Jo Ann Barefoot is CEO & Cofounder of AIR - the Alliance for Innovative Regulation - and host of the global podcast show Barefoot Innovation. A noted advocate of “regulation innovation,” Jo Ann is Senior Fellow Emerita at the Harvard Kennedy School Center for Business & Government. She has been Deputy Comptroller of the Currency, partner at KPMG, Co-Chair of Treliant Risk Advisors, and staff member at the U.S. Senate Banking Committee. She serves on the board of Oportun; on the fintech advisory committee of FINRA; on the Milken Institute U.S. FinTech Advisory Committee; and on the California Blockchain Working Group Advisory Board. Jo Ann previously chaired the boards of directors of the Financial Health Network and FinRegLab and served on the CFPB’s Consumer Advisory Board. She currently serves on the boards of FinRegLab and the National Foundation for Credit Counseling. Jo Ann cofounded Hummingbird Regtech and, in 2020, was named to the Fintech All of Fame by CB Insights. AIR was honored in Fast Company's 2021 awards on World-Changing Ideas.
David Ehrich is Co-founder and Executive Director of AIR - the Alliance for Innovative Regulation, a non-profit dedicated to the digital modernization of the regulatory system. David is the architect of the Bank On National Account Standards, and he is a Co-Founder of Petal, a fintech credit card pioneering the use of cash flow underwriting to help consumers build safe and affordable credit access when they do not have a credit score or a history of credit. David was appointed to the CFPB's Consumer Advisory Board, and is a member of the Marketplace Partner Advisory group for Change Machine. David serves on several nonprofit boards and is an active fintech advisor and investor. David holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, and a B.S. from Cornell University.
Thomas J. Curry is a partner in Nutter’s Corporate and Transactions Department and a co-leader of the firm’s Banking and Financial Services group. He advises clients in a wide range of policy, regulatory, governance, and other matters. He chairs the Milken Institute’s Fintech Advisory Committee and is a foundation board member of the newly launched initiative Alliance for Innovative Regulation (AIR), which will help regulators integrate technology into every stratum. Prior to joining Nutter, Tom served as the U.S. Comptroller of the Currency until May 2017. He most recently served as an expert consultant for the International Monetary Fund.
Adrienne Harris is a Towsley Foundation Policymaker in Residence at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy and a Gates Foundation Senior Research Fellow with the Center on Finance, Law, and Policy at the University of Michigan. She also advises fintech companies, financial institutions, and large venture capital firms. Most recently, Adrienne was the Chief Business Officer and General Counsel a San Francisco-based, insurtech start-up for which she is now an Advisor. Adrienne was a Special Assistant to President Obama for Economic Policy at the National Economic Council in the Obama White House, advising the White House on financial reform, financial technology, cyber security, consumer protection, and housing finance reform, and spearheaded the Administration’s fintech strategy. She previously served as Senior Advisor to Deputy Treasury Secretary Sarah Bloom Raskin.
Kabir backs early-stage entrepreneurs who want to fundamentally transform the financial sector and improve people’s economic outlook. At Flourish, he leads global policy and ecosystem building efforts, makes investments in the US and emerging markets, and incubates new areas of work. Kabir has developed a portfolio of investments in regtech and banking technology, backed startups in frontier markets in South Asia. Kabir has a deep background in emerging markets, having cofounded a program at CGAP and the World Bank that laid the foundations of digital financial services in emerging markets.
Cantwell F. Muckenfuss III is a Visiting Clinical Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School and a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP where he focuses on the representation of financial institutions. Mr. Muckenfuss is a founder, member and past Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of City First Bank of D.C., N.A., a community development bank in Washington, D.C. He is also Chairman of the Board of City First Enterprises, Inc., the nonprofit controlling shareholder of City First Bank. Mr. Muckenfuss received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Vanderbilt University, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and his law degree from Yale Law School.
Michael S. Barr is the Joan and Sanford Weill Dean of Public Policy at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, the Frank Murphy Collegiate Professor of Public Policy, the Roy F. and Jean Humphrey Proffitt Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, and the Faculty Director of the Center on Finance, Law, and Policy at the University of Michigan. He is also a nonresident Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and previously, at the Brookings Institution. He served under President Obama from 2009–2010 as the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions, and was a key architect of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. In the Clinton Administration, Barr served as Special Advisor to President William J. Clinton, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Community Development Policy, Special Assistant to the Treasury Secretary, and Special Advisor and Counselor on the Policy Planning Staff at the State Department. During the 1993 October Term, he was a law clerk for Associate Justice David H. Souter. He received his J.D. from Yale Law School; an M. Phil in International Relations from Magdalen College, Oxford University, as a Rhodes Scholar; and his B.A., summa cum laude, with Honors in History, from Yale University.
John provides a wide range of regulatory and compliance solutions for financial services, fintech and cryptocurrency firms. He was most recently General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer of Circle Internet Financial, Inc., a global crypto finance company that is seeking to help change the global economy. Mr. Beccia previously served as Senior Vice President and Deputy General Counsel for Boston Private Financial Holdings, Inc., a publicly traded bank holding company. He was also Assistant General Counsel for Investors Bank & Trust Company and Chief Regulatory Counsel and Research Director for The Financial Services Roundtable where he was responsible for all regulatory affairs and assisted with legislative efforts for the trade association. Mr. Beccia has served as Chairman of the In-House Counsel Subcommittee of the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Banking Law Committee and is currently an Adjunct Professor of Boston University School of Law. Mr. Beccia has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Providence College, a J.D. from Roger Williams University School of Law, and a LLM in Banking and Financial Law from Boston University School of Law.
Richard Berner is Clinical Professor of Management Practice in the Department of Finance, and, with Professor Robert Engle, is Co-Director of the Stern Volatility and Risk Institute. Professor Berner served as the first director of the Office of Financial Research (OFR) from 2013 until 2017. He was counselor to the Secretary of the Treasury from April 2011 to 2013. He served as chief or senior economist at Morgan Stanley, Mellon Bank, Salomon Brothers, Morgan Guaranty Trust Company, and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. He received his BA from Harvard College and his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania. He is an advisor to FinRegLab, MacroPolicy Perspectives, HData, and the Alliance for Innovative Regulation, and is a member of the Milken Fintech Advisory Committee and the IMF panel of experts for financial stability.
Chris Brummer is a Georgetown law professor, lecturer, and author. He has earned an international reputation as a premier thought leader in financial services and the law, and a tireless advocate of diversity and inclusion. Chris started his career at Cravath Swaine and Moore LLP, and now serves as the Faculty Director of the Institute of International Economic Law. For over a decade, he has also lent his expertise to nonprofits and policymakers, and offered his insights as to how firms and governments can best understand and react to new developments and challenges in the financial system. Aside from working as a professor and spearheading multiple initiatives and organizations related to financial regulation, he also serves as both a member of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s Subcommittee on Virtual Currencies and the Consultative Working Group for the European Securities and Markets Authority’s Financial Innovation Standing Committee. Chris holds multiple degrees, including a J.D. with honors from Columbia Law School and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is also the author and/or editor of several books, including Fintech Law in a Nutshell and Cryptoassets: Legal, Regulatory and Monetary Perspectives. He is the founder of Washington DC’s Fintech Week and the host of the Fintech Beat podcast.
Described by Chambers as "a recognized dean of the consumer finance bar," Jerry Buckley has, over a 40 year career, established himself as an acknowledged leader in financial services law. A founding partner of Buckley LLP, Mr. Buckley assists his clients — banks, mortgage companies, credit card issuers, insurance companies, broker dealers, fintech lenders, investment banks, and private equity investors — with business formations and acquisitions, risk management, and enforcement matters involving federal and state regulators. He has extensive experience with electronic signatures and serves as General Counsel of the Electronic Signatures and Records Association. He is co-author of The Law of Electronic Signatures and Records. Prior to entering private practice, Mr. Buckley served as Republican Staff Director of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, where he participated in drafting most of the laws that serve as the foundation for today’s consumer finance law ─ the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the Truth in Lending Act amendments, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, the Community Reinvestment Act, and the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. For many years, Mr. Buckley has been a leading advocate for updating and modernizing the nearly 50 year old regulatory regime that is slowing down financial innovation. Several years ago he wrote a widely read article in the American Banker urging development of “dynamic disclosures,” to offer far more useful information to consumers than is provided under the cumbersome and voluminous static disclosures currently provided. He recently took the lead in a pro bono project producing a white paper on “Regulatory Hurdles to Fintech Innovation,” based on interviews with innovation leaders in each of the federal financial regulatory agencies. Mr. Buckley serves as an Adjunct Associate Professor of Law at the American University Washington College of Law. The recipient of numerous awards and honors, he received the Senator William Proxmire Lifetime Achievement Award from the American College of Consumer Financial Services Lawyers in 2015.
Agnes Bundy Scanlan, Esq., is the President of The Cambridge Group LLC, a strategy and risk management advisory firm. The Cambridge Group provides regulatory risk consulting, operational expertise on consumer banking regulations, interim staff augmentation, training guidance, and more. Based on her unique experiences, Agnes is recognized as a strategic partner and trusted advisor who provides hands-on advice to execute and implement solutions successfully.
Recently, Agnes was senior advisor for Treliant, where she counseled financial services firms on various challenges, including strategy, governance, regulatory, compliance, and risk management matters.
Previously, Agnes served as the Northeast Regional Director of Supervision Examinations for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”). As Regional Director, Agnes oversaw the regional staff, and represented the CFPB Supervision mission on all matters relating to conducting consumer financial protection supervision and examinations at a variety of complex depository financial institutions and non-depository consumer financial services companies. The 32 financial institutions and 25 companies under her regulatory authority had assets totaling over $6 trillion.
Earlier, Agnes was the chief regulatory and compliance officer, and global chief privacy officer at TD Bank. She worked in similar roles at Bank of America and its predecessors. Agnes also served as counsel at Goodwin Procter and for the United States Senate Committee on the Budget.
Agnes is an independent director for Truist Financial Corporation’s Board of Directors and NewTower Trust Company. She is a fellow of the American College of Consumer Financial Services Lawyers, a commissioner for the American Bar Association’s (“ABA”) Commission on Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Profession, and, is the chair of the ABA’s Business Law Section’s Privacy Subcommittee. Agnes was selected for inclusion in Boston Business Journal’s Most Powerful Women, and in Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business. She is the former vice chair of the Smith College Board of Trustees, former chair of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors’ Consumer Advisory Council, former (and founding) chairman of International Association of Privacy Professionals, and former chair of FannieMae’s Housing Impact Advisory Council.
Agnes holds a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and a A.B. from Smith College. She is a member of the Bar of the Supreme Court of the United States, the Bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the Bar of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the Bar of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. Last year, Agnes completed Harvard University’s certification course on Cybersecurity: Managing Risk in the Information Age and MIT’s certification course on Artificial Intelligence.
Andrew Burt, an internationally recognized expert on the intersection between data privacy, security and artificial intelligence, is Chief Legal Officer at Immuta, where he leads the company's Legal Engineering team. The team, comprised of lawyers with deep expertise in data science, focuses on automating compliance and oversight activities within the Immuta software platform.
Before joining Immuta, Andrew served as Special Advisor for Policy to the head of the FBI Cyber Division, where he was the lead author on the FBI’s after action report on the 2014 attack on Sony. A frequent speaker and author, he has published articles on technology and law in The New York Times, The Financial Times, and Harvard Business Review, where he is a regular contributor.
Andrew is a visiting fellow at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project, a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a certified cyber incident responder. He holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a B.A. with first class honors from McGill University.
Fabrice Coles is an attorney and former senior Capitol Hill staffer who is committed to sustainable financial inclusion at scale. Prior to his current role advising banks on Congressional developments related to FinTech and community development, Fabrice spent a decade working in the United States Congress. During his tenure, he served as the Executive Director of the Congressional Black Caucus and as an economic policy advisor in both the House and Senate. Fabrice has also served at the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund. He holds a J.D. from the Howard University School of Law, an LLM in Securities and Financial Regulation from Georgetown University Law Center and an MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business.
Jotaka L. Eaddy is the founder and CEO of Full Circle Strategies, LLC - a social impact consulting firm committed to advancing transformative change and global impact.
Described as the “Olivia Pope of Silicon Valley” by Forbes Magazine, Jotaka is a dedicated and seasoned strategist with more than 20 years of experience in policy, advocacy, and movement building.
Within her current practice, Jotaka works with clients including corporate, non-profit, foundations, technology and government organizations seeking to advance policy, ideas, and change. Jotaka has led regulatory, legislative, and social impact initiatives at the federal and state level for leading non- profits and within the C-Suite of leading technology companies, helping to bridge the gap between Washington DC and Silicon Valley.
Most recently Jotaka served as Vice President of Policy; Strategic Engagement, and Impact for LendUp. Within her capacity, Eaddy served as a member of LendUp’s Executive Management team and represented LendUp's regulatory, legislative, and social impact initiatives at the federal and state level. Eaddy's team was responsible for measuring how LendUp's products benefited consumers, such as saving customers more than $200 million in fees and interest, and creating a series of financial education courses that have been viewed more than 2.1 million times.
As one of the few black women that has served in the C-Suite of a Silicon Valley based company, Jotaka is a passionate advocate for increased diversity and impact metrics in the tech sector. Committed to social impact and social justice; Jotaka serves as a board advisor to several tech start-up companies including Maker’s Row, Inc.; Gauge, Inc., Tech Dojo, and Hustle, Inc. From 2009-2014, Eaddy served as Senior Advisor to the President and CEO and Senior Director for Voting Rights for the NAACP. Within that capacity she directed external affairs and strategic initiatives on behalf of the Office of the President and CEO and led the NAACP’s strategy to defend and expand voting rights. Under Jotaka’s leadership – the NAACP played a pivotal role in a wide array of voting rights initiatives including: changing the Delaware State Constitution to expand voting rights to people with felony convictions, stopping the spread of voter suppression laws such as photo id, and secure the voting rights of more than 300,000 citizens with felony convictions in the state of Virginia through an executive order signed by the Governor.
In addition to domestic advocacy, Jotaka has lobbied within various international forums including the United Nations Human Rights Council, African Union, the Organization of American States, and Council of Europe, among others.
In 2004, Jotaka directed the national lobby and international advocacy campaign against the juvenile death penalty in the United States. Those efforts contributed to the 2005 landmark US Supreme Court decision Roper v. Simmons which abolished the juvenile death penalty in the United States and was supported by an amicus brief signed by more than 50 nations.
A noted speaker and advocate, Jotaka has traveled extensively, serving as a guest lecturer and strategist on human rights and social impact at various institutions and universities covering 49 states and 25 countries.
As a student at the University of South Carolina, Ms. Eaddy served in a number of leadership capacities, including tenure as student representative on the University’s Board of Trustees. As a student senator, she authored legislation and coordinated strategies that resulted in the passage of the University of South Carolina’s student resolution calling for the removal of the Confederate flag from the South Carolina State House Dome. Most notably, Ms. Eaddy was elected Student Body President, becoming the first black woman to be elected to the position in the University of South Carolina’s 213-year history and the first black woman elected to such a position in the state of South Carolina.
Eaddy is the receipt of several honors and awards including: SF Times Bay Area Most Influential Women in Business, 40 under 40 Silicon Valley Tech Diversity, Rainbow Push Outstanding Public Service Award, Root 100 Most influential African Americans, Essence Magazine Woman to Watch, My Carolina Association Outstanding Black Alumni, Midwest Academy Heather Award, Empower Magazine Political Rising Star, University of South Carolina College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Young Alumni, among others.
She serves on several boards including: University of South Carolina Alumni Association (Board of Governors), Marijuana Policy Project, and Board Advisor to Gauge, Inc., Makers Row, and Hustle, Inc.
Jotaka’s work has been highlighted in several publications including: Forbes Magazine, TechCrunch, Inc., Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, The Guardian, Essence Magazine, Fortune Magazine, Black Enterprise Magazine, Root 100 Most Influential African Americans, Politics365.com, MSNBC, CNN, Al Jazeera America, Aspire Network, Huffington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, BET, The Nation Magazine, Democracy Now, the Art of Activism, Black America Web.com, the American Prospect, among others.
Judith Erwin is the founding CEO of Grasshopper Bank, the first digital commercial bank in the United States. Judith was on the founding executive team for Square 1 Bank in 2005, responsible for venture capital services globally. Square 1 successfully went public in 2014 and was later sold to Pacific Western Bank. She previously worked at Imperial and Comerica. After 35 years in banking, Judith knew it was the time to make significant changes in the commercial banking industry. Her strategy was to build a bank from scratch providing both a modern technological framework and intuitive user experience for the digital entrepreneurs Grasshopper serves. Grasshopper Bank opened its doors on May 13, 2019 becoming the first US digital commercial bank, first new bank in NY in ten years, and first de novo with a female CEO, female CTO, and female CFO.
Amy has over 25 years of experience shaping banking and consumer financial protection law and regulation. Amy was Senior Deputy Comptroller and Chief Counsel at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) from February 2013 to November 2017 where she served on the agency’s executive committee and oversaw all of the agency’s legal activities and licensing functions. Amy led the OCC’s strategic initiative on responsible innovation resulting in the establishment of the Office of Innovation and the fintech national bank charter. Previously, she held a number of positions in the US Congress, including Chief Counsel to the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs where she led the Committee’s work in responding to the financial crisis, including the Dodd-Frank Act, and Minority General Counsel to the House Committee on Financial Services. Amy currently serves as a senior advisor to FS Vector, an advisory firm that helps innovative financial companies with their compliance, business strategy and policy needs. She is on the board of directors for Varo Money, a challenger mobile bank, and FinRegLab, a newly established nonprofit that tests new technologies and data to inform public policy and drive more inclusive financial services.
Christopher Giancarlo is Senior Counsel to the law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher and the former Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Mr. Giancarlo also served as a member of the Financial Stability Oversight Committee (FSOC), the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets, and the Executive Board of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO). Before entering public service, Mr. Giancarlo served as the Executive Vice President of GFI Group Inc., a financial services firm. Under his leadership, the CFTC published primers on virtual currencies and smart contracts, oversaw the launch of the first bitcoin futures contracts and created LabCFTC as the agency’s stakeholder in the digital evolution of derivatives trading markets.
He recently launched a non-profit, The Digital Dollar Foundation. The Digital Dollar Project is a partnership between Accenture (NYSE: ACN) and the Digital Dollar Foundation to advance exploration of a United States Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). The purpose of the Project is to encourage research and public discussion on the potential advantages of a digital dollar, convene private sector thought leaders and actors, and propose possible models to support the public sector. The Project will develop a framework for potential, practical steps that can be taken to establish a dollar CBDC.
Chris has over 45,000 followers on Twitter as @giancarloMKTS where he is known as “CryptoDad.”
Daniel Gorfine is an experienced regulatory, public policy, strategic communications, and business executive, and the founder of Gattaca Horizons LLC, a boutique advisory firm. Gorfine has substantial in-house, government, and think tank experience across the technology and financial markets & services sectors, and was previously appointed by the Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to serve as the federal agency’s first Chief Innovation Officer and Director of LabCFTC. In that capacity, Gorfine developed and led the Commission’s new technology innovation and regulatory modernization effort focused on informing policy and helping the Agency keep pace with modern, digital markets. Gorfine served as a senior agency representative on FinTech and crypto-asset issues, worked with staff and Members of Congress, coordinated with domestic and international regulators, and provided expert testimony before Congress. He also currently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center teaching FinTech Law & Policy. Prior to the CFTC, Gorfine was Vice President, External Affairs & Associate General Counsel at OnDeck where he spearheaded efforts to create a new industry trade association and business standards. Gorfine also previously served as Director of Financial Markets Policy and Legal Counsel at the Milken Institute think tank, and earlier in his career worked at the international law firm Covington & Burling LLP. He also served a clerkship with U.S. District Court Judge Catherine C. Blake in the District of Maryland. A graduate of Brown University (A.B.), Gorfine holds a J.D. from George Washington University Law School and an M.A. from the Paul H. Nitze School for Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University.
Yvette began her career with the Federal Reserve before transitioning to corporate leadership roles with Citigroup, Barclays, and most recently Wells Fargo, where she was Executive Vice President and Chief Compliance Officer. With Wells Fargo, she spearheaded innovations in RegTech-supported risk management platforms, overhauled consumer protection frameworks, and strengthened the compliance function by enhancing data and analysis. A member of the Wells Fargo Management Committee and Chair of the Regulatory and Risk Management Committee, she worked closely with the CEO and other senior executives to develop business strategies that met goals for growth while complying with US and global regulatory requirements.
Howell Jackson is the James S. Reid, Jr., Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. His research interests include financial regulation, consumer protection, international finance, and federal budget policy. Professor Jackson has co-authored three books—Financial Regulation: Law and Policy (2nd ed. 2018), Analytical Methods for Lawyers (3rd ed. 2017), and Fiscal Challenges: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Budget Policy (2008)—and the author of numerous scholarly articles. Professor Jackson frequently consults with public officials and regulatory agencies on financial regulation. He is also trustee of College Retirement Equities Fund (CREF) and affiliated TIAA-CREF investment companies. Before joining the Harvard Law School faculty in 1989, Professor Jackson practiced law in Washington, D.C., and was a law clerk for Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall. He received his JD and MBA degrees from Harvard University in 1982 and a BA from Brown University in 1976. Additional information on Professor Jackson’s outside activities is available at https://helios.law.harvard.edu/Public/Faculty/ConflictOfInterestReport.aspx?id=10423.
Wendy Jephson is Head of Product Research & Ideation at Nasdaq. Wendy is responsible for leading a unique team of experts that combines behavioural science, financial domain knowledge, and advanced analytics to bring diverse thinking and cross-industry experience to designing and delivering technology that solves some of the biggest challenges in financial services. Dual qualified as a commercial lawyer and Business Psychologist with domain expertise in healthcare and financial services, in her role as Co-Founder Wendy was instrumental in the original vision, growth phase and the recent acquisition of Sybenetix by Nasdaq. As Head of Behavioural Sciences at Nasdaq Wendy and her team work closely with Alpha clients using behavioural science methodology to dive deeply into complex challenges facing the financial industry. Together they are designing innovative technology for Conduct Risk that can deliver efficiency, consistency and greater resilience to our organisations. Recognised as a leader in her field, Wendy regularly delivers keynotes to Regulators, Buy and Sell-side organisations and leading universities around the world on topics as diverse as AI, Surveillance, Technology Design, Cognitive Engineering, Organisational Resilience and Conduct and Culture.
Dan Kimerling started Deciens because of the realization that there was (and, other than Deciens, is) no Venture fund focused on supporting fintech companies at the seed stage. Having helped to start three companies and invested in over forty, he thought that this was a major problem for founders trying to re-shape a sector that is over 20% of global GDP. As Founder and Managing Partner at Deciens Capital, Dan is responsible for all aspect of the firm, including raising capital, sourcing and executing investments, and collaborating with portfolio companies. As part of this, he is on the board of several portfolio companies. The firm build’s on his successful angel track record, including Tala, Truelink Financial, Starcity, SimpleLegal (acquired by Onit), and Fuze Network (Acquired by Ingo Money). Until September 2017, Dan was a senior executive at Silicon Valley Bank responsible for API Banking, Open Platform, and Global Research and Development. He joined Silicon Valley Bank in July of 2015 through the acquisition of Standard Treasury, which he co-founded and served as the CEO. Standard Treasury - a YCombinator company - was the leading provider of API solutions to the financial services community and was named one of the 10 technology companies to watch by The American Banker in 2014. Because of his work on bringing cutting edge technology to banks, Dan was named to the 2015 Forbes' 30 under 30 list. Before starting Standard Treasury, Dan was the first employee and Chief Operating Officer of Giftly, a stored value technology company acquired by GiftCards.com in May 2013. While leading the company, Business Insider named Giftly one of "The 20 Best Start of 2011" and Dan one of the "25 Hot Young Stars In Silicon Valley". Giftly's mobile app was also named by "Best of the App Store" by Apple in 2012. Before Giftly, Dan was a journalist and analyst at TechCrunch, the leading technology website on the Internet until its acquisition by AOL in 2010. He also helped to run their well-regarded conference business for two years. Earlier in his career he was an award winning policy scholar, being named the Anne Armstrong Leadership Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a Jeff Metcalf Fellow at the Hudson Institute. He graduated from the University of Chicago with a BA and MA (both with honors) and studied mathematical (analytic) finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of business for a year as a Booth Scholar. Outside of his work at Deciens Capital he is also the Co-Founder and a Principal at Gutenberg Capital, a Real Estate investment company based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He lives with his wife and their dogs in San Francisco CA and Santa Fe NM.
Anju Patwardhan is Managing Partner at CreditEase Fintech VC Fund. Prior to this, Anju worked in banking for over two decades with Citibank and Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) in global and regional leadership roles. Anju is a member of the World Economic Forum (WEF) fintech steering committee, Fintech Faculty at Singularity University, and a Distinguished Fellow of the Singapore Institute of Banking and Finance. She serves on several international boards including the Gulf International Bank (Saudi Arabia), University of the Future (India), OCBC Bank’s Digital Advisory Council (Singapore), board nominee of the PIF (Saudi Arabia), and various fintech companies in the US/UK. She was a 2016 Fulbright Fellow & Visiting Scholar at Stanford University, and Distinguished Careers Institute Fellow at Stanford in 2017 and 2018. While at Stanford, she published papers on the use of technology to support financial inclusion and also collaborated on launching a fintech course for the MBA students. She was also on the advisory board of the Government of Estonia’s e-Residency program. She was also an Innovation Fellow at the National University of Singapore, and Fintech Industry expert at UC Berkeley. She is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology and the Indian Institute of Management and has additional qualifications in board directorship, risk management and art appreciation.
Arjan Schütte is the founder and a managing partner of Core Innovation Capital, a mission-driven venture capital fund investing in financial services companies that empower everyday Americans. His investments include Ripple, Oportun, SynapseFI, Fundera and TIO Networks. Arjan is a sought-after consumer finance expert and a passionate advocate for market-based financial inclusion. He blogs for Forbes, and has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Economist, among others. He has spoken everywhere from SxSW to Stanford, from Money2020 to the White House. Arjan served as member of the CFPB’s Consumer Advisory Board and is a Senior Advisor to the Financial Health Network (formerly CFSI), the nation’s leading authority on financial health, which he helped start in 2004. He currently serves on boards including SynapseFI, and PadSplit, and as observer to boards including Fundera, Mosaic, Hugo, and PayJoy. Previous boards include Ripple, and TIO Networks. A number of Arjan’s investments have been successfully excited, including Oportun (IPO), TIO Networks (by PayPal), AccountNow (by Green Dot), CircleLending (by Virgin Group), L2C (by TransUnion), and RentBureau (by Experian). Prior, Arjan spent a decade as an entrepreneur in several venture backed startups as a technology leader and general manager including Pierian Spring Software, Cognitive Concepts (acquired by Houghton Mifflin), Capella Learning (NASDAQ: CPLA), and DoTheGood. Arjan earned his Master’s from the Media Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as an Interval Research Fellow, and his Bachelor’s in Philosophy and Communication at Lewis & Clark College. He commutes between Los Angeles and San Francisco, when he’s not doting on his his wife and two young children, learning the piano or cooking.
David Silberman has been involved in consumer finance issues from a wide range of perspectives for over three decades. As President and CEO of Union Privilege, an affiliate of the AFL-CIO, he led the development and oversaw the delivery of a range of consumer financial products and services to union members. After leaving Union Privilege, David served as General Counsel and Executive Vice President of the Kessler Financial Services, a privately-held company providing marketing and advisory services to financial institutions and their affinity-group partners. Following the passage of the Dodd-Frank Act, David joined the implementation team for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and was named the Associate Director for the Division of Research, Markets, and Regulations. In 2016-2017, David also served as the Acting Deputy Director for the CFPB. Mr. Silberman retired from the CFPB in 2020, and now serves as a Senior Advisor to the Center for Responsible Lending and the Financial Health Network’s Financial Solutions Lab. He also has been named an adjunct professor at Georgetown’s School of Public Policy and at Harvard Law School, from which he graduated. Mr. Silberman began his legal career as a law clerk to Chief Judge David Bazelon of the D.C. Circuit and Justice Thurgood Marshall.
Laura Spiekerman is a cofounder and CRO at Alloy. Alloy's API enables financial services companies to better manage their digital onboarding and identity requirements, increasing conversion and reducing fraud for banks and fintechs alike. Alloy works with both fintech companies and banks, including Marqeta, Petal, Brex, Radius Bank and others. Prior to Alloy, Laura lead Business Development & Partnerships at an ACH payments startup and was on the Research & Investment team at Imprint Capital Advisors (acquired by Goldman Sachs). Laura is a proud Barnard College alumna and lives in Oakland, California.
Matt Van Buskirk is Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Hummingbird Regtech. Hummingbird gives superpowers to the people fighting financial crime by reducing paperwork, providing smart, data-rich analytics, and enabling collaboration for compliance professionals and law enforcement agents. Before launching Hummingbird, Matt was the Director of Regulatory Affairs at Circle.com, an international consumer payments startup leveraging blockchain technology. He was previously a consultant with Treliant Risk Advisors, a Washington-based management consulting firm specializing in the financial services industry, and a regulator with the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Thrift Supervision. His speaking credentials include the American Bankers Association Regulatory Compliance Conference, the Monetary Authority of Singapore's Fintech Festival, Money 2020, Finovate Europe, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, and the Department of Homeland Security's annual AML conference.
Raul Vazquez is the CEO of Oportun, a high-growth, mission-driven Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) and provider of inclusive, affordable financial services that empower people to build a better future. Based in Silicon Valley, Oportun serves individuals who other lenders consider “unscoreable” and has made over 3.2 million loans totaling over $7.3 billion across 12 states. Oportun’s customers have saved an estimated $1.5 billion in interest and fees compared to the alternatives typically available to them. Raul joined Oportun in 2012 after having held various senior leadership roles at Walmart, including EVP and President of Walmart West, President and CEO of Walmart.com, and EVP of Global eCommerce for developed markets. He is a board member of the National Association for Latino Community Asset Builders (NALCAB), and also serves on the Board of Directors of Intuit. Raul has previously served as a board member for Staples, as a member of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) Consumer Advisory Board, and is the past of Chair of the Federal Reserve Board’s Community Advisory Council. Mr. Vazquez was named the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2018 National Award winner in the Financial Services category. Under his leadership, Oportun was named by Time Magazine as a Genius Company in 2018 and recognized as one of 50 businesses inventing the future. Mr. Vazquez led Oportun through a successful IPO in September of 2019, and the company is listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the ticker symbol “OPRT.” Mr. Vazquez is a graduate of Stanford University with BS and MS degrees in industrial engineering and earned an MBA at the Wharton School of Business.
Colin Walsh is the CEO and co-founder of Varo Money, which is on track to become the first mobile-centric national bank in U.S. history. Colin founded Varo with a specific vision: to help millions of people improve their financial lives. Colin is uniquely positioned to lead the mobile bank revolution and has more than 25 years of experience in consumer banking at large global financial institutions. He led Europe’s largest credit and charge card business as an Executive Vice President at American Express. Colin also led the UK’s largest mortgage and savings businesses at Lloyds Banking Group, and served as Managing Director for the firm’s retail bancassurance, credit, debit and merchant acquiring businesses. Under Colin’s leadership and with an experienced team, Varo is building the best banking company in the country for consumers looking to build their financial health. The team recently launched No Fee Overdraft, the first-ever service of its kind to remove fees on overdrafts. Varo has raised $179M and serves more than 1 million registered customers across the country.
Lifetime entrepreneur with experience in text analytics, cyber forensics, and cross-border ventures. Co-founder of Basis Technology and investor in Customer Matrix, Diffeo, Lucidworks, Luminoso, Polyswarm, Recorded Future, Tamr, and Zoomd. Advisor to Diffeo, PolySwarm, and Thrive Bioscience. Delivered key enabling technology to Amazon and Google for their Japan market launches, and to Bing and Yahoo for their Asian expansion. Worked with the US Intelligence Community on high volume, multilingual DOMEX, HUMINT, OSINT, and SIGINT. Non-profit experience as business development director of the Free Software Foundation and director of the Unicode Consortium. Spent formative years at MIT as a student, teaching assistant, and research assistant at the AI Lab and Project MAC.
A true FinTech pioneer, Shamir Karkal played a crucial part in building the infrastructure that would pave the way for online banking. In 2009, he co-founded Simple, the first bank of its kind in the United States, and later headed the Open Platform at BBVA. Shamir was drawn to serve smaller companies, co-founding Sila in 2018 with the goal of empowering financial innovations. Shamir studied physics and computer science at Bangalore University and is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business. He lives with his family in Portland, Oregon, and enjoys jiu-jitsu, long-range target shooting, and studying history whenever possible.
Josh has spent 20 years moving from the architecture of the internet to the architecture of money, and how people think about it. Currently, Josh is dedicating his time to his family, and growing herd of goats, cattle and sheep on his farm in rural Oregon. Prior to this Josh was the founder and CEO of Simple.com. At Simple, he used his background in systems engineering, quantitative analysis, and behavioral economics to design a retail banking experience designed to help people feel confident with money. He has an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University, a BSc in Mathematics and Statistics and almost a medical degree from the University of Melbourne.
David Schwartz is Chief Technology Officer at Ripple. David is one of the original architects of the XRP Ledger. Prior to joining Ripple, David Schwartz was Chief Technical Officer for WebMaster Incorporated, a Santa Clara software developer. He developed encrypted cloud storage and enterprise messaging systems for organizations like CNN and the National Security Agency (NSA). Known as “JoelKatz,” he is a respected voice in the digital currency community.
Gary M. Shiffman is an applied micro-economist and business executive working to combat organized violence, corruption, and coercion. He received his BA from the University of Colorado in Psychology, his MA from Georgetown University in National Security Studies, and his PhD in Economics from George Mason University. His academic work is complimented by his global operational experiences, including his service as a U.S. Navy Surface Warfare Officer in the Pacific Fleet with tours in the Gulf War; as an official in the Pentagon and a Senior Executive in the US Department of Homeland Security; as a National Security Advisor in the US Senate; and as a business leader at a publicly-traded corporation. Currently, Dr. Shiffman serves as the CEO of Giant Oak, Inc., a machine learning and artificial intelligence company building software to support professionals in the fields of national security and financial crime. He dedicates time to Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, teaching the next generation of national security leaders. Dr. Shiffman recently published The Economics of Violence: How Behavioral Science Can Transform Our View of Crime, Insurgency, and Terrorism with Cambridge University Press in 2020.
Experienced Executive and Advisor managing technology risk as a transformational Chief Technology Officer (CTO), First-ever CTO of City of New York, Financial Services CTO, successful entrepreneur, an expert in technology risk and audit, regulatory technology, intelligent automation and data governance. Ms. Tantoco has an impressive track record in enterprise transformation at scale, as Senior Product Manager at Palm, CTO at Merrill Lynch and UBS, and holds four US patents on intelligent workflow. Appointed New York City’s first-ever Chief Technology Officer, Tantoco led the Mayor’s Office of Tech and Innovation and groundbreaking initiatives in smart city tech. Most recently, Tantoco co-founded Grasshopper Bank. raised $131M in seed and capital funds, building a digital bank from scratch. Tantoco is currently a Board Member and Advisor, consultant, and speaker on artificial intelligence, regulatory tech, and fintech.
Matt Van Buskirk is Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Hummingbird Regtech. Hummingbird gives superpowers to the people fighting financial crime by reducing paperwork, providing smart, data-rich analytics, and enabling collaboration for compliance professionals and law enforcement agents. Before launching Hummingbird, Matt was the Director of Regulatory Affairs at Circle.com, an international consumer payments startup leveraging blockchain technology. He was previously a consultant with Treliant Risk Advisors, a Washington-based management consulting firm specializing in the financial services industry, and a regulator with the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Thrift Supervision. His speaking credentials include the American Bankers Association Regulatory Compliance Conference, the Monetary Authority of Singapore's Fintech Festival, Money 2020, Finovate Europe, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, and the Department of Homeland Security's annual AML conference.
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