Barefoot Innovation Podcast

Today's show is a special one because it includes breaking news. My guest is Linda Lacewell, the New York State Superintendent of the Department of Financial Services, and she will not only share her program for innovating in the midst of a pandemic, but will also announce an exciting initiative: that DFS is working with us at AIR to host New York's first-ever regulatory tech sprint, in partnership with the Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS). The sprint will take on one of the most daunting challenges facing regulators today, namely, how to get more information, faster, about the companies they oversee, without escalating the burdens of regulatory reporting on the industry, in the midst of a crisis.

Today's guest is Sam Graziano, the CEO of Fundation. In this episode, Sam tells us about Fundation's journey, starting with his own very usual mix of skills and then the company's launch as a direct line-of-credit lender to small businesses. He describes their epiphany, a few years back, in realizing that the technology platform they built was exactly what banks need in order to automate their own small business lending. Fundation had developed automated risk models that enable banks to say yes to business customers that, under traditional standards, would be rejected. Today, the company has a 50/50 split between direct lending and bank partnerships.

I'm delighted to say that my guests today are Allie Burns, the CEO of Village Capital, and Sarah Willis, Head of Financial Health Work at JPMChase and former Director at the MetLife Foundation. Our conversation focuses on how to bring more capital into fintech ventures that really advance consumer financial health. Allie lays out today's venture capital landscape, which is heavily skewed to a few markets and away from startups that work on building financial health. Sarah explains MetLife's efforts on how to influence the fintech industry to diversify both founders and the customers served.

Rebeca Romero Rainey is president and CEO of the Independent Community Bankers of America® (ICBA), the leading advocacy organization representing community banks. A third-generation community banker born and raised in Taos, New Mexico, she is the former Chairman and CEO of Centinel Bank of Taos.

Shamir and Angela explain the fascinating meanings of the word, Sila. They describe their business model, their customer base, and their back-end infrastructure based on Ethereum. They explain their revenue model -- they say their pricing is so good, especially for startups, that they put it right on their homepage. And they share their vision of the money world of the future. They point out that programming has been transformed in the last decade, so that it's easy today to integrate new technology into existing systems using software development kits, without the need for complex, expensive integrations.. Why, they ask, can't the world of banking and payments work like that? Why does it take three days for a global bank to move money? And what should a 21st century commerce system look like? Shamir and Angela think it should connect everyone on the planet; it should work over the internet; and it should enable anyone to build and ship applications on top of it, using standardized protocol libraries that developers can draw upon.

One benefit of my work is that I get to spend time with the innovators who are reshaping regulatory agencies all over the world. I have my favorites, and one of those is today's guest. He is Haime Workie, who leads the innovation team at FINRA. Haimera Workie is the Head of Financial Innovation and Senior Director at FINRA. He is responsible for leading FINRA's Office of Financial Innovation, which focuses on analyzing financial technology (FinTech) innovations and emerging risks and trends related to the securities market. As part of these responsibilities, he works to foster an ongoing dialogue with market participants in order to build a better understanding of FinTech innovations and their impact on the securities markets.

The triple crises of 2020 -- pandemic, economic contraction, and racial and social upheaval -- are opening up new kinds of conversations. Today's episode is one of these -- my discussion with Rodney Hood, the Chairman of the National Credit Union Administration. Chairman Hood is the first African-American, ever, to head a US federal financial regulatory agency -- and one of only eight to hold presidentially-appointed roles in these agencies since the New Deal. As we continue our Barefoot Innovation special series on financial regulation after the pandemic, we focus closely on the challenges of racial disparity in the financial system, and what to do about them.

One evening last October, I was pushing my way through the throngs of people at Money 2020 in Las Vegas, when someone called out my name. I turned and saw today's guest -- Albert Forkner. He is the Banking Commissioner of the State of Wyoming, and our conversation led to this podcast, because he is doing one of the most innovative regulatory experiments in the United States -- or maybe anywhere. One evening last October, I was pushing my way through the throngs of people at Money 2020 in Las Vegas, when someone called out my name. I turned and saw today's guest -- Albert Forkner. He is the Banking Commissioner of the State of Wyoming, and our conversation led to this podcast, because he is doing one of the most innovative regulatory experiments in the United States -- or maybe anywhere.

Today's episode of our special series on the future of regulation after the pandemic takes us across the Atlantic (virtually) to talk with one of my favorite Barefoot Innovation guests. He is Christopher Woolard, the interim CEO of the UK Financial Conduct Authority. In our conversation, Chris talks about the opportunity to come out of this crisis and "build back better." He discusses how the FCA has converted to the work-from-home environment and what adjustments may last beyond the crisis. He shares the worry that the economic downturn will follow the common crisis pattern of strengthening large incumbent firms at the expense of smaller ones, and how to avoid wiping out a decade of innovation. He talks about impacts on vulnerable consumers and on the UK's fabled fintech sector, and describes the government's efforts to build a bridge over the crisis and get as many people across it safely, as possible.

Today in our special series on financial regulation in the pandemic and beyond, we are honored to have with us the Chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Jelena Mc Williams. She opens a fascinating window into how the FDIC is conducting off-site examinations in the crisis, and especially into the impressive speed with which banks are adopting technology to handle flows of information. She is hopeful that we will be able to find silver linings in how these unprecedented challenges are accelerating technology adoption, and laying the groundwork for a better financial system.