Lex Sokolin

Chief Marketing Officer

Generative Ventures

Generative Ventures is an engaged venture capital fund, investing in the Machine Economy powered by Fintech, accelerated by AI, and settled on Web3.

Managing Partner & Co-Founder

Fintech Blueprint

The Fintech Blueprint is the leading analytical Fintech & DeFi newsletter in the industry, with over 200,000+ investors and entrepreneurs relying on our strategic judgment.

CEO & Founder

Argonautic Ventures

Thematic investing in digital art NFTs, with focus on generative, computational, and neural art

Venture Partner

ConsenSys

Built and lead the ConsenSys Cryptoeconomics team. We focus on (1) rigorous token engineering and mechanism design, (2) Web3 & DAO engagement strategy, and (3) treasury management through asset allocation in crypto and DeFi, using macro and fundamental investing approaches. We've launched MetaMask Grants DAO, are designing Infura's decentralized network, built the first ever corporate-DAO collaboration with BanklessDAO, and are an active delegate in Uniswap and MakerDAO, among other frontier explorations.

Chief Economist

Restructured and led 30 person Marketing team to deliver commercial outcomes across products with consumer, developer, and institutional fintech distribution. Collaborated with Sales and senior leadership to design, operationalize, and execute go-to-market and community strategy. Worked with branding, content, and growth functions to shepherd the poetry of our data-driven story.

Co-lead ConsenSys Fintech / DeFi strategy, and management of the Codefi product group, which builds and deploys blockchain-based financial software. We power over 20 million users in the MetaMask wallet trading $10B+ in volume via decentralized exchanges. Launched software products supporting tokenized institutional capital markets, CBDCs and stablecoins, and the lifecycle of digital assets.

Global Fintech Co-Head

InterPrivate Acquisition Partners

SPAC sponsor focused on late stage fintech and infrastructure transactions.

Strategic Advisor

Coinhouse

Board Member

Autonomous Research

Acquired by AllianceBernstein (NYSE:AB). Autonomous is a top research firm for institutional investors focusing on global banks, insurers, investment managers, and capital markets. I founded and managed the Fintech practice (Autonomous NEXT), which delivered industry-leading analysis of the impact of emerging tech -- machine learning and artificial intelligence, crypto assets and blockchain, virtual and augmented reality, roboadvisors, neobanks, and insurtech -- on the financial industry.  Our research was read hundreds of thousands of times, we led several innovation engagements with large industry participants (top capital markets exchanges, global banks, payment/card networks), and our work has been cited by the Economist, WSJ, Bloomberg, CNBC, Reuters, Business Insider, and the Financial Times.

Global Director Fintech Strategy & Partner

AdvisorEngine

Board Director

Acquired by Franklin Templeton (NYSE:BEN). AdvisorEngine helps financial advisors, broker/dealers, financial planners and wealth managers serve their clients through digital advice technology. Our award-winning wealth management platform was built on roboadvisor DNA, and supports both the traditional HNW advisor model and completely digital, low-touch interaction. As Chief Operating Officer, I managed our product development team, innovation processes, corporate strategy, and was a member of the Board of Directors.

Chief Operating Officer & Founder

NestEgg Wealth

Acquired by AdvisorEngine. NestEgg was an online wealth management technology firm and RIA that reached customers digitally in a scalable way. We pioneered private-labeled roboadvisor tech for independent financial advisors, banks, RIAs and credit unions. We also offered FedWise, an embeddable financial literacy chatbot for financial websites. I founded and led the company as Chief Executive Officer until its exit.

Deutsche Bank

Provided corporate finance advice across balance sheet to clients in financial services, media and technology.

Associate, Investment Banking, Financial Institutions Goup & Media and Telecoms

I am a co-founder of Generative Ventures, an engaged venture fund focused on the machine economy. We look at Seed and Series A company across Fintech, Web3, and Artificial Intelligence. Previously, I held the roles of Chief Economist, Chief Marketing Officer, and Global Fintech Co-Head at ConsenSys, the labs company behind MetaMask and Ethereum. Additionally, I write the Fintech Blueprint -- an industry newsletter for 170,000 readers at https://www.fintechblueprint.com/.

By background, I am a New York & London entrepreneur with senior operating and board-level experience, i.e., thick scar tissue, in blockchain, digital investing, and wealth management. I've spent my time on Wall St -- Lehman, Barclays, Deutsche -- but also hand-coded websites and programmed generative abstract art. I founded the Fintech practice at Autonomous, a financial services equity research firm, acquired by Alliance Bernstein, where I focused on artificial intelligence, blockchain, and mixed reality. Previously, I was COO and led product design and corporate development at AdvisorEngine, a wealth management platform built on roboadvisor DNA, acquired by Franklin Templeton. I was also CEO of NestEgg, a roboadvisor focused on delivering financial advice algorithmically, which I founded while getting a JD/MBA from Columbia -- a reckless but fun decision.

As part of building a view around Fintech and Futurism, I've been lucky to contribute to the WSJ, The Economist, Financial Times, CNBC, Reuters, American Banker, ThinkAdvisor, Financial-Planning, and Investment News, among others. I've also spoken on the future of technology at Money2020, LendIt, Techonomy, General Assembly, In|Vest, T3 Enterprise Edition, and the FPA conferences. 

In addition to my work in financial services, I'm a practicing visual artist focusing on abstraction and new media, with work exhibited in galleries and published nationally.  That's shared here: http://urban-aesthete.tumblr.com/

Chief Cryptoeconomics Officer

Capital raised is often the metric by which we judge start-ups. Without visibility into the underlying dynamics of the business — profitability, customer retention — we are left interpreting the available signals. 

An institutional investor putting money into a company functions as that signal, as they’ve certainly done due diligence one cannot divine from the outside.

By that metric, Petal, the fintech credit builder company, looked successful to many of us. The company has raised over $300MM in equity to build its business, and over $680MM in debt financing to underwrite the credit provision. The company had 400,000 users of these products, with nearly 40% previously rejected by a traditional bank, and claimed somewhere between $20MM and $100MM in revenue

Recently, Petal spun off its Prism data unit, which is the underlying underwriting technology that powered the Petal offering from the capital-intensive lending business. 

And in larger news, Petal itself was sold off to Empower Finance for an undisclosed amount — likely lower than the $800MM prior valuation. 

We are, of course, sad to see an outcome where a helpful fintech wasn’t able to build a profitable stand-alone company. But we are not surprised it happened in lending.

In this article, we discuss the acquisition by Empower Finance, Empower Finance itself, and a similar company called Elevate Credit, which eventually was acquired at a fraction of its peak valuation. 

The lending sector, attractive for its upfront revenue, is fraught with risks of high defaults and regulatory challenges. We conclude that while fintech can reduce transactional frictions, it cannot alone solve the deeper economic issues that lead to financial distress for many consumers.


Lex Sokolin on LinkedIn • 10 min read

Lessons from Petal's sale to Empower, after nearly $1B in capital raised

Can the SEC take down Uniswap, and all of DeFi with it?

Just when it looks like the DeFi sector has recovered, with near all-time highs across asset prices and usage, the SEC has come in to save us all from having a good time.

The regulator has sent a Wells Notice to Uniswap Labs, the leading decentralized exchange in Web3. The notice is the last step before an enforcement action, and — probably — a very public lawsuit. The SEC will try to sink Uniswap and shatter DeFi in its decentralized robot core.

Recently, Uniswap passed $2 trillion in cumulative volume. We can see around $40-80 billion of monthly volume, which would annualize to around $500 billion per year today. It generates around $50-$150MM in fees per month for its users, which is equivalent to $500-$1B per year. This comes from around 400,000 daily active users. Many of those users were also the lucky recipients of Uniswap’s original airdrop — worth several thousand dollars at the time and constituting 15% of the available supply. Today, the market capitalization sits between $5 and $10 billion. This is an absolutely Blockbuster outcome for innovation.

It is fascinating to see the SEC in court over its various enforcement actions, from XRP to Coinbase and others. It is also encouraging that occasionally the regulator is warned about over-reach, and does not get what it wants. As advocates of innovation, we want to see Uniswap survive and triumph through this period. Hopefully the system of American checks and balances against its own executive power will allow the rest of the world to benefit from DeFi and open software.

The full analysis is in the newsletter entry below. If you enjoyed it or this post, please comment, 👍 or ♻️.

Lex Sokolin on LinkedIn • 9 min read

Can the SEC take down Uniswap, and all of DeFi with it?

3% cashback on all transactions and 5% back on travel 

Robinhood, the Menlo Park based company best known for popularizing commission-free trading — and the meme stock frenzy — entered the credit card space with its new Robinhood Gold Card.

The launch of a credit card comes less than a year after Robinhood’s $95MM cash acquisition of credit card company X1 -- the self-proclaimed “smartest credit card ever made” was a no-fee, rewards-based credit card offering a modern digital interface, innovative income-based underwriting, and user-friendly features such as easy subscription cancellations and single-use virtual cards. 

Robinhood needs to derive maximum value from their customers because their monthly active users (MAUs) have been falling since 2021. The company had over 20 million users in 2021, and shows around 10 million in 2023 — a 50% collapse.

That said, while overall MAUs are declining, subscription based Gold Members are increasing, adding 280K during 2023, and an additional 90K in the first 2 months of 2024. 

Will this card turn things around?

Lex Sokolin on LinkedIn • 8 min read

How can Robinhood afford 3% cash back on its new credit card?

Is Banking as a Service dead?

In today's fintech landscape, BaaS pioneers like Unit and Synapse are caught in a tug-of-war between innovation and regulation. Despite shaking up traditional banking, they're facing tough scrutiny. 

It is easy for the technologist to feel frustrated here. Money, however, isn’t a public good only. It is the property and soul of the State. This is why banks are licensed entities — brought into the fold to access and deliver the mana of the country. 

Are they part of the government's systemic machinery? Or are they private businesses built for the Internet age?

In our latest Long Take we explore ways we can move forward despite the inevitable challenges that await. 

#fintech 

Last week Robinhood announced that they would be entering the credit card space with its new Robinhood Gold Card to much fan fare. 

While the perks of the card are seemingly very consumer friendly, in order to be profitable, the revenue from these streams must cover the costs associated with reward programs and unrecoverable debts. 

When managed properly, credit cards are money-making machines. That said, it's crucial to recognize that the income generated is distributed among various stakeholders in the ecosystem. 

The issuer, also known as the issuing bank (e.g., Chase, Citi, Barclays) receives the largest share, generally getting the majority of interchange fees and interest income, as they are the entities extending the credit. The credit networks (e.g., Visa, Mastercard) receive a smaller portion of the interchange fee. However, as networks participate in a significantly higher number of transactions, this really adds up — with merchants paying MasterCard and Visa collectively over $100B in 2023.

Robinhood is clearly working in the  “land and expand” strategy stage, acquiring customers and then cross-selling them on the Fintech bundle to grow ARPU.

The allure of the credit card is likely to attract a demographic distinct from the existing Gold Members, which might complicate cross-selling efforts. 

But will the new credit card users bring $40,000 to the trading platform? 

Robinhood seems willing to pay 3% cash back for a while to test the hypothesis.

#fintech #robinhood #finance 

Chainlink Aims to Make Transfers Across Blockchains Safer with New Bridge App 'Transporter'

Chainlink  announced the release of "Transporter," its new blockchain bridge application, facilitating the movement of crypto assets and data across various networks. 

Designed for both individual users and institutions, Transporter aims to provide a secure and cost-efficient method for executing high-value token transfers. 

The application initially supports several major blockchains, including Arbitrum, Avalanche, Base, BNB Chain, Ethereum, Optimism, Polygon, and WEMIX.  

via CoinDesk

#crypto #blockchain 

Mecury, a business banking startup established in 2017, has recentnly launched a new consumer banking division.

With a client base of over 100,000 businesses, primarily startups, Mercury is expanding its offerings to include personal banking services.

Immad Akhund, co-founder and CEO of Mercury, shared the move was driven by customer demand for personal banking products complementing their business services.

Unlike many neobanks that serve the underbanked, Mercury aims to cater to "power users," offering advanced features like multi-user support, customizable debit cards, and enhanced FDIC insurance up to $5 million.

Serving both businesses and indiviual consumers will certainly be challenging, but could pay off big and the set the bar for other fintech challengers. 

#fintech 

Klarna ‘Wikipink’ challenges broken US credit system with transparent data

Amid concerns over credit practices in the US, Klarna is positioning itself as committed to creating ethical credit solutions by sharing insights on repayment rates and consumer demographics. 

The Wikipink initative aims to challenge the traditional credit card model, promoting a shift towards fairer, consumer-friendly options.

David Sykes, Chief Commercial Officer, Klarna said: 

“We still see too many of the traditional banks and credit card companies pushing products on consumers with exorbitant interest rates, hidden fees, and revolving debt. It is very clear that the traditional credit card model does not work in the favor of the vast majority of customers. 

Wikipink is not just a showcase of Klarna's achievements, but a call to action for the entire financial industry to prioritize consumer well-being. By sharing our data and practices openly, we aim to inspire a shift towards more ethical, transparent, and consumer-friendly credit options.”

#fintech #finance #credit 

Alternative Layer-1 Monad raises $225MM before launching its testnet

There continues to be a gold rush for performant computational blockchains. And why not? 

The payoff could be hundreds of billions of dollars.

What makes them performant? Speed, scalability, and the ability to process complicated computations. If we are in the Nintendo version of the world today, Super Nintendo and Playstation are just around the corner. To that end, Monad has raised $225 million and Berachain has raised $100 million in capital. 

These are ridiculously large fund-raises for what are essentially pre-product market fit infrastructures. But we leave the venture capital dynamics discussion creating these valuations to another time.

Monad is a Layer 1 blockchain claiming the ability to process 10,000 transactions per second (TPS). This is a material increase on Ethereum’s 15 TPS, or 55 TPS when considering L2 transactions, and even Solana’s 4,000 TPS — all while maintaining a technical design similar to Ethereum. It features a decentralized validator set and is EMV-compatible, supporting and executing smart contracts and applications developed for the Ethereum Virtual Machine. 

This means that users can use the same wallets, like MetaMask, and block explorers, like Etherscan, to sign or view transactions. Applications can be ported over to Monad without any code changes and the address space is the same as on Ethereum, enabling users to reuse their existing keys. 

At the crux of Monad’s performance are (1) parallel execution and (2) superscalar pipelining. Parallel execution is the ability to process multiple transactions simultaneously, rather than sequentially. 

This is significant because traditional blockchain operations process transactions one at a time, which can lead to bottlenecks and slow confirmation times during periods of network load. Parallel execution ensures that transactions that do not depend on each other's outcomes can be processed in parallel.

Once Monad is live, the challenge will be attracting top dApps, particularly now that L2 transactions are cheap enough for most users following EIP-4844’s implementation. Ethereum is also working towards its roadmap goal of achieving 100,000 TPS on L2s through sharding, although this milestone is still years out. 

The question is whether we will see demand for such TPS before Etherum is able to effectively scale. 

Clearly, some VCs think we will.

#fintech #crypto #blockchain #protocol 

👀 

A wallet allegedly belonging to the U.S. government has moved 30,175 bitcoins this week to an account apparently linked to Coinbase. 

The last confirmed sale by the government – which in late 2022 seized roughly 50,000 bitcoins related to the Silk Road website – was in March 2023, when it unloaded 9,861 coins for $216 million.

This transfer has sparked speculation about the U.S. government's intentions for its sizable BTC holdings.

#fintech #crypto #web3 

Aurionpro Solutions to acquire fintech startup Arya AI for $16.5 million

Platform-as-a-service Arya AI, founded in 2013 by IIT Bombay graduates Vinay Kumar and Deekshith Marla, is set to be acquired by Aurionpro Solutions. 

Arya.ai specializes in cloud-based AI solutions for financial services, providing tools to analyze data, underwrite risks, and monitor fraud. Their technology also automates the reading and analysis of bank statements, gathers KYC details, and offers a robust platform for banks, lending companies, and insurers to streamline operations.

Arya.ai serves approximately 95 clients, including branches of ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, and Axis Bank. Currently, they generate about 60% of its revenue from India and 40% from the rest of the world, with the US accounting for about 8% and Europe, West Asia and Africa 4%.

In the all-cash deal, NSE-listed Aurionpro Solutions is set to acquire 67% stake of the Mumbai-based company.

#fintech #ai 

Taplio

Lex Sokolin's Linkedin Analytics

Lex Sokolin

What is Lex talking about?

Lex Sokolin's Best Posts (last 30 days)

Want to drive more opportunities from LinkedIn?

Taplio

.css-1jgreyo{background-image:linear-gradient(284deg, rgba(39,43,72,1) 0%, rgba(33,47,183,1) 100%);color:transparent;-webkit-background-clip:text;background-clip:text;}Lex Sokolin's Linkedin Analytics

Lex Sokolin

What is Lex talking about?

Lex Sokolin's Best Posts .css-qqfgvy{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);}(last 30 days)

Want to drive more opportunities from LinkedIn?

Lex Sokolin's Linkedin Analytics

Lex Sokolin's Best Posts (last 30 days)