Tearsheet Podcast: The Business Of Finance

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet Editor in Chief, Zack Miller. As an early PayPal employee, Oded Zehavi jumpstarted the firm’s Middle East and Africa business. From there, he joined Payoneer to help with a turnaround by optimizing sales, product and marketing. Now, Oded is the CEO and co-founder of Mesh Payments, a corporate payments firms that uses a speciality in helping firms manage their subscription spend to eventually handle their total spend. We talk about the changes Oded has seen in the payments industry over the past 15 years and where he thinks it’s headed in the future. We drill down into opportunities for payments firms in the SaaS economy and how Mesh uses its experience managing SaaS payments to expand into its clients total spend -- it grew 600 percent over the past year. Oded Zehavi is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with employment data platform Argyle to create a podcast series about the rising importance of employment data and how lenders, banks and fintechs are using this data to make financial products available to more people, solving some of the challenges with today’s financial services. Thanks to rapid technological advancements, everything we know about work is constantly changing. The pandemic also brought about massive job losses and many career paths changed as a result. With the rise of the gig economy, this new reality means more and more people are joining the non-traditional, multi-income workforce. Financial systems, like credit scoring, weren't built for this new worker -- they were built for the W2 worker, with a single full-time job and monthly pay stubs. This leaves non-traditional workers underserved by traditional financial services, and puts major hurdles in the way of deserving folks toward their financial wellbeing. Fintechs like Arg

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet Editor in Chief, Zack Miller. An important theme we’ve covered has been the rising availability of earned wage access solutions. As more workers engage in the gig economy, fintech and payment solutions are emerging that help people access their wages as they earn them, instead of waiting for a monthly or bi-weekly pay cycle. Payfare is one of those companies. Fresh off an IPO in Toronto in March of this year, the company works with platforms like Uber, Lyft, and Doordash to enable their workers to get paid. Payfare CEO Marco Margiotta joins us on the podcast to discuss the move to go public and what changes that presented to management. Marco discusses trends in gig economy payments and earned wage access. Lastly, we look ahead to see where earned wage access matures to and how Payfare’s products will continue to support workers. Marco Margiotta is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with employment data platform Argyle to create a podcast series about the rising importance of employment data and how lenders, banks and fintechs are using this data to make financial products available to more people, solving some of the challenges with today’s financial services. Good fintech solutions address the status quo of who gets to benefit from financial services. They do so by first recognizing that there is power in non-traditional data, and secondly that the ownership of that data belongs with its creator: the consumer. From providing mobile-based banking services where brick and mortar banks don’t compete, to simplifying payment flows for one-person businesses, fintechs empower individuals by giving them the financial tools and pathways to improving their lives. I spoke with Hannah Arnold, vp of business development at Argyle, about using employment data to supplement poor or nonexistent credit in the lending process.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I'm Tearsheet Editor in Chief, Zack Miller. OppFi is a fintech platform offering financial products to most Americans. The business was built on a core small-dollar monthly installment loan product for near prime customers. As it goes public, OppFi is expanding its product set into credit cards and payroll deduction products serving consumers with FICO scores under 620 with incomes of $50,000 a year. OppFi CEO Jared Kaplan joins me on the podcast to discuss the types of financial products 150 million Americans can use to live their lives and what their alternatives are. We discuss OppFi’s growth trajectory and plans for the future as a public company. Lastly, we hit on how the firm differentiates from its competitors, including Upstart, which at first blush, feels quite similar.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I'm Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. When you look at investment behavior, people are more likely to invest in things family and friends invest in than they are to follow professional advice. That’s why there have been an infinite number of social investment platforms created that allow investors to copy one another. But when it comes to investing in real estate or creating businesses together, friends and families had to essentially recreate the wheel each time they made an investment. That includes creating a company with legal documents, funding an account, managing a cap table. There’s a lot that goes into it and that’s what Tribevest wants to help with. Tribevest is an early stage company that provides what an investor group needs to make investments: including a bank account, a schedule of contributions and communication tools. CEO Travis Smith joins me on the podcast to talk about his own personal journey putting money in private investments that he took with

T>he following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with employment data platform Argyle to create a podcast series about the rising importance of employment data and how lenders, banks and fintechs are using this data to make financial products available to more people, solving some of the challenges with today’s financial services. A fintech CTO’s job is wide and varied. Building a secure fintech solution that handles sensitive financial and employment data requires you to tread carefully. You can’t really move fast and break things. It gets really interesting when you imagine the challenge of getting at employment data, for example, requires building new tools on top of legacy tech stacks that weren’t built with modern fintech requirements in mind. Argyle's CTO Audrius Zujus speaks to Tearsheet editor in chief about the challenge and opportunity to build fintech solutions that are scalable and secure.

I’m Zack Miller, editor in chief of Tearsheet. The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with employment data platform Argyle to create a podcast series about the rising importance of employment data and how lenders, banks and fintechs are using this data to make financial products available to more people, solving some of the challenges with today’s financial services. The nature of work is changing. People are taking on more gigs, driving for Uber, freelancing on projects. I talk with Argyle CEO and founder Shmulik Fishman about the opportunity to build an employment data ecosystem, connecting employers, payroll providers, and consumers. We discuss his entrepreneurial journey, the technical challenges ahead, and the role of consumer-permissioned data in the financial industry.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I'm Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. This article was sent out to subscribers to EarlyStage, Tearsheet’s newest newsletter. With EarlyStage, we go deeper on some younger companies that point to trends, products and services, and entrepreneurs that should be on your radar screen. Into a sea of sameness, new challenger banks are launching left and right. More are focusing on demographic needs, like providing banking services to the LGBTQ community or to immigrants. Better Financial, on the other hand, addresses a problem the majority of Americans know well: financial shocks. It could be losing a job or getting sick. Better Financial has embedded insurance products into its banking platform that provide a safety net for when something unexpected happens. It all happens behind the scenes. Thiel fellow and founder Kaushik Tiwari is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. Revenue based financing is quickly becoming a popular route for businesses to tap into needed capital. Structured like a loan and not equity, new financing firms are using this new/old type of financing to help all types of businesses to scale. ClearCo brands itself as the world’s largest ecommerce investor. It’s fresh off of closing its own $100 million equity round, including $250 million debt facility. The company, which rebranded from Clearbanc, has close to a $2 billion valuation and is sharing new data on how Clearco’s proprietary AI is democratizing funding to female founders and people of color. ClearCo’s co-founders, Michele Romanow and Andrew D’Souza, an entrepreneurial couple, join me to discuss their plans for with this new round of funding and why ClearCo is well positioned to fuel entrepreneurship outside of typical venture networks and regions.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. The journey from screen scraping consumer financial data to API, permissioned access continues. U.S. Bank recently announced a partnership with technology partner, Plaid. Gareth Gaston from U.S, Bank and Ginger Baker from Plaid join us to talk about the recently announced integration between the two around consumer financial data. We discuss the nature of the integration and why it’s significant. Both Ginger and Gareth describe the relevance of the US Bank permission hub and Plaid portal synching. We also talk about the impact API deals like this have on consumer behavior and fintech uptake.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. Corporate credit card firm Ramp is hot off a big fundraising making it one of the youngest firms to reach billion dollar valuation status in history having launched in February 2020. Eric Glyman, Ramp’s co-founder and CEO, joins me on the podcast to talk about how Ramp’s positioning to help its business clients spend less has impacted its trajectory. We discuss the most recent fundraising round that saw Stripe, Goldman Sachs, and Thrive participate and what’s interesting investors around Ramp’s software-led model. Eric describes how Ramp’s product is changing, maturing. Ramp’s Eric Glyman is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I'm Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. Money continues to pour into the space. From IPOs to large venture rounds to SPACs, there’s a lot of liquidity sloshing around. And yet, there are still lots of opportunities. JAM FINTOP Banktech is a $150 million investment fund, looking to deploy capital into tech firms serving community banks around the US. What’s really interesting is all 66 of the fund’s limited partners are community banks, accounting for $600 billion in assets. That would rank as the fifth largest US bank. The fund is a partnership between Fintop Capital and Jacobs Asset Management (which we’ll refer to as JAM.) On today’s show, we have Joe Maxwell of Fintop, joined by Adam Aspes and Ryan Zechariah of Jacobs Asset Management on the show to talk about the fund and its investments, sure. But it’s also a conversation around the future of community banking and what kinds of tools and technologies they’ll need to be competitive in the future.

Hari Gopalkrishnan is the Client Facing Platforms Technology executive for Bank of America Merrill. He’s responsible for leading the development of the next generation of integrated technology solutions for the company’s consumer and wealth management client-facing channels. He also manages the bank’s websites and e-commerce initiatives. Hari joins me on the podcast to talk about Erica — the firm’s AI-driven virtual financial assistant. We talk about where it’s come from and where it’s headed — with an insightful look on how customers used it during the past year. Hari describes some of the important customer-facing initiatives Bank of America has underway. Hari Gopalkrishnan is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios in partnership with small business lender BlueVine. It's Small Business Week, and BlueVine really wanted to highlight how it's helping small businesses, particularly around the paycheck protection program. Today, we're happy to have two guests with us: First, Eyal Lifshitz, CEO of BlueVine. Eyal is a third-generation small business entrepreneur who co-founded BlueVine to build a better financial future for small businesses Eyal is joined by one of his customers, Joy England of Advocates in Action. She talks about her experiences navigating through the pandemic as a small business and how firms like BlueVine helped SMBs with the PPP program, assisting in accessing needed funding during a trying time.

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with Wave, a financial software company for entrepreneurs and small businesses, to create a three part podcast series on what micro businesses and solopreneurs really need now from their banks, financial service providers, and financial software. Personal finance app Mint inspired a lot of things. As an early fintech, it showed users the potential of what it could be like to successfully manage your personal finances. For entrepreneurs, Mint also was inspiring, showing the power a financial services app could have to amass millions of users. Mint inspired other founders to launch their own offerings in the space. It definitely inspired Wave’s Kirk Simpson. He was especially interested in Wave’s pricing model: free.

Welcome to the Tearsheet Podcast. I’m Tearsheet editor in chief, Zack Miller. Smaller community banks and credit unions have an opportunity to differentiate and compete in payments. Unfortunately, many smaller FIs haven’t formulated a succinct strategy. It’s a good time to do it — there are technologies and tools out there to help them service their customers better. Tede Forman is Jack Henry’s head of consumer and commercial payments. He’s seen upfront the evolution in payments — from bill pay to real time payments — and its impact on bank offerings. He joins me on the podcast to talk about the choices and new opportunities in faster payment options. We talk about advances in bill pay technology and how it’s become table stakes for FIs. We also talk about how smaller banks and credit unions are finding ways to punch above their weight through technology partnerships and collaborations. Tede Forman is my guest today on the Tearsheet Podcast.

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with Q2, a digital banking software company, to create a four part podcast series on how embedded finance and banking as a service is changing the definition of who is a bank, where customers turn for banking products and services, and how it is helping some of the weakest players in the economy get access to the modern financial industry.  There’s still almost 20% of the U.S. population that’s underbanked. That’s tens of millions of people who may have access to basic banking but are falling between the cracks. That’s in spite of the fintech bull market we’ve had over the past few years. I interview Q2's Ahon Sarkar about the impact banking as a service changes the economics of banking. The result is more products and services available for the underbanked. We discuss how this changes the banking industry and the customers it serves.

I’m Zack Miller, editor in chief of Tearsheet. The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with Wave, a financial software company for entrepreneurs and small businesses, to create a three part podcast series on what micro businesses and solopreneurs really need now from their banks, financial service providers, and financial software. It’s never a simple time for small business owners. They live and breathe cashflow. Many function pretty much hand to mouth, so any disruption -- let alone the pandemic we’re navigating through -- any disruption can really challenge an entrepreneur. I, for one, wouldn’t like to see a world with all big box retailers, faceless corporations, hawking me throwaway stuff and disposable experiences. I think the crisis brought out the fact that small businesses are really important parts of our cities, towns, and communities. If they suffer, we all suffer. Kirk Simpson, is the CEO of Wave, a provider of free accounting software for entrepreneurs. He lives and breat

The following was produced by Tearsheet Studios. We worked with Wave, a financial software company for entrepreneurs and small businesses, to create a three part podcast series on what micro businesses and solopreneurs really need now from their banks, financial service providers, and financial software. One of the things that’s got me really interested in fintech was hearing founders’ own stories. What got them into the business. Why some left high paying jobs to throw their hats in the entrepreneurial ring. A ring that can be really hard, confounding and a roller coaster of emotion. Many of them started their business out of a deep connection to the problem they’re trying to solve. And when you trace back through their stories, you can get some insight and apply it to your own business, practice, or department you’re trying to build. In 2009, Kirk Simpson founded Wave, accounting software for entrepreneurs, micro businesses and solopreneurs. He didn’t have an accounting background -- his co-founder did --