Fei Ye (WG '19) speaks with Julien Courbe, Partner and Head of PwC's U.S. Financial Services Advisory practice. Fei and Julien discuss PwC's top 8 digital predictions in financial services for 2018. PwC's trends cover a range of topics including digital banking, insurtech and blockchain. Check out the Wharton FinTech Medium for more details on PwC's report. Julien leads PwC’s US Financial Services Advisory practice, covering banking, capital markets, insurance and asset & wealth management c...
Feb 06, 2018•34 min
Brian Shah (WG '18) speaks with Dan Aisen, Co-Founder and Head of Quantitative Strategy at IEX. Dan discusses the founding of IEX and the future of high frequency trading. IEX is the subject of Michael Lewis' bestselling book Flash Boys. As part of the founding team, Dan was responsible for building out the core functionality of IEX as a trading venue. As the company grows and evolves, he continues to develop new products and tactics that IEX can use to protect investors from predatory strategie...
Jan 30, 2018•13 min
John Pennington (WG '19) speaks with Jani Valjavec, co-founder and CTO (Trading) of ICONOMI, the world’s first blockchain-based digital asset management platform for the decentralized economy. A well-known member of the blockchain community, Jani is a crypto and app token expert and was an early blockchain enthusiast. In 2013, he co-founded Cashila, the first registered Bitcoin company in Europe to acquire a license for the execution of banking transactions via bitcoin. In 2016 Jani co-founded I...
Jan 28, 2018•40 min
Elena Gerasimova (Wharton 2018) and Nipun Jasuja (Wharton 2018) chat with Catherine Flax, CEO of Pefin, the world’s AI financial advisor. Established in 2011, Pefin is a fintech company based in New York City. Pefin, which stands for PErsonal Financial INtelligence, uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to provide fiduciary financial advice at the fraction of a cost of a traditional financial advisor. On the day this podcast was recorded (November 30, 2011), Pefin went live to end consumers! And we ...
Dec 16, 2017•33 min
David Gogel (WG'18) speaks with Charles Birnbaum (WG'11), Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners. BVP is a multi-stage venture capital firm that invests across enterprise, consumer and healthcare. Charles focuses on financial services, consumer and education investments. David and Charles speak about building investment and industry theses, opportunities in the cryptocurrency market, trends in insurtech, and the evolution of the tech-enabled specialty industry. Charles is a partner in Bessemer's N...
Dec 08, 2017•35 min
Brian Shah (WG '18) chats with Amy Nauiokas, Founder and President of Anthemis Group, a leading financial technology investment and advisory firm. In this podcast, Amy discusses why she started Anthemis and the rationale behind providing both investment and strategy capabilities under one roof. She explains her guiding investing philosophy and how the team sources and evaluates new opportunities. At the end, Amy shares her perspective on U.S. vs. European startups and key trends in the financial...
Nov 28, 2017•27 min
Jess Douglass, Wharton MBA 2018, chats with Sarina Siddhanti, Head of Direct Business, Funding Circle US. Funding Circle is a peer-to-peer lending marketplace that allows investors to lend money directly to small and medium-sized businesses. Funding Circle was the first website to use the process of peer-to-peer lending for business funding in the UK, and now operates in the UK, US, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands. In this exciting podcast, Sarina shares her thoughts on how financial service...
Oct 26, 2017•27 min
Antonio Munoz chats with Bastiaan de Goei, Director of New Ventures at AXA Next. In this informative podcast, Bastiaan demystifies the insurance industry, talking about emerging trends, and the need for using data better and creating simpler risk products. He also discusses strategies for disrupting insurance based on the level of control a firm wishes to have across the value chain. Bastiaan started his career working in strategy consulting and private equity. He then moved to AXA where he has ...
Oct 16, 2017•42 min
Nipun Jasuja (Wharton 2018) chats with Tobin McDaniel, president of Schwab Wealth Investment Advisory, a registered investment advisor and the sponsor of Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, Charles Schwab’s new automated investment advisory service. In this insightful podcast, Tobin shares his views on the evolution of the wealth management landscape in the US, the importance of incorporating the human element when you are responsible for the hard-earned money of your customers, and the thrills of ru...
Sep 19, 2017•34 min
Antonio Munoz (Wharton MBA’17) chats with Matt Miller, founder and CEO of Embroker, which is a leading tech-enabled commercial insurance broker. Embroker’s new, all-digital approach to business insurance combines the ease of technology with expert advisors to take the pain out of getting the right coverage for your business. In this engaging podcast, Matt talks about what made him change career trajectories and start Embroker, about challenges in insurance and disrupting the insurance industry, ...
Jul 23, 2017•36 min
David Gogel chats with Arthur Hayes, CEO and Co-Founder of BitMEX, aka the Bitcoin Mercantile Exchange, a cryptocurrency-based derivatives exchange based in Hong Kong. They discuss Arthur’s background, the launch of BitMEX, Bitcoin, Ethereum, derivatives trading, exchange business models, regulation, security, initial coin offerings, and the future state of cryptocurrencies. BitMEX handles on average $100 million dollars per day in the total value of products traded.
Jul 10, 2017•39 min
Ruhi Dang (Wharton MBA '18) chats with William Hockey, co-founder and CTO of Plaid. Plaid is the tool that empowers a large number of applications you use today. In very simple terms, Plaid allows a variety of financial-technology startups to access their customers’ bank account information. Tune into this podcast to hear William discuss the story of Plaid, the emerging industry trends and talk about how some out-of-the-box startups are using Plaid today. What’s more you ask? Some xkcd humor and...
Jul 02, 2017•25 min
Happy Summer! Volunteering, internships, and general travel has taken Wharton students to all corners of the world this summer. Wharton FinTech has also made its first foray into Southeast Asia. Check out this latest podcast, where Kevin Vichyastit (Wharton MBA 2018) chats with Iwan Kurniawan, Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Modalku, a P2P lending platform in Indonesia for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs). Modalku is funded by Sequoia Capital, and founded by locals, hoping t...
Jun 13, 2017•25 min
David Gogel (MBA '18) chats with David Klein, co-founder and CEO of CommonBond. David discusses a wide range of topics in FinTech, student lending, and entrepreneurship. He goes deep on CommonBond’s student loans products, business model, and future prospects. He discusses how the Wharton MBA experience helped him launch CommonBond. We also cover David’s views on the FinTech industry more broadly, blockchain, and advice for student entrepreneurs. David Klein is CommonBond’s co-founder and Chief ...
May 12, 2017•38 min
Nipun Jasuja (Wharton MBA 2018) chats with Kaz Nejatian, Co-founder and CEO of Kash, a Y Combinator Summer 2014 payments startup. Kash's mission is to make payments simple by getting rid of interchange, chargebacks, and everything merchants hate. In this fun podcast, Kaz fondly speaks about his memories as an immigrant kid that incepted the seeds of entrepreneurship, his obsession with consumer behavior, the story of Kash, and his insightful perspectives on digital payments, both in the US and i...
May 03, 2017•31 min
Matt Applegate chats with Will Janensch, Co-Founder and COO of Concur Reference Data, about blockchain solutions for capital markets. Will has over 15 years of experience in market and reference data at Thomson Reuters as VP of Strategy and senior roles in Marketing and Operations at Thomson Reuters and First Data. Will led the strategy on multiple $100M+ M&A transactions, including the $625M acquisition of FXAll. He holds a BA from Yale University and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate Schoo...
Apr 24, 2017•45 min
Christophe Williams (MBA '18) chats with Andy Rachleff, co-founder and CEO of Wealthfront. Andy discusses a wide range of topics in FinTech, investing, and how to grow tech companies. He goes in-depth on Wealthfront's competitive advantages in automated investing and how he approaches product/marketing strategy to grow sustainably. Also covered are Andy's background in venture capital, the process of founding Wealthfront, and how he sees disruptive innovation affecting financial service incumben...
Apr 18, 2017•35 min
Brian Shah (MBA '18) chats with Michael Tannenbaum, Chief Revenue Officer of SoFi. As CRO, Michael is responsible for driving successful execution and growth across SoFi’s core lending products. In this podcast, Michael discusses the company's foray into new financial products, its unique membership perks, and its recent acquisition of Zenbanx. He also shares his perspective on the current fundraising environment and the future of financial technology.
Apr 10, 2017•18 min
Aditya Goel chats with Ram Ahluwalia, Co-founder and CEO, PeerIQ. This New York-based financial information services company is creating tools to analyze, access, and manage risk in the peer-to-peer lending sector. In this podcast, Ram discusses the trends, evolution and future of alternative lending markets and the role of analytics and platforms in this asset space, sharing both his own perspectives and insights from recent industry conferences. Ram also provides precious nuggets of wisdom for...
Mar 22, 2017•47 min
Nipun Jasuja chats with Brandon Yahn, Founder of Student Loans Guy - a brand new FinTech startup. Brandon started Student Loans Guy to help people better understand their student loans and more easily navigate the lending and refinancing marketplace. In this podcast, Brandon shares his perspectives on the student loan market in the US, describes the mission and vision behind Student Loans Guy, and walks us through his exciting professional journey, sharing candid advice for budding entrepreneurs...
Mar 16, 2017•36 min
