Tearsheet Podcast: The Business of Finance

Some partnerships in financial services begin with a handshake and end with a contract dispute. Others start with a Sunday morning LinkedIn message and evolve into something that transcends the typical vendor-client relationship. The collaboration between Cross River Bank and Best Egg falls firmly into the latter category. "When we first got into the business, we met several new companies, and some of them were like three guys in a garage," recalls Adam Goller, EVP and Head of Fintech Banking at Cross River.  An impromptu conversation in 2013 between Best Egg's founder and Cross River's CEO would eventually grow into a partnership that has facilitated nearly $35 billion in loans and 2.5 million customers – reshaping the lives of people and communities who were previously underserved by traditional FIS and had limited access to credit. What began as basic loan origination has evolved into sophisticated closed-loop capital market solutions, including the development of Best Egg's "BEAST" securitization platform, which uses Cross River's CRB Securities to package assets for sale to institutional investors. The progression reflects Cross River's willingness and ability to help fintechs climb the rungs of product expansion as they grow: "We have so many use cases where a partner came to us for lending, and that ultimately expanded to a deposit product, a payment service, and a card product," Goller notes. Although partners that offer point solutions can help fintechs get started, they don't set them up for the future. The Cross River - Best Egg partnership shows how the right BaaS and bank partner helps fintechs move beyond the start up mindset with more sophisticated financial support as they mature.  Listen to this conversation to learn about the blueprint fintechs should use to identify the right banking partners at the start and how Cross River can help fintechs look beyond isolated business cases and build long term product road maps, with the support of a large financial institution and the agility of a fintech.

CFOs are abandoning quarterly planning cycles for week-by-week assessments as trade tensions, tariff uncertainty, and supplier volatility force a new short-term reality onto financial leadership. Seamus Smith, EVP and Group President of Automated Finance at FIS, and Chrissy Wagner, SVP of GTM at FIS, break down how finance leaders can balance urgent risk management with strategic growth positioning through data quality, automation, and AI. Smith and Wagner reveal that cybersecurity tops the list of CFO concerns, but inefficient processes and lack of visibility into money flows are the real operational killers, particularly as organizations grow through M&A. They explain how FIS helped clients navigate recent tariff disruptions through better data visibility, why paper checks remain one of the biggest fraud vectors in modern finance, how supply chain finance is underutilized in the US compared to Europe, and why AI is already delivering $3.70 in returns for every dollar invested in credit underwriting and collections.

Welcome to a special 4dFi podcast exploring the latest trends and technologies reshaping finance. I'm Zack Miller, Tearsheet's Editor in Chief. Today, we're unpacking the rise of AI agents and their potential to transform how consumers interact with financial services. I'm joined by my partners Russell Weiss, an AI expert and startup builder, and Josh Liggett, a seasoned fintech investor. Together, we'll bring a multidimensional view to this complex space. We'll dive into real-world examples like Capital One's Chat Concierge, which has driven a 55% boost in customer engagement by automating key tasks across thousands of auto dealer sites. Looking ahead, we'll consider the implications for traditional banks. Will they invest billions in proprietary AI models, or cede ground to big tech and infrastructure players increasingly embedding financial services? We don't have all the answers but want to open up with good questions and thinking about where things are headed. We'll also explore how the evolution of AI agents could intersect with web3, crypto, and asset tokenization to enable digital transactions. Russell and Josh will weigh in on which players are poised to thrive in this new era of AI-powered finance. There's a lot to cover, but one thing is clear: AI is no longer a far-off possibility for banks. It's a present-day reality redefining what's possible. Stay tuned for a thought-provoking discussion of the opportunities and challenges ahead.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast, where we explore financial services together with an eye on technology, innovation, emerging models, and changing expectations. I'm Tearsheet's editor in chief, Zack Miller. We've been covering AI in financial services for a while now—chatbots, generative AI, fraud detection models. But something fundamental is shifting. We're moving beyond AI as a tool that assists humans to AI as an actor that takes action on our behalf. Agentic AI is no longer a research project. It's live. Capital One has AI agents helping consumers buy cars. Visa is letting AI agents spend your money. RBC has agents executing trades, learning and adapting in real-time to market conditions. It's already here. The question is: what does it take to make this work at scale? What infrastructure do you need when an AI agent is handling real financial transactions at 2 AM? How do you architect for reliability when there's no human in the loop? My guest today is Kevin Levitt, who leads global business development for financial services at Nvidia. Before Nvidia, Kevin spent years inside fintechs like Credit Karma and Roostify. At Nvidia, he's working with firms like Capital One, Visa, and RBC as they deploy agentic AI in production—not pilot programs, actual live systems processing real transactions. We're digging into the case studies, the computational demands of multi-agentic systems, the security challenges when agents control money, and what financial institutions need to be thinking about now. Nvidia's Kevin Levitt is my guest today on the podcast.

Banks dramatically underestimate how their customers share financial data, and most of it happens through insecure screen scraping that creates fraud vulnerabilities and slows performance. Shane McWilliams, Head of Retail Digital Banking at FIS, breaks down the three critical challenges separating thriving institutions from those being left behind: serving small and medium businesses as a central financial hub, enabling secure data sharing through APIs, and moving beyond product-centric thinking to build sticky customer relationships. McWilliams reveals that when he asks bank executives to guess what percentage of their customers are sharing data with third parties, "they're not even close" to reality. He explains how modern SMBs expect their banks to integrate everything from cash flow monitoring to accounting systems, why personalization needs to go beyond UX optimization, and how banks that orient around customer needs rather than products will win in today's competitive environment.

Although every company is becoming a fintech now, Wix didn't set out to do so – the firm's entry into financial services started from observing what millions of small business owners actually needed when building their online presence. For Amit Sagiv and Volodymyr Tsukur, co-heads of payments at Wix, the path to serving these SMB customers well was paved through financial products: Wix had to take the payment infrastructure it had built for itself and transform it into tools that could help merchants manage their businesses. The foundation was already there. Wix had developed sophisticated billing systems to support its freemium model, accumulating deep expertise in payment routing, risk management, and global processing. "We built tremendous payment capabilities," Sagiv explained. "The billing manager of Wix wanted to take that offering and build a service for our users." What started as a small project evolved into a comprehensive financial platform serving businesses across the globe. The company now processes over $3 billion per quarter with a team of 160 people, covering payments, checking accounts, and capital lending. Listen to the podcast to hear how a chance collaboration between Wix's billing team and gateway developers turned into a fintech operation processing billions quarterly. Sagiv and Tsukur discuss why they deliberately avoided becoming a full-fledged bank, and how website data reveals creditworthiness before transaction history does. It's a conversation that dives deep into what it means to be serving SMB customers digitally and how firms can do embedded finance right.

SMBs don't have access to the same level of sophisticated lending options as consumers.There is one fundamental problem that prevents this class of product from pushing forward: lenders juggle multiple data vendors, wrestle with disconnected point solutions, and these tools lack the ability to paint a full picture of the SMB customer and their needs. The result is an ecosystem where a majority of time is spent on solving operational blockades rather than building solutions that cater to the whole lending lifecycle of a SMB customer. “We need something that covers everything. There can't just be a bunch of point solutions," says Jon Fry, founder and CEO of Lendflow. Lendflow has tackled this challenge by building a unified embedded lending infrastructure that works with over 200 companies to streamline three critical pillars in the lending lifecycle: distribution, decisioning, and workflow automation. The firm is not a lender today, nor are they interested in becoming an embedded lender in the future; instead it has positioned itself as the technology backbone that enables existing lenders to become embedded lenders themselves. Lendflow's approach is paying off for clients like BHG Financial, which uses the firm's entire platform suite and has seen dramatic improvements in operational efficiency and approval rates through the partnership. Listen to this podcast to learn how Lendflow is helping lenders break out of the fragmentation quagmire and access a full agentic AI toolbox that helps re-engage borrowers, as well as improve efficiencies for internal processes.

Welcome to the Tearsheet podcast, where we explore financial services together with an eye on technology, innovation, emerging models and changing expectations. I'm Tearsheet Editor in Chief, Zack Miller. There's an old theory in lending that you can only master two or three things: growth, credit performance and profitability. For decades, this has been accepted wisdom, until AI started changing the fundamentals of how we assess credit risk. Today, I'm joined by Paul Gu, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Upstart. Paul's journey reads like a modern Silicon Valley story—from Chinese immigrant to Yale dropout. He became part of the inaugural class of Thiel Fellows before co-founding Upstart in 2012. Under his leadership, Upstart has gone from zero model training data points in 2013 to processing 91 million data points today. Their AI predicts both default and prepayment likelihood for every month of a loan's term, and Paul believes Upstart's AI is bringing them closer to achieving all three pillars of lending—an approach that could redefine consumer lending across the entire credit lifecycle. We'll explore how this evolution is playing out, dive into Upstart's 2025 roadmap, including their push for 10x AI leadership and GAAP profitability, and discuss what this means for the future of credit.

In a sector where AI is promising a significant leap forward, financial institutions demand speed — with safety. Temenos has a track record of innovation and the customer trust to bring AI into the core of banking. Chief Product Officer Sai Rangachari is just nine months into his role at Temenos, but his mandate is sweeping: simplify product experience, co-create with banks, and embed AI across the entire platform. “There are three things that you hear from leadership and customers. Number one is product experience, resiliency, availability — investing more in making it easier to consume,” he said. “The second one is co-creation. Customers want to give us more advice. They want to be in the room. They want to help shape the products. Ultimately, they are the users so we welcome it.” The third undertaking is layering AI across Temenos' entire product suite. With Product Manager Copilot, FCM AI Agent and AI Studio, Temenos is helping clients simplify workflows and enhance decision-making, and giving them the flexibility to build and scale their own AI use cases within a trusted, regulated environment. In this episode, Rangachari discusses why traditional technology providers are in a better position to help banks integrate AI than fintechs, how Temenos' AI strategy could change the way we experience retail banking, and where he sees traditional providers' competitive advantage.

Today, we're joined by Camila Vieira, a Partner at QED Investors focused on Latin America. Camila brings a wealth of experience to our conversation, having established herself as one of the region's most influential fintech investors. Camila joined QED in 2022 as the company's first employee based in São Paulo, Brazil, where she focuses on early stage investments. As an investor and operator with experience working across different regions, she brings a well-rounded perspective to the table, connecting founders and startups to valuable resources while leveraging QED's deep fintech expertise. Prior to joining QED, Camila built her career at the intersection of technology and financial services. She started at Moody's, a credit rating agency, before joining Goldman Sachs to focus on corporate credit and economic risk. Later, as part of Goldman's investment banking division, she helped fintech, software, and e-commerce companies raise capital and navigate the transition from private to public markets. She went on to join the global strategy and corporate development teams at Ceridian, a global software company servicing more than 160 countries. More recently, Camila spent time at Hotmart, a Brazilian tech unicorn whose platform facilitates sales of digital products, enabling creators to build, monetize, manage, and grow globally. There, she led strategy and operations, ESG, and investor relations. Today, we'll explore the dynamic Brazilian fintech ecosystem, discuss cross-border investment opportunities, and uncover lessons that US investors and financial professionals can apply when looking to diversify their portfolios into these high-growth regions. Before we jump in, I just want to tell you about a new initiative we're running at Tearsheet.  4dFI is an exclusive group of out-of-the-box builders and investors knitting together a community to invest in the next wave of fintech startups. We're bringing together current and former banking executives interested in investing in and learning about emerging market fintech startups. 4dFI's network will be able to both help new companies reach maturity faster, while startups can provide new ways of thinking to our community members. At 4dFI Capital Partners, I'm joined by Russell Weiss, experienced product and startup builder and Josh Liggett, who has led fintech and blockchain diligence, investments, and strategic partnerships at OurCrowd. If you are interested in learning how emerging market fintechs are changing the financial services landscape around the globe and would like to play a part in crafting this new future, signup on https://tearsheet.co/4dFI.

The payments landscape is experiencing regulatory upheaval, forcing financial institutions to rethink their approach to money movement modernization. With ISO message format changes, Swift updates, and evolving fraud requirements hitting simultaneously, banks are facing a complex web of compliance demands that require immediate attention. "The regulatory agenda for money movement is probably one of the most aggressive we have," said Elaine Duff, SVP and Head of Money Movement at FIS. "It's across the globe. We're seeing the ISO message intended to help firms standardize their messaging, become more efficient, and make their operations much more standardized." Yet the scale of change extends far beyond simple messaging updates. The oncoming change affects fraud tools, digital channels, reporting formats, and entire operational workflows. For many institutions, the traditional rip-and-replace approach to modernization has become both financially and operationally untenable. Nick Dovaras, Global Account Manager at AWS, emphasized the broader pressures driving urgency: "There's customer expectations as well. Customers are expecting 24/7, instant, and customer-friendly mobile applications that are connected to online systems.” Dive into this episode to hear about how financial institutions are navigating regulatory pressures through modular modernization strategies. FIS' Duff and AWS' Dovaras break down the critical role embedded fraud protection is playing in real-time payments, and why cloud-based solutions are enabling banks to modernize their money movement capabilities without the risks of traditional rip-and-replace approaches.

Today on the Tearsheet Podcast, we're diving into a story that captures the evolution of modern finance — where professional athletes aren't just endorsing products, but building the infrastructure that empowers the next generation of wealth creators. I'm joined by Sheldon Day, Co-Founder and President of The Player's Company, a collective of over 500 professional athletes and accredited investors who are rewriting the playbook on financial empowerment. As a NFL defensive tackle with the Washington Commanders and eight-year veteran, Sheldon understands firsthand the financial realities that athletes face both during and after their careers. The Players Company isn't just another investment club — it's a platform democratizing access to wealth-building tools once reserved for the ultra-wealthy, while providing financial education many athletes never received. Since 2019, TPC has facilitated investments in startups like ZenWTR, Teamworks, and Public.com, proving athletes can be sophisticated capital allocators when given the right resources. We'll explore how Sheldon went from reading defensive formations to reading investment prospectuses, and how The Players Company is scaling to empower athletes across all sports to build generational wealth.

From streamlining complex onboarding flows to surfacing the right information at the right time, design thinking encourages product design teams to bring empathy and intentionality into every layer of product development, creating experiences that are intuitive, responsive, and centered around real human needs. Temenos is leading the charge to bring that mindset back to banking innovation, with Erik Johnson, Head of Product Design, at the helm. For Johnson, creativity and collaboration go hand in hand with functionality. On this episode of the Tearsheet podcast, Johnson talks about structuring his design team in a “centralized, hybrid” model, solving design challenges with data and empathy, and how Temenos' Innovation Hub in Orlando is structured to be a “we space” for exploring and co-creating new banking products.

More than half of Americans report that they will run out of money when they stop earning a paycheck and millions haven't saved enough to maintain their standard of living in retirement, There is an urgent need to re-imagine the role record keepers play in financial wellness, and it starts by leveraging technology to close the gap between capabilities and customer expectations. “When I look at things like automatic enrollment and automatic increase, that's where it starts,“ explains Will Hicks, Head of FIS Global Retirement Products and Services. “Then it bleeds into the technology phase in terms of how you deliver that. How do you actually let participants know how that impacts their financial future?“. The sector is in transition, where traditional retirement record keeping is expanding into comprehensive financial wellness platforms. Scott Parker, Partner at Deloitte Consulting and leader of their wealth retirement practice, notes that the industry is “at the cusp of taking it to the next level and getting outside of what we've always done in the past, which is more and more communication.“ The change is driven by both technological capabilities and changing expectations which center around integrated solutions: “Our clients are asking us to bring those solutions together, because they want a clear picture of not just their retirement, but what are they doing in the banking space?“ said Sherry Baker, SVP and Head of Global Wealth Products and Services at FIS. Listen to the podcast to discover how retirement industry leaders are breaking down traditional silos to deliver integrated financial wellness solutions that go far beyond the 401(k). Learn the role that modernization, data, personalization, and cybersecurity play in pushing record keepers forward. It's a conversation on record keeping organizations can meet regulatory requirements while meeting the daily engagement expectations of younger participants.

As fintech companies transition from scrappy startups to scaled operations, traditional leadership models often hit their limits. The demands of managing complex partnerships, navigating regulatory requirements, and driving sustainable growth require a different kind of executive structure than the founder-led approach that got many companies off the ground. Today, I'm joined by Prashant Fuloria, CEO of Fundbox, and Anchit Singh, the company's Chief Business Officer, to explore how they've developed a collaborative leadership model that's helped drive Fundbox's evolution in the embedded finance space. We'll dig into the CEO-CBO dynamic, how they divide responsibilities, and what other growing fintechs can learn about building leadership structures that scale.

Americans give nearly half a trillion dollars to charity each year—over 2% of GDP. Yet despite this massive scale, charitable giving remains stuck in the past, dominated by donor-advised funds marketed exclusively to the wealthy and clunky processes that make generosity harder than it should be. Today I'm joined by Adam Nash, co-founder and CEO of Daffy, a modern platform that's democratizing charitable giving through technology. Adam brings decades of experience building consumer fintech products as the former CEO of Wealthfront and in leadership roles at LinkedIn, Dropbox, and eBay. During the pandemic, he recognized that while fintech had revolutionized how we save and invest, charitable giving had been largely untouched by innovation. We'll explore why Adam left Wealthfront to tackle charitable giving, how Daffy's membership-based model differs from traditional approaches, and why he believes donor-advised funds will soon be as common as 401ks. Adam will share insights on tax-advantaged giving as more people hold appreciated assets like stock and crypto, how Daffy is incorporating AI, and why they've opened their APIs to partners like Betterment and Robinhood.

As the banking landscape accelerates toward digital transformation, some financial institutions are questioning how fast and far to leap. Others have long made the jump. As Canada's first cloud-native bank, EQ Bank is already ahead of the curve. Its early adoption of a cloud-native core banking platform through a partnership with Temenos is now powering its next phase: real-time data and AI-driven innovation. Behind it all is a long-standing relationship between EQ and Temenos that encourages mutual collaboration and support. In today's episode, Temenos' Chief Revenue Officer Will Moroney and EQ Bank's Vice President and Chief Technology Officer Geoff Vona discuss the benefits of cloud-native banking, improving customer experiences through real-time data, developing new capabilities powered by AI and how technology partners and banks can offer each other deeper value.

Today, traditional insurance faces mounting pressures from new technologies and market entrants, and digital transformation has become an imperative rather than an option. Kamiel Bouw, Global Head of Insurance for Citi Treasury and Trade Solutions, joins the show today. He brings extensive experience navigating this evolving landscape, where efficiency, data-driven approaches, and customer-centricity have become paramount. With traditional insurers working to adopt new technologies within legacy infrastructure, Buow describes how Citi has positioned itself to strategically support these organizations capture opportunities while enhancing customer experience. Throughout the interview, Buow explores several transformative themes reshaping the insurance industry. He uses real life case studies to emphasize the tremendous opportunity in digitizing payment processes — both for premium collections and claims payments — highlighting how instant payments can create superior customer experiences while providing operational benefits. Buow also discusses how Treasury functions must evolve beyond their traditional role as financial settlement centers to become innovation leaders, engaging across enterprise-wide initiatives and providing expertise in risk management and end-to-end payment flows. Listen to the podcast to gain unique insights into emerging technologies like digital assets and tokenization and their growing role in insurance, and how organizations can start with small, focused use cases to drive learning and foster broader adoption of this new tech.

Banking executives face a familiar dilemma: decades-old core systems technically constrain innovation while replacement costs can reach hundreds of millions of dollars and take years to implement. Meanwhile, fintechs launch new products in weeks while traditional banks remain trapped in months-long approval cycles. The challenge extends beyond technology. "Most banks duct-tape capabilities onto what they already have, and eventually they break," explains Ritesh Rihani, Vice President of Enterprise Banking at Galileo. "You've seen the number of outages we've had in the industry recently. That's all happening because they put duct tape upon duct tape." The pressure to modernize comes from multiple directions. Customer expectations have evolved toward integrated experiences and ease of use and operational risks multiply as the pool of COBOL programmers shrinks through retirement. Regulatory compliance becomes increasingly difficult with manual processes and fragmented systems. This podcast explores five critical dimensions of core modernization: balancing costs with competitive necessity, understanding operational and regulatory risks, implementing incremental transformation strategies, enabling product innovation, and unlocking the future potential of modern banking architecture.

Isabelle Guis understands the need for marketing to speak technology's language. With an engineering background, Guis sees her strength as Temenos' Chief Marketing Officer in bridging the communication gap between technology innovation and the value it brings to customers. In a conversation at the Temenos Regional Forum Americas 2025 held May 28-30 in Miami, Guis explained that Temenos values customer centricity above all else. “There is this reliability, this expertise that's needed to make sure you deliver,” she said. “And you innovate without compromising what you already have.” Guis also discussed how banks are investing in technology to stay competitive amid economic uncertainty, and why legacy systems can hinder that progress. She outlined paths that banks can take to modernize their core infrastructure, offering alternatives like the choice between cloud or on-premise solutions — or even module-specific upgrades. Guis also shared how Temenos' new motto “Leading Banking Forward” captures the company's vision for collective progress in the banking industry. Today's podcast episode explores Temenos' customer-centered perspective, the need for digital transformation in banking through modern infrastructure, and the company's strategic vision of how it can emulate industry-wide progress and leadership.

The infrastructure for crypto-native finance is maturing beyond proof-of-concepts into real financial products. Tokenized securities are moving from experimental pilots to regulated offerings, stablecoin infrastructure is becoming the backbone for 24/7 payment systems, and traditional fintech companies are quietly integrating crypto rails to improve settlement and unlock new capabilities. I'm joined by Juan Lopez, General Partner at VanEck Ventures, where he focuses on investments at the intersection of traditional finance and blockchain technology. Before joining VanEck, Juan was at Circle Ventures, giving him a front-row seat to how institutional-grade crypto infrastructure has developed. His portfolio includes companies building the regulated infrastructure enabling this shift from experimental to operational. Juan's perspective on where real value is being created—from tokenized equity platforms achieving regulatory approval to stablecoin routing systems—offers insight into how crypto infrastructure is becoming essential plumbing for modern financial services. We'll discuss what's driving adoption, where the next wave of exits will come from, and how fintech companies are integrating blockchain technology to improve their core business models.

While co-branded credit cards have dominated consumer wallets for decades, a new option is emerging in the payments landscape. Co-branded debit cards represent an untapped opportunity for brands to deepen customer relationships while addressing the preferences of a generation that increasingly chooses debit over credit. Derek White, CEO of Galileo Financial Technologies, has been at the forefront of this shift. Under his leadership, Galileo recently powered Wyndham Rewards' launch of what's being called the industry's first co-branded debit card in the US. "The opportunity is huge here, where we have customers that have a deep loyalty with the brand," White explained. The timing for this launch is strategic. 30% of customers are pulling out debit cards when making purchases at major travel and entertainment brands, "even though they're not getting rewards associated with it." This value gap represents millions of transactions where brands could be deepening customer relationships but aren't. Listen to this Tearsheet podcast episode with Derek White to learn about how co-branded debit cards are creating new monetization opportunities for brands, what consumer behaviors are driving this new product, and how the convergence of AI, blockchain, and quantum technologies might fundamentally change how money moves through payment systems.

SMBs are drowning in a sea of disconnected financial tools, juggling separate platforms for banking, payments, accounting, and lending. Many business owners find themselves logging into five or six different systems just to manage their daily operations, creating inefficiency and driving up costs at a time when economic pressures are mounting. U.S. Bank's latest 2025 Small Business Survey shows that SMBs are looking to their FIs to collapse these various digital solutions into one integrated experience. "They are overwhelmed by the number of standalone software solutions which exist in the marketplace," explains Shruti Patel, Chief Product Officer for the Business Banking segment at U.S. Bank. "They would like to consolidate these so that they're not constantly juggling with multiple tools or playing mental gymnastics, all while streamlining costs." The survey data, drawn from approximately 1,000 SMB owners across the country with revenues up to $25 million, shows a clear trend toward viewing banks as comprehensive financial hubs rather than simple repositories for funds. SMBs are seeking integrated solutions that combine banking, payments, and software capabilities under one roof. Listen to this podcast to learn about U.S. Bank's Shruti Patel is helping U.S. Bank position itself as the primary re-bundlers of financial services in the post-pandemic era.

Financial institutions are drowning in payment complexity. Between legacy systems, and the accelerating pace of change in how people pay, banks face a modernization crisis that threatens their competitive position. At the FIS Emerald Conference 2025, FIS announced a partnership with Episode Six which is designed to address these challenges head-on. Episode Six, an API-driven payments technology provider, will now be working with FIS to deliver a cloud-based, end-to-end digital payments platform. The collaboration brings together FIS's global scale and institutional relationships with Episode Six's modern, configurable payment infrastructure. The new partnership will allow FIs to scale beyond their local borders, without having to build new tech and processes from scratch. "We did some pretty hefty research over an extended period of time," said Rob Hudson, Head of International Banking, at FIS. "It became very apparent very quickly that Episode Six was the one that we wanted to work with. This was the standout opportunity for us, without doubt." John Mitchell, CEO and co-founder of Episode Six, emphasized the strategic nature of the partnership. "We've always envisioned that if we had a partner with the strengths and the scale of FIS, that our platform would be used in a much broader capacity," he said. "This partnership is going to enable us to present a solution that will allow all of our clients to innovate at scale." Listen to the podcast to learn what financial executives can do to navigate legacy system constraints surprisingly well, tackle global payment complexity to expand internationally, and implement progressive modernization without putting careers on the line. It's a conversation on practical strategies for overcoming institutional resistance to change while delivering the cloud-native solutions that modern banking demands.

The fintech investment landscape is heating up again. After a challenging 2022 and 2023, early-stage funding is recovering, with companies focused on practical problems attracting serious investor interest. The shift is toward infrastructure, embedded finance, and AI applications that solve real workflow problems. Sheel Mohnot has been tracking this evolution from multiple angles. As co-founder of Better Tomorrow Ventures, he's raised $300 million across three funds focused on pre-seed and seed-stage fintech companies. His perspective comes from building and exiting—he founded FeeFighters, which sold to Groupon in 2012, and ran the fintech accelerator at 500 Startups. BTV's thesis centers on what Mohnot calls the "everything is fintech" trend—vertical SaaS companies that increasingly derive revenue from payments and financial services rather than software subscriptions. Toast exemplifies this shift, starting as restaurant point-of-sale software and now getting 83% of revenue from financial services. Today, we'll explore why Mohnot believes fintech is back, what types of companies are getting funded in 2025, and his view on AI in fintech—where it's working and where it's just hype.

The credit industry is shifting how it evaluates borrowers. Traditional credit scoring has left over a billion people without access to financial services, but lenders are increasingly turning to alternative data—bank transactions, spending patterns, real-time financial behavior—to make more informed decisions about creditworthiness. Andrew Endicott has been at the center of this shift. As co-founder of Petal, he pioneered what they called “cash flow underwriting”—using real-time bank data alongside traditional credit reports to approve people for credit cards who would otherwise be turned away. The approach worked: Petal raised nearly $1 billion, proving that alternative underwriting isn't just better for consumers—it's good business.

The traditional banking model for small and medium-sized businesses has reached an inflection point. Before banking centered on straightforward product relationships, like loans, deposits, and basic services. However, banks are evolving recognizing that their SMB clients need operational partners who understand the unique challenges of running a business while wearing multiple hats. KeyBank has embraced this evolution, positioning itself as a consultative partner for its SMB customers. Mike Walters, President of Business Banking at KeyBank, describes the bank's approach as fundamentally client-centered. "We try to center the client in every decision we make," Walters explains. "Our clients in the small business space are unique. We use the term owner-operator at KeyBank and we use it very intentionally, because these business owners, they don't just own the business, they run the business." This distinction shapes everything about how KeyBank serves its business clients. The bank has moved beyond traditional banking silos to create integrated service ecosystems that address the full spectrum of business operations. Now the bank focuses on understanding how money flows through a client's business and identifying opportunities to create efficiencies. The approach represents a broader industry trend toward comprehensive business partnerships, where banks want to use their central role in SMB operations to become strategic advisors and enablers for everything from cash flow optimization to operational efficiency.

While attention often focuses on developed markets, the most exciting fintech innovations are emerging where mobile technology, young digital-native populations, and gaps in traditional banking converge. These regions aren't just adopting Western models – they're creating entirely new paradigms that may eventually reshape global finance. Today I'm joined by Nadia Costanzo, Director of Banking for the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America at Wise. Nadia drives Wise's expansion across these regions by building banking relationships, securing licenses, and navigating complex regulatory frameworks. Her background is uniquely valuable – before Wise, she worked with Kiva in Nairobi facilitating microfinance across Africa, contributed to the World Bank's Universal Financial Access agenda, and worked directly with microfinance institutions in Paraguay. Today, we'll explore how fintech evolves differently across emerging markets, examine key challenges, and discuss surprising innovations where traditional banking is limited. We'll also consider what these developments mean for established financial institutions looking to engage with these dynamic markets.

The traditional lending officer is facing their biggest disruption in decades. Gen AI is oozing into financial services quickly and deeply enough that it's already impacting how we evaluate credit risk and make lending decisions. This tension between human judgment and algorithmic precision is the latest focus in our ongoing AI series exploring how artificial intelligence is transforming financial services. Joining us are Jonathan Kolozsvary, Global Head of Small Business at Visa, who brings insights on how transaction data can unlock lending opportunities that traditional credit models miss. And Patrick Reily, co-founder of Uplinq and Malcolm Baldrige Award recipient, whose AI predictive models are already being used by the Federal Reserve. Together, they tackle a critical question: Are we witnessing the evolution of the lending officer, or are we approaching a future where algorithms handle what humans have done for generations? The answer will shape the future of lending and the broader relationship between technology and trust in financial services.

Financial institutions are losing an average of $100 million annually due to a fundamental disconnect between fintech innovation and traditional financial systems. A phenomenon FIS and Oxford Economics have termed the "Harmony Gap." "We hear a lot from people about the challenges and friction they see in the money lifecycle," explains FIS CTO, Firdaus Bhathena, at his firm's Emerald Conference at the end of May in Orlando, Florida.. "But we had not been able to quantify that." His firm's collaboration with Oxford Economics is changing that, providing hard data on what many suspected but couldn't measure. The new research, based on surveys of 1,000 executives across the US, UK, and Singapore, reveals that disharmony in the financial system is a costly reality affecting everything from cybersecurity to operational efficiency. As Margaux McLoughlin of Oxford Economics puts it, "When there are disruptions across the money lifecycle, that's what we call disharmony." Understanding what the research describes as a Harmony Gap requires examining how the modern financial ecosystem operates, why the human cost extends far beyond corporate losses, and what organizations can do to bridge the disconnect between innovation and implementation. The path forward requires a rethinking of how financial institutions approach systemic challenges in an interconnected world.

Embedded finance offers a chance for fintech firms, vertical SaaS companies, and marketplaces to drive revenue growth and build a sticky offering.  Always strapped for cash and with their owners juggling multiple responsibilities at once, small businesses increasingly adopt vertical SaaS platforms to run their operations, the demand for integrated banking, payments, and lending solutions continues to accelerate.   For firms that can successfully navigate this landscape, embedded finance offers a powerful pathway to differentiation in an increasingly competitive market while addressing the critical financial needs that traditional institutions have struggled to meet effectively. On the show today, I am joined by three leaders in the space sharing insights into what it takes to succeed: Yoseph West, Co-founder and CEO of Relay which is a digital business banking platform serving SMBs, Sol Lax, CEO of Revenued, a leader in revenued-based financing and  Caleb Avery, founder and CEO of Tilled, a modern embedded payments provider for software companies Tune in to hear us plot the market shift from embedded payments to lending, underwriting challenges for thin-file customers, and strategic partnership models that create comprehensive solutions for small businesses.  In this episode we will examine two case studies: how  Relay and Tilled are implementing embedded lending in their platforms through their work Revenued and sketch out a plan for fintechs that want to mature their embedded finance offerings to offer sophisticated products like lending and working capital to their SMB customers. If you're a platform serving SMBs, embedded lending isn't just a feature – it's a way to make your product indispensable.  As customers look for financial solutions that meet them where they are, platforms that deliver seamless, flexible capital access will win. This episode is a must-listen for any SaaS, fintech, or ma

Traditional banking services alone aren't enough to serve the diverse needs of small and medium-sized businesses. Banks need to go further and think of their digital footprint as a launching pad for SMB owners by adding value-added services. On the show today, Mark Valentino, President of Business Banking at Citizens, and Taira Hall, EVP and Head of Enterprise Payments at Citizens, join to talk about how the bank is building more comprehensive solutions through value-added services for SMB customers. Valentino and Hall dive into how the bank is moving away from a purely transactional relationship to become more of a command center for SMB owners, highlighting how SMB owners' needs and the broader focus on CX is leading this change. Tune into the show to explore how traditional FIs can evolve to become modern digital hubs for SMB owners through the addition of Value Added Services like spend management, a focus on APIs, and a robust partnership-first strategy. Both Valentino and Hall provide a strategic overview and practical examples – melding the worlds of business banking and payments together to forge a powerful narrative about how Citizens is evolving to meet the changing expectations of small business owners.

Nine months into her role as Chief Product and Technology Officer at Temenos, Barb Morgan is focused on a simple principle when it comes to product strategy: quality over quantity. "We want to build less, but build it better," Morgan said during a conversation at the Temenos Regional Forum Americas 2025 held May 28-30 in Miami. Temenos' approach centers on co-creating meaningful solutions with bank customers rather than rushing to market with multiple products. Morgan emphasized that the company is "really focused on making sure that whatever we put out there is meaningful," as the industry navigates what she calls the "AI hype curve." Morgan's insights reveal why many banks struggle with AI adoption despite the technology's promise. The real barriers aren't about computing power or algorithms — they're messier problems involving decades-old data systems that were never designed for AI and organizational cultures that haven't caught up to the pace of technological change. Her conversation also detailed Temenos' bet on bringing innovation closer to customers, such as through its new hub in Orlando designed for co-creation, and why the company is taking a strategic and deeply integrated approach to AI that enables banks to deploy AI-powered solutions faster and safer.

Non-bank financial institutions (NBFIs) are capturing more and more market share in SME lending by leveraging technology to offer quicker lending solutions. This puts pressure on FIs to evolve their approaches while managing costs and improving service quality. Finastra's Principal Product Manager Kristen Lista joins the Tearsheet podcast today to discuss the most critical areas where FIs need to focus: consolidating technology to improve efficiency, decreasing the time between application and access to funding, enhancing back-office operations, and creating more client-centric experiences. Lista offers a valuable look inside the complex web of challenges that FIs are facing when trying to improve the SME lending products. From technology integration strategies to practical advice on process improvement, Lista offers an actionable blueprint that can help FIs better compete in the SME lending space, driving growth and customer loyalty.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast, where we explore financial services together with an eye on technology, innovation, emerging models, and changing expectations. I'm Tearsheet's editor in chief, Zack Miller. As digital assets mature beyond speculation into practical financial tools, forward-thinking institutions are evaluating how programmable money fits into their product strategies. For traditional banks, it's an opportunity to modernize settlement systems and explore new revenue streams. For fintechs, it's about embedding digital asset capabilities without the regulatory and technical overhead. Today, I'm joined by Ben Milne, whose journey from founding payments innovator Dwolla to now leading Brale offers interesting insights into the evolution of financial infrastructure. At Dwolla, Ben built an API-first payments platform that helped modernize ACH transfers. Now with Brale, he's creating the infrastructure layer for compliant stablecoin issuance across multiple blockchains. What's particularly notable about Ben's transition is how it reflects broader shifts in the financial services landscape—from renovating legacy rails to building entirely new ones. In our conversation, we'll unpack how this experience shapes Brale's approach to working with both incumbents and challengers, the strategic considerations for institutions exploring stablecoins, and what product and strategy executives should be planning for in this rapidly evolving space.

The financial services industry is undergoing deep technological change. API-first architectures are creating new possibilities for integration. Digital platforms are democratizing access to investing. Artificial intelligence is personalizing wealth management. Digital-first brokerages are redefining what's possible. Global investing barriers are falling. Traditional firms are navigating complex digital transformations. And infrastructure companies are scaling to meet growing demands. To help us understand these critical trends, we're joined by Harry Temkin, Chief Digital Officer at DriveWealth. DriveWealth is at the forefront of embedded investing technology, powering fractional trading and digital investment experiences for partners across the globe. As CDO, Harry leads the company's technology strategy and digital innovation initiatives, bringing decades of experience in financial technology.

Tearsheet is excited to launch 4dFI Capital Partners, an exclusive group of out-of-the-box builders and investors building a community to invest in the next wave of fintech startups around the world. If you are an accredited investor and want to learn more, sign up here Across Latin America, we're witnessing a massive shift as regions traditionally dominated by cash transactions begin embracing digital financial tools. This transition represents more than just technological adoption—it's creating new economic opportunities, enhancing financial inclusion, and building resilience against growing cybersecurity threats. The numbers tell a compelling story: a $448.4 billion digital payment opportunity exists across Latin America, the Caribbean, and the U.S. With nearly 12 million small retailers processing $362 billion in B2C sales — 43% still in cash —a nd 90% of B2B transactions between small retailers and suppliers handled through traditional methods, we're looking at a financial transformation that's just beginning. Today, I'm joined by someone at the forefront of this transition. Walter Pimenta serves as Executive Vice President of Commercial and New Payment Flows for Mastercard Latin America, where he's leading initiatives to expand SME acceptance solutions, scale enablement through strategic partnerships, and strengthen cross-border payment capabilities. Walter's team is also tackling another critical trend: the growing cybersecurity challenges facing SMEs, with recent research showing 46% of small businesses have experienced cyber-attacks, resulting in bankruptcy for nearly 1 in 5 affected companies.

As General Manager of PayPal's Small Business and Financial Services Group, Michelle Gill is responsible for bringing together the products and services that help small business owners run and grow their business. She is my guest for this episode of the Tearsheet Podcast. Michelle brings deep financial expertise and experience building platforms and tools that help customers manage their finances to her role on PayPal's Senior Leadership Team. Michelle was previously Senior Vice President of Intuit's business money management, payment, and banking service, QuickBooks Money Platform. Prior to Intuit, Michelle successfully integrated and expanded SoFi's lending business as General Manager and Executive Vice President of Consumer Lending and Capital Markets. Drawing on her early career experience as a Managing Director and Partner at Goldman Sachs, Michelle also served as SoFi's Chief Financial Officer before moving into the product leadership role. Before that, Michelle spent a decade leading the U.S. Assets business for global investment firm Sixth Street Partners. Given her career and experiences, Michelle brings a broad view of fintech innovation. She focuses on user-centered solutions. At PayPal, she leads efforts to help entrepreneurs navigate the complicated web of financial tools they often depend on. “The preponderance of [small businesses] use greater than 15 tools to run their business,” she shares. “What they got into business for is the passion… and yet they end up spending more time on things that are not what they love.” Our conversation explores how PayPal is actively trying to reduce that complexity. It does so not by offering more tools, but by making the ones they already use work better together. Gill outlines the strategy behind PayPal's cash flow-based lending model and how it fits within their open ecosystem, whether it's digital lending, embedded finance, or leveraging open banking.

Investment in data is the hallmark of successful Gen AI implementations, according to Citizens' Chief Data and Analytics Officer, Krish Swamy. Giving us a system wide view of how Citizens is leveraging Gen AI, Swamy joins the podcast to talk about harnessing the power of data to drive decision-making, enhance customer experiences, and navigate the complexities of digital transformation in the banking sector. Our conversation delves into the challenges and opportunities of building a data-driven culture within a traditional banking environment, and how Citizens is positioning itself at the forefront of financial innovation through strategic analytics initiatives. Swamy, who also heads the firm's Generative AI Council, shares his vision for the future of data in banking and the tangible ways Citizens is turning data insights into meaningful actions that benefit both the institution and its customers.

In today's financial landscape, innovation is more than just a buzzword—it's a driving force separating industry leaders from those left behind. Finding, nurturing, and scaling the right technologies has become a specialized skill set all its own. Joining us today is Ryan Falvey, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Restive. Ryan has spent the last 15 years at the forefront of identifying and championing market-changing innovations in financial technology. His track record speaks for itself—since 2015, he's invested in 40 early-stage fintech firms that have collectively grown to represent approximately $3 billion in aggregate equity value. Before founding Restive, Ryan led the development of the Financial Solutions Lab, a groundbreaking partnership between JPMorgan Chase and the Financial Health Network. His experience also includes developing payment solutions with leading tech companies at Silicon Valley Bank and serving as Strategy Group Lead at Enclude Solutions, where he oversaw global strategy consulting for mobile-enabled financial products. “We're not investing in fintech apps — we're investing in infrastructure,” Falvey explains early on. That distinction underscores a larger trend he sees in the market: a move away from flashy consumer-based apps toward foundational financial APIs. It also focuses on backend tooling and embedded finance capabilities. Falvey's insights aren't theoretical — they're rooted in his day-to-day decisions as an investor. At Restive, he's helping startups through early product development. He emphasizes practical scalability and regulation-ready business models. “You don't build a consumer business by launching an app anymore,” he says. “It's not about the app — it's about access, context, and integration.” From fintech regulation to platform economics, Falvey shares grounded wisdom. He focuses on how successful startups are navigating today's uncertain investment landscape. What's emerging is a more nuanced strategy for funding — one that prioritizes durability over disruption.

In a world where financial inclusion remains one of our generation's greatest challenges, emerging markets are becoming the true laboratories of fintech innovation. While developed economies iterate on convenience, companies operating in regions with limited banking infrastructure are fundamentally reimagining what financial services can look like from the ground up. Today, we're diving into this fascinating intersection of opportunity and impact with David Lask from Tala. Tala has built a reputation as a pioneer in financial inclusion, providing access to credit and financial services to underbanked populations across multiple continents. David joins us fresh from the Fintech Americas Miami conference to share his insights on the rapidly evolving Latin American fintech landscape. We'll explore how the unique challenges and opportunities in this region are fostering innovative approaches to financial services, with a special focus on Mexico as a compelling case study of fintech evolution.

Artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming the financial landscape, creating new opportunities for innovation while reshaping consumer expectations around speed, personalization, and security. As financial institutions and businesses race to integrate AI capabilities, we're witnessing a fundamental shift in how payments are processed, how fraud is detected, and how financial services are delivered. Today, I'm delighted to welcome Davi Strazza, President of North America at Adyen, a global financial technology platform that's at the forefront of this AI evolution. Davi leads Adyen's North American operations, where the company is leveraging artificial intelligence as a strategic growth driver through initiatives like their recently launched Uplift platform. In our conversation today, we'll explore how Adyen is implementing AI solutions to enable hyper-personalization, enhance fraud detection, and automate complex financial processes. Davi will also share his insights on the state of real-time payments in the US and what companies need to do to make instant payments a more fundamental part of our commerce and financial system.

Joe Heck, CEO of Zip, joins me on the Tearsheet Podcast to discuss the evolution of alternative payment solutions in the US. Zip is a leading Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) company. Joe shares lessons from his 20 years of experience in consumer lending and fintech payment solutions. Heck brings insights from his previous leadership roles at Happy Money and TrueStage. Heck's background plays a role in his approach to financial services. Growing up in Flint, Michigan, he understands the challenges of paycheck-to-paycheck living. “There's a consumer base largely ignored by traditional financial systems,” Heck explains. “FICO doesn't serve them well, but they have a great ability to pay.” Zip focuses on providing financial flexibility to these consumers. It offers structured repayment plans that don't push them into revolving debt. According to Heck, “We win when the consumer wins. If they can't pay us back, our model doesn't work either.” The Big Ideas BNPL's Growth Potential in the US – With only 2% of payments currently in BNPL, there is significant room for expansion compared to markets like Europe and Australia. Financial Inclusion for Underserved Consumers – Zip is focusing on consumers who don't fit traditional credit models but have strong repayment potential. “We provide access when and where they need it,” says Heck. Strategic Partnerships Drive Accessibility – Integrations with Stripe and retailers like GameStop are making BNPL more available to consumers. A More Transparent Alternative to Credit Cards – Unlike credit cards that encourage revolving debt, BNPL provides structured, predictable payments. “We're not built in a way that traps consumers in debt,” Heck emphasizes. The Role of Cash Flow Management in BNPL's Future – Zip is investing in tools that help consumers manage unpredictable income streams, ensuring more repayment flexibility.

Fintechs have pushed the industry to focus on client experiences, and our show today digs into how traditional banks can collaborate with global banks like Citi to improve experiences like cross border payments for their clients. In our conversation today, Aashish Mishra, Citi's Global Head for Banks sales and North Asia head for Financial Institutions and Fintech Sales, Treasury & Trade Solutions (TTS), dives into how the bank's 24/7 US dollar clearing business, as well as solutions like Worldlink ® Payment Services, are helping the firm's bank clients deliver modern and intuitive experiences to its customers. Aashish Mishra is part of Citi's Services' business based in Hong Kong, and he performs two roles: he's responsible for TTS sales and strategy for all FI client segments in North America, which spans banks, fintechs, insurance, asset managers, and broker dealers. And for the bank segment globally, his focus is on delivering the entire TTS solution set to his clients, including cash clearing, global payments and receivables, Banking as a Service, liquidity solutions and trade solutions. Prior to this role, he spent extensive time in Citi's Security Services business, including as the Head of Custody Product and Head of Direct Custody and Clearing business for Asia.  Aashish has extensive experience in the financial institution space, and has worked closely with senior clients, regulators, and financial market infrastructure during his career. Today, he brings that insight from multiple arms of the vast Citi footprint to the show to explore how banks can push their products further without burdening their teams with technical lift, as well as where he expects client expectations to go in the future.

In late January, Upbound Group completed its acquisition of Brigit, a leading financial health technology company. This deal brings together Upbound's established brands like Rent-A-Center and Acima with Brigit's digital platform that offers earned wage access, credit building products, and financial wellness tools. The combined company now serves approximately four million active customers, including Brigit's impressive base of over one million paying subscribers. I'm thrilled to welcome Zuben Mathews, co-founder of Brigit, to our podcast today. Zuben continues to lead the Brigit team as they now operate as a business segment within Upbound Group, alongside his co-founder Hamel Kothari. In our conversation today, we'll explore the strategic vision behind this acquisition, how Brigit's technology will enhance Upbound's existing services, and what this means for millions of Americans who have been traditionally underserved by mainstream financial institutions. We'll also discuss how Brigit's proprietary cash flow underwriting technology and machine learning capabilities might change the landscape for accessible financial products.

Banking digital assistants may be common now, but in 2017, Bank of America was one of the first to be thinking about how they make the firm's customer experience more powerful. The answer was an in-house build of a digital assistant that required the firm to hire PhDs in linguistics and build a collaboration structure that could facilitate teams from different departments. In 2024, BofA clients interacted with Erica 676 million times bringing its total interactions since its launch in 2018 to 2.5 billion. On the show today, Hari Gopalkrishnan, who leads Bank of America's Consumer, Business & Wealth Management Technology team, joins us to tell the tale of how the firm built its industry-leading digital assistant, Erica. Hari shares how the firm has gradually expanded Erica's remit beyond consumer banking to also include multiple lines of business and individual and corporate clients across the firm's global footprint. It's a dive into what it takes to push the boundaries in this industry, how the firm thought about development, testing, expansion, and how Erica's capabilities can be expanded with the recent innovations of Gen AI.

Financial inclusion remains one of the most pressing challenges in today's economy. Millions of Americans struggle to access basic financial services simply because they lack a credit history or have damaged credit. This gap in our financial system doesn't just create inconvenience – it perpetuates cycles of financial inequity that can last generations. In my latest episode of Tearsheet, I sat down with Julie Szudarek, CEO of Self Financial, a company working at the forefront of this challenge. Julie took the helm at Self just over a year ago, bringing over 20 years of leadership experience from companies like Groupon and Atida. Though fintech is a new arena for her, Julie's expertise in building customer-focused businesses is exactly what's needed to tackle financial inclusion at scale. “I've never done fintech before,” Julie told me candidly. “But what I bring to the table is a deep understanding of how to build customer-focused businesses that are sustainable over time.” Her mission at Self aligns well with the broader movement toward more accessible financial services: “We are only here to make outcomes for our customers better than before they started working with Self.” The Big Ideas Decoupling Secured Credit Cards for Easier Access. “We decoupled the secured card so customers don't need a credit builder account first. It's about reducing barriers.” The Power of Low Deposit and No Credit Check. “Our deposit is $100, and for many, there's no hard credit check. That makes it much less intimidating for people facing rejection.” Customer Education as a Core Focus. “About 65% of our customers say they had no financial education. So we focus on teaching them about interest, compounding, and managing credit.” Expanding Product Offerings to Keep Customers Engaged. “We were limited in what we offered. Now we're focusing on products that meet customers where they are and help them keep growing financially.” Partnerships to Reach More Communities. “Regions Bank and Pathway Homes are some of our key partners — together, we're helping more people build credit who might otherwise be left out.”

Blockchain technology continues to bridge the gap between traditional finance and the digital asset ecosystem. Today, we're witnessing a fascinating convergence where decentralized finance protocols are being integrated into user-friendly platforms, making sophisticated financial tools accessible to everyday users. One of the most significant developments in this space is the ability to leverage crypto assets without selling them—unlocking liquidity while maintaining exposure to potential appreciation. Coinbase has recently launched a groundbreaking product that allows customers to borrow USDC against their Bitcoin holdings in under a minute, all powered by onchain lending protocols. I'm delighted to welcome Max Branzburg, Vice President of Product at Coinbase, to discuss this innovation. As a key architect of Coinbase's product strategy, Max has been instrumental in developing solutions that make crypto utility more tangible for millions of users. Today, we'll explore how Bitcoin-backed loans represent a pivotal step in Coinbase's vision for onchain financial services, the technical infrastructure making this possible, and what this means for the future of personal finance.

Today we're examining the evolution of asset management and financial advisory services. As technology transforms how we invest and manage wealth, we're exploring the critical balance between innovation and human expertise. We'll discuss how disruption in the advisory space creates new opportunities for clients and advisors alike, why personal relationships remain essential even as AI expands, and how progressive firms are reimagining compensation models. We'll also look at the hybrid approach resonating with next-gen clients who want both self-directed tools and personalized guidance. Joining me to explore these topics are Steven Woods, CEO and Founder of Stirlingshire, and Jim Webb, VP of Investments. Their firm is working to remake the asset management model for both clients and advisors. Today, we'll hear about their non-traditional approach to wealth management, how they're balancing technology with the human touch, and why this matters for both financial professionals and their clients. The Big Ideas: Challenging the Traditional Asset Management Fee Structure: Stirlingshire allows advisors to keep 100% of asset management fees and commissions with zero expenses. This flips the traditional model where firms take substantial cuts from advisor earnings, creating better economics for both clients and advisors. The "Advice on Demand" Innovation: Stirlingshire offers a hybrid model between self-directed investing and full management. Clients can self-direct at zero commission but access professional advisors when needed, with advisors only getting paid when their specific recommendations result in profits. Technology-Enabled Compliance and Remote Work: By embedding compliance directly into their technology systems, Stirlingshire eliminates the need for physical offices and reduces compliance staffing. This automation significantly reduces overhead costs while increasing advisor flexibility. AI as an Efficiency Tool, Not a Replacement: Rather than replacing human advisors, Stirlingshire uses AI to make them more efficient. Their AI tools quickly analyze portfolios and provide market context, saving advisors time without making actual investment decisions. Disrupting the Industry to Drive Broader Change: Stirlingshire aims to force change across the entire financial advisory industry, similar to how Robinhood disrupted commission structures. Their goal is to push other independent firms toward more advisor-friendly compensation models by demonstrating a successful alternative approach.

Today I'm excited to introduce you to 4dFI Capital Partners — or as we call it, 4dFI — a new initiative bringing together the worlds of traditional finance and innovative fintech. In this episode, we're diving into three key themes reshaping global financial services: Hidden Innovations in Emerging Markets As Russell Weiss points out, "There's some incredible innovations happening in emerging markets, and oftentimes investors and executives in the US and Europe are sort of missing it. They're not hearing those stories. They're not getting access to that technology." We'll explore how companies like Nubank are just the beginning of a wave of groundbreaking financial solutions coming from regions outside traditional financial centers. From Fintech to Impact Investment In regions where traditional credit infrastructure is lacking, services like earned wage access aren't just convenient—they're transformative. Josh Liggett explains how these solutions are "where a FinTech turns from a FinTech company to also an impact investment," creating both financial returns and meaningful change in consumers' lives. Building a Value-Add Investment Community Beyond just providing capital, Fortify aims to create a network of experienced professionals who can offer expertise, connections, and insights to emerging market fintechs. This collaborative approach benefits everyone involved—investors gain exposure to new models, startups receive valuable guidance, and ultimately, consumers get better financial products. I'm joined today by my partners Russell Weiss and Josh Liggett, who bring complementary skills in data science, VC deal-making, and fintech expertise to this exciting venture. Whether you're a financial industry veteran looking for new horizons or simply curious about where global fintech is heading, today's conversation offers valuable insights into the future of finance beyond traditional markets. Let's dive in.

Student debt is a major financial challenge, with U.S. borrowers owing over $1.8 trillion in total. This ongoing debt burden affects millions of individuals. Traditional financial institutions are looking for ways to solve this issue. Meanwhile, fintech innovations are providing solutions. These new technologies are helping to address the problem. Michelle Tran is the head of commercial at Summer and founder of NYC Fintech Women. She joins the Tearsheet podcast to discuss how fintech is streamlining student loan repayment. The conversation focuses on the improvements fintech brings to the process, highlighting how fintech is powering a new generation of financial wellness programs. “For many borrowers, navigating student loan repayment is like filing taxes on their own,” Tran explains. “The process is complicated. And a simple mistake can lead to missed opportunities for debt relief.” Tran highlights how fintech platforms like Summer act as a “TurboTax for student loans,” helping borrowers complete complex federal student loan relief applications accurately. There is a growing demand for employer-sponsored loan repayment benefits. Fintech solutions are helping connect employees with the right programs. These solutions play an essential role in meeting that demand. The Big Ideas * Employers Are Becoming Key Players in Student Debt Relief. “Graduates are considering job offers carefully. They are looking for companies that offer student loan repayment assistance. This benefit is becoming a key factor in their decision-making.” * Federal Loan Forgiveness Programs Are Underutilized. “Many borrowers don't realize they qualify for loan forgiveness. Fintech is helping them access these benefits more efficiently.” * Technology Reduces Errors in Loan Applications. “Automation ensures borrowers submit accurate applications, increasing approval rates for federal programs.” * Fintech Solutions Are Expanding Beyond Student Loans. “Managing debt holistically creates a more secure financial future. The debt includes credit cards and retirement savings.” * Personal Finance Education is a Critical Component. “Helping borrowers understand their financial options leads to better decision-making and long-term stability.”