integration with Shopify completed, with additional partnerships on the horizon and increased service offerings planned.
• 10x intraday leverage available on newly introduced 24/7 futures products, enhancing trading capabilities for users.

Welcome back to FinTech OGs! This week, I’m joined by two leaders whose careers have shaped the evolution of modern financial technology: David Haber, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz and co-lead of their AI Apps Fund, and Owen Jennings, an executive officer and Block’s Business Lead.

From early ventures like Bond Street and the first days of Cash App to today’s frontier of AI in finance, David and Owen share how FinTech continues to evolve—what’s working, what hasn’t changed fast enough, and the massive opportunities they see ahead. We cover everything from consumer financial health to small business challenges, AI-driven automation, and the next wave of credit innovation.

This is a masterclass in FinTech past, present, and future.