Fintech Impact

During the 45th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira sits with Daniel Faggella, CEO of Emerj. Daniel well known consultant in the Artificial Intelligence space and shares his thoughts current and future implementations of AI in the financial industry.Show Notes::30— Introduction of Daniel Faggella, CEO of Emerj3:20— The AI trends we are seeing now and how they are adding value to fintech.4:30— Artificial Intelligence can be valuable by finding patterns of sourcing financial fraud.6:33— Why noting the differece in transactions is more useful than setting rules when spotting fraud8:19— AI has its limits. AI can properly route customer service tickets to the correct person. However, it can´t navigate customer phone calls.12:20—How AI is successfully being applied for loans and insurance underwriting to assess risk.15:00— How we can find risk proxies to correlate risk and suss out patterns.18:00— In insurance, the AI game changer will be implemented within the customer experience.19:00— How the proliferation of AI will change business´s and their customer experience.20:00— There are still many opportunities to implement AI like in the process of onboarding new customersI.22:00— AI will complement the way we deal with customers and create sales funnels. Salesforce is just the tip of the iceburg.26:20— There aren´t as many indicators for success in using AI in wealth investing as there are in banking and insurance.27:08—Trying to predict trading in a way that can be implemented with AI is risky business. It would be similar to trying to predict the world.29:30— Trading data is generally not all encompassing, and therefore, it is hard to implement AI in this area.31:00— The AI community is full of collaboration, and in general, this is good.32:00— However, AI is a big power game, and it can be worrying.33:34— It is easy to get pessimistic about the evolution of AI and our species.34:00—AI requires data architecture to improve performance. AI also requires IT people to collaborate with data scientists which can many times be difficult to moderate.36:20— AI doens´t implement like IT37:38— AI is a big cultural change for many companies38:12— The hopeful transition of AI technology: Easy, Cheap, Ubiquitous3 Key Points:1.    Artificial Intelligence is taking the main stage in many industries and has many opportunistic applications.2.     However, trying to implement AI technologies into the trading world would mean that an all encompassing data-set would need to exist or in other words, you would have to be able to predict the world.3.    Though there are several fields to implement AI to reap benefits such as customer service and insurance underwriting, implementing AI in trading is a unsurmountable task.Tweetable Quotes:-      ¨Being able to coax out patterns of normal is one big, and certainly, fruitful application [of AI].” –Daniel.-      “AI doens´t implement like IT.” – Daniel.-      “With AI, we are talking about a probabilitic understanding of things” –Daniel.Resources Mentioned:The Fintech ImpactItunes to access the podcastRefer to Jason Pereira´s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech eventsWoodgate FinancialDaniel Faggella Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 44th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, sits with Andrew Ostro, Co-founder and CEO of PolicyMe. Andrew shares how his digital tool, Policy me, is changing the face of life insurance. Jason and Andrew discuss how the tool is streamlining and reinventing an industry that has a bad reputation of customer service and marginsShow Notes:● :30—Introduction of Guest Andrew Ostro, CEO of Policy Me● 1:00—PolicyMe is a digital life insurance advisor. They allow the customer get the best price for what they need.● 1:50— Andrew worked as an actuary and within the insurance industry. Insurance is historically technologically behind.● 3:00—There are some principles of the industry didn ́t influence change.● 4:20— Agents tend to maximize their revenue rather than focusing on the clients protection.● 5:00— Meeting with advisors can tend to be a large time suck. Policy Me tries to reduce the time spent on finding the ideal policy for you.● 6:00— If insurance is expensive, they shouldn’t buy what they don't need. Policy Me is advising on this.● 7:47— Policy Me is supported by companies because they act as a broker (middleman) rather than replacing.● 10:15— Intelligence behind risk factors doesn't necessarily do much for the policy. No good data on companies accepting risks.● 14:00— Policy Me is currently focusing on advice and later moving to the product solution.● 15:00— Policy Me seeks to optimize their questions to give quality advice in less time.● 16:00— The advice of the tool is based on customer objectives.● 21:00— Policy Me has a streamlined process that speeds up issuing insurance policy.● 22:18— The break down the process to make it simple. Their focus is on the onboarding/activation side. We recognize that the process needs to be supported by a human advisor. Customers can contact them 24/7.● 24:20— A lot of customers are going through the tool and enrolling immediately. There is always room to improve the process.● 27:08— The biggest challenges starting this was trying to do too much too early. It was culturally hard to overcome as a mindset.● 29:30— The major thing to improve in the insurance industry is streamlining the process.● 32:00— Policy Me wants to get it across that they are trying to give quality advice. The strategy to do this is with marketing and branding.● 33:00— Life insurance can be the difference between a family going into poverty after a death and surviving the hardship.3 Key Points:1. Life insurance has tended to be a clumsy industry where advisors put their profits ahead of their clients objectives. 2. Meeting with an advisor can be time consuming. PolicyMe is a digital platform that allows you to compare, pick, and enroll in a life insurance policy while getting the best price. 3. Life insurance can be the difference between a family overcoming a hardship or entering poverty. PolicyMe prides itself in providing quality, unbiased advice that clients can take action on immediately.Tweetable Quotes:- “If you are proud of your first launch, you launched too late.” –Andrew.- “The big issues we are seeing with life insurance is 1- getting bad advice 2- customer experience wasn’t great.” – Andrew.- “Life insurance is an incredible product when you look at what it does for society. It can bethe difference between a family going into poverty or continuing to live their life after death” – Andrew.Resources Mentioned:● The Fintech Impact● Itunes to access the podcast● Refer to Jason Pereira ́s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech events● Woodgate Financial● Andrew Ostro● PolicyMe Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 43rd episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, sits with Dan Rosen, Co-founder and CEO of D1g1t. They discuss how D1g1t is improving the digital wealth managment side of advising. D1g1t is creating a tool that streamlines and desegments financial advising. The impact is huge.Show Notes:● :30—Introduction of Guest Dan Rosen, Co-founder and CEO of Digit.● 1:00—Digit is a new digital wealth management platform.● 2:16— Digit bridges the gap of lack of client-facing tools.● 4:20—The tool doesn ́t replace advisors but instead add value to the current human advisor.● 6:25— Of the three most important life questions, two of them are purely financial.● 9:00— Dan ́s experiential background from chemical engineering to alchemy. He shares how he arrived where he is today.● 13:30—The UI and UX of Digit is equal to none. It is a revolutionary product.● 14:47— If you find a true need, people will tell you what their painpoints are. All you need to do is listen.● 18:15— Digit allows financial advisors to have everything in one place. historically, the advising data and information is fragmented.● 19:20— Digits allows advisors to streamline and make their processes easier.● 20:00— The advisor claims that if they have the Digits platform they will take higher targets.● 21:10—Understanding your household is can make a huge impact on your planning.● 25:10— Automated solutions will fail in market volatility situations. Clients still need to talk to an advisor to figure out changes in portfolio.● 27:18— Financial education is still an important pillar to make the tool successful.● 28:40— Clients need to see your value.● 29:25— Clients need to know the context of the overall goal.● 34:30—No one builds something on their own. It is all about the team.● 37:10—Our tools have a direct impact on people, and that is a huge change in the industry.● 38:26— Dan gets excited about hte power of math has to change people ́s lives.3 Key Points:1. D1g1t is a digital wealth management tool having a huge impact on the FInancial Advisng industry. 2. The tool allow clients and advisors to see all the analytics and client information in one place. For a largely segmneted industry, this has a huge impact. 3. The tool isn ́t replacing advisors but rather allowing them to streamline their processes and hit higher targets.Tweetable Quotes:- “No one builds something on their own. It is all about the team.” –Dan. - “I think financial advisors are going to provide much, much better service and tools totheir clients when using analytics, and using good analytics, but not using analytics blindly.” – Dan. - “I look at the look at everything we do in life is being part of Mac the math, you know, the recorder I'm on right now. They tend to be a watch tonight. It's, you know, once you appreciate that, it's everything comes back to the numbers.” – Jason.Resources Mentioned:● The Fintech Impact●Itunes to access the podcast● Refer to Jason Pereira ́s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech events● Woodgate Financial●Dan Rosen●D1g1ts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 42nd episode of the Fintech Impact Podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, welcomes Melissa Best, CEO and Founder of Quickestate. After 32 years as a money manager, Melissa leveraged her knowledge to create a tool to make estate settling easier for families. Quickestate is the company that resulted. It is a company that provides the software which allows for an easy estate settling process. The tool supports advisors in giving the best support to their clients and allows the information to be presented in an organized, actionable way. Melissa and Jason discuss the intricacies of settling an estate and how Quick Estate eases the settlement process.Show Notes:● 1:00—Quick Estate is a tool that allows people to organize their estate before disaster struck● 1:50—Melissa was a money manager as well as a portfolio manager for estates. The estate process was so painful for families.● 3:00—With do it yourself technology, Melissa empowered clients to easily take care of the estate.● 3:55—As the population ages, managers start getting more questions from clients. Many customers find themselves in the role of executive with no idea where to start.● 4:50—Quickestate is targeting advisors and other professionals.● 5:20—The response rate from advisors about the software has been great.● 6:00—Advisors are now able to give customers a better, holistic service thanks to Quickestate.● 7:00—If you have never been an executor of an estate, it can be a difficult role to navigate.● 9:00—Quick Estate helps organize, provide directions, and prevent conflict when settling an estate.● 13:40—It is important for the executor to know personal information, location of original legal documents, and assets and debts inventory.● 17:10—Quick Estate allows the executor to show up prepared and organized which reduces fees with the accountant substantially.● 19:50—All the advisors pay a basic licensing fee for the software or more if you are using a do-it yourself or concierge model.● 23:40—The spinoff benefits to the clients are excellent.● 24:52—Consolidating assets is also possible once you have the tool to see everything holistically. The tool can provide visibility to a lot of new opportunities● 26:00—One of the biggest challenges is trying to find the right developer to produce the right software.● 28:30—Melissa hopes more advisors see the difference this tool will provide their clients.● 28:50—Melissa has a passion for creating ease for families needing to settle an estate.3 Key Points:1. Settling an estate can be an intricate process that encompasses many steps. The process can last as long as two years.2. Quickestate is a company that provides software to promote an easy and successful estate settling process.3. Currently, the software is sold to advisors allowing them to support their clients more thoroughly through the process.Tweetable Quotes:- ̈Most estates take a minimum 2 years to settle .” –Melissa- “Managing the money is the executors most important job. ̈–Melissa- “The two problems for executors are not knowing where to start and procrastination.” – Melissa.Resources Mentioned:● The Fintech Impact● Itunes to access the podcast● Refer to Jason Pereira ́s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech events● Quickestate● Melissa Best● Woodgate Financial Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 41st episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, welcomes George Bordianu, Co-Founder of Balance. Balance is a cryptocurrency solution that allows people to invest and diversify their assets. Balance offers customers simplicity and ease while navigating the cryptocurrency. Jason and George delve into the intricacies of cryptocurrency and how Balance solves customer pain points.Show Notes:● 0:50—Introduction of guest George Bordianu, Balance.● 1:00—Balance is the easiest way to invest in cryptocurrency.● 2:55—Balance was born out of frustration.● 4:40—There is no pool of money; there is clear distinction between each clients share.● 6:17—With Balance, you can buy a diversified portfolio with one click.● 7:24—People pay a little larger fee without having to worry about diversifying.● 8:40—There is a finite set of finance business models but there is an infinite number of scams.● 9:15—Unlike Robo-advising, Balance cannot talk about their risk. Balance exists just to provide access.● 11:00—Balance doesn ́t make decisions for their clients.● 12:39—Balance does all of the tech behind the scenes, but do not currently do rebalancing. Right now, rebalancing qualifies as advice.● 15:30—George wanted to build something that he would be comfortable investing his own money.● 16:10—Balance offers their customer solution to individuals as well as businesses.● 17:50—Cold Storage means that your keys get stored offline. Your crypto is secure in this storage method. Some companies even go as far as holding paper copies.● 20:10—Balance doesn't ́t charge for monetizing or transferring your money. It is transparent with their fees.● 22:06—Balance provides cold storage for a charge.● 23:00—Balance provides value for customers who choose to hold their crypto with them rather than monetizing.● 24:00—George discusses the challenges of creating Balance. Many challenges are intertwined with regulation of the market.● 27:20—Balance offers customers simplicity. In a complex market like cryptocurrency, simplicity is hard to find. The fee structure Balance offers is greater than their competitors.● 30:20—George is excited by the personal aspect of building a solution for cryptocurrency.3 Key Points:1. Cryptocurrency can be very complex. Balance is a company that created the technology to make trading and diversifying in Cryptocurrency as easy as pressing a button. 2. Balance strictly provides the technology to make investi and ng easier, but they do not give advice in the field as it is unregulated. 3. Balance not only provides ease but also takes the non-transparent fees out of this service adding the most value for customers.Tweetable Quotes:-  ̈ We [Balance] went for pretty much anything [currencies] that is real value and stable enough and liquid so we can get out of the market when our clients want.” –George.- “There is no pool of money. We maintain fully segregated wallets for each of our clients.” – George. - “ We [Balance] are just here to provide access.” – George.Resources Mentioned:● The Fintech Impact● Itunes to access the podcast● Refer to Jason Pereira ́s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech events● George Bordianu● Woodgate Financial Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 40th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, sits with Paul Desmarais III, Chairman of Portag3 Ventures. They discuss the new technology within fintech, how Portag3 is making a difference, and how technology bridges gaps and addresses the pain points of the industry.Show Notes:● 1:00—Introduction of guest Paul Desmarais III, Chairman of Portag3 Ventures.● 1:23— Portag3 is one of the world ́s leading financial services innovation investment funds. Portag3 invests in fintech globally. They focus on direct to consumer and also some B2B markets. Their three vertical focuses are Insure-tech, personal finance, and risk management● 1:55—Financial advising is making a huge impact on Canadians future. Advised clients fair much better than the unadvised, but the majority of Canadians go unadvised.● 3:20—Portag3 is focused on building companies that address the pain points in the financial space.● 4:55—In a  ̈choose-what-you-pay-your-advisor ̈ model, the customer saves money and wins.● 5:20—It is hard for traditional businesses to incubate from external disruption.● 6:00—Power Financial owns the general partnership of Portag3.● 6:34—80% of Canadian assets are controlled by the bank.● 7:28—B2B platform is empowering advisors to serve smaller clients in a more effective way.● 8:43—You have got to be on-top of the technology or else you will be crushed by the competition. You must adapt.● 10:30—Borrowell was started as a B2C lending platform. If you have a low credit score, you can go there to get coaching on your credit score.● 11:10—Another example of a technology tool that is making a difference is the online mortgage tool. It allows people to get mortgages completely online, and it is a very transparent system.● 12:10—Portag3 empowers companies by understanding their pain points and investing in solutions to overcome them.● 14:18—The area of payment in Canada is falling behind other countries very quickly. Does the system make sense? This could be an area of opportunity for fintech.● 15:41—Portag3 has invested in Blockchain, sponsoring a company called EOS. We believe there is an opportunity there, but it is a matter of when. Blockchain is still highly speculative.● 17:00—When a lot of people migrate to a certain system, you get a network effect. If that happens with blockchain, companies need to be cautiously ready for the switch.● 19:50—We need better policy for the banks and the companies involved.● 20:40— Portag3 has made over 30 investments in fintech.● 21:26—Through Coho, you can open an account. This is the first example of how collaboration is on horizon in fintech.● 22:26—Some banks no longer have a brick and mortar foundation allowing them to partner and grow outside of their core geography.● 24:17—In this new virtually based model, there is a huge opportunity to go after new players through collaborating with fintech.● 24:53—Fintech is a generational investment opportunity.● 25:13—Changes in technology are easier to implement today.● 26:20—Being an entrepreneur today is much cheaper than it used to be.● 26:40—Regulators care about the consumers and want them to be advised.● 28:00—M&A is on the horizon for fintech.● 29:00—Paul ́s biggest wish is to have modern back-office systems in every business that we have.● 29:47—The people are what gets Paul motivated. He wants to make a positive impact on their lives.3 Key Points:1. Fintech is allowing more people to have access to financial services. Technology allowsfinancial companies to extend their reach. 2. Keeping-up with current financial technology helps companies adapt and avoid gettingeaten by competitors. 3. Financial technology is disrupting, growing, and making positive impacts on the industry.Tweetable Quotes:- “We are simply growing the size of the population that is being advised. We are notnecessarily disrupting it in an aggressive way.” –Paul.- “We come in as value-adding investors.” – Paul. - “We believe aggregation is the future of financial planning.” – Paul.Resources Mentioned:The Fintech ImpactItunes to access the podcastRefer to Jason Pereira ́s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech eventsWoodgate Financial Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episode 39witha Panel from the Institute of Advanced Financial Planners Conference Title: Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies, Are They an Investment you should Recommend to your Clients? Summary:During the 39th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira(award-winning  financial planner, university lecturer,  writer), Kyle J Kemper (Executive Director and Chief Strategy Director of the Blockchain Association of Canada), and David Hayes (Technology Brokers International) discuss the phenomenons of blockchain and cryptocurrency. The three put forth their view of the cutting edge investments and leave us with revolutionary takeaways. The trio help demystify the complexity of both Blockchain and Cryptocurrency.Show Notes:●         00:48—Introduction ofFintech Conference in Ontario--Details are avaiable on Jason´s linkedin profile.●         4:23—Introduction of the panel who will be discussing cryptocurrencies and blockchain. Kyle J Kemper, David Hase, and Jason Pereira speak as part of the panel.●         7:52—To be so sure about whether your coffee is fairtrade, you need data and a secure system to verify it. A solution that can do this is Blockchain. Blockchain can manage all of our data, and it can help keep our information secure.●         10:23—Blockchain fast facts: 1,600 cryptocurrencies already exist. 54th most popular google search this year. One of the most valuable start-ups in Canada is a bitcoin company. The biggest bitcoin story is about the bitcoin bubble.●         11:23—Canada is creating their own national cryptocurrency.●         12:08—The recent cryptocurrency bubble. Cryptocurency breaks Warren´s basic tenenant of investment: Invest in things that have intrinsic value.●         13:20—Problems of cryptocurrency include scalability, huge energy consumption, fraud, money laundering, and security. The number one concern and problem is that people don´t trust the systems.●         14:34—Is now the time to invest in Cryptocurrency?●         14:54—David kicks off the panel.●         15:03—David has a vested interest in the cryptocurrency, and from a technology standpoint, he believes in the future of blockchain. It is a great technology.●         16:30—Blockchain can promote cyber security and will grow to include biometrics--your fingerprint and more. Blockchain is generally trusted.●         17:30—Amazon and IBM are working with blockchain as part of their formula, and they are growing their business nicely.●         17:50—Digressing from Blockchain, Bitcoin is dead. In startk comparison to Blockchain, David doesn´t like bitcoin.●         18:28—Bitcoin is more of a digital trend.●         18:53—Once someone (like the world bank) enters the market and adds stability and credibility to the volatility, digital currencies would be a good investment and that would be a key time to invest in the sector.●         19:50—Shopify allows every single type of bitcoin to be used on their platform.●         20:22—Transition to Kyle Kemper●         20:26—There is actually a website that has bitcoin arbituaries that shows you how many times bitcoin has died. Bitcoin is here and digital currencies are the future.●         21:26—You are taking risk by not having bitcoin in your portfolio. Kyle wouldn´t use it to support his mortgag, but it is an investment worth having.●         22:26—In the past, we needed banks to move the money. With bitcoin, banks do not stifle the transcaction process in terms of supply and inflation. ●         23:26—With bitocoin, you skip the need for interrmediaries like banks.●         24:17—Bitcoin is a currency, a commodity, and a ledger that everyone can witness. ●         24:53—Bitcoin is young but still growing.●         25:25—As big players come into the market, there will be a flip in the market from volatility to stability and credibility.●    &nb

During the 38th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host, interviews Gary Baker, COO of Cannex. Cannex is a one-stop shop for annuity pricing. Jason and Gary delve into the complexities surrounding the annuity industry. From Big Data to global trends, Gary gives an all-encompassing view of annuities and what the industry is up against.Show Notes:1:11—Introduction of Guest, Gary Baker—COO of Cannex, a one-stop shop for annuity pricing1:40—Cannex got started from a couple friends gathered in a small apartment. 2:33—Gary´s experiential background of nearly 30 years within finance including a stint with GE Capital.3:45—There are two different segments within Cannex, annuities and savings products.4:50—The premise of Cannex is to provide a central exchange for brokers to sell third-party products.5:30—Cannex´s largest business investments focus on technology and Research and Development.8:20—Distributors want assurance of the market and Cannex provides value back to them.10:28—The areas the business focuses on includes information security and investment and development.12:20—The complexity of the market can be difficult to overcome while still adding value.13:26— Cannex overcomes the complexity of the market without over-simplifying and still extracting the best value13:30—Cannex´s quantitative perspectives guides them through the complexity of the industry.15:30—The biggest challenges when developing the company occur when trying to develop the right platforms to be more efficient.15:50—Systems and processes are major areas of focus when developing the company.17:07—The financial planning tools´ functionality help give the industry a quantitative perspective.17:30—Essentially an annuities portfolio is a Super Bond.17:54—We use real-time data to optimize our processes.18:58—When working with our data tools we have to be cognizant of the assumptions, blac box and the effects on returns and correlations.21:20—The role of financial advisors in the annuity industry is more process focused than product focused.22:30—Recently, we have seen a movement from a product sale to a process sale in the market.24:00—We do not use ordinary indices to do benchmarking at Cannex.24:08—Gary demystifies the benchmarking they do and the indices they use.25:21—Principal, interest, and longevity28:20—The difficulties of getting their data tools into the market stem from the reality of the modern advisor: 90% psychology, 10% numbers30:00—We want to focus on what is quantitatively the best economic scenario for the client.33:28—There needs to be global trend for professionalizing the annuity industry.33:50—Cannex is dedicated to being a change-agent in the annuity industry.34:00—An independent evaluator can help give the industry a more quantitative outlook.35:12—Price doesn’t correlate with quality--a higher price does not mean better quality.35:40—Cannex is helping to quantify value propositions in the market.36:00—Cannex´s data platform is available to students.3 Key Points:1.    Gary and Jason discuss nature of the annuity market and how Cannex began.2.    The toll complexity takes on the industry and how Cannex relies on Quantitative methods to counter this challenge.3.    The industry needs to move towards professionalism.Tweetable Quotes:-      “There is this tug of war between the market wanting simplicity and traders wanting to deliver value. So, what we do is add analytics on top of our core platform to pull the marketing story off of it.” – Gary.-      “The easy part [of the business] is the methodology and the processes that we put together to deconstruct and then put everything into an apples to apples environment. The tougher part is building the systems and processes that allow us to be more efficient when programming these products into the platform, and most importantly to allow our clients to configure what we provide” – Gary.-      “If you talk to financial advisors themselves, they would tell you my practice is 90% psychology and 10% numbers” – Gary.Resources Mentioned:The Fintech ImpactRefer to Jason Pereira´s Linkedin for Information about the Fintech event hosted by Individual Finance and Decision Center: New Developments in Fintech and their impacts on SocietyCannex Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 37th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Thomas Schickler, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer for Liquidity Marketplace. Liquidity Marketplace is a platform that will allow and enable Fortune 1000 businesses to lend to other Fortune 1000 businesses for their liquidity needs—at a lower rate and a more efficient experience.Time Stamped Show Notes:● 00:58 – Clients of Liquidity Marketplace include Fortune 1000 companies, banks,and non-bank financial businesses.● 01:17 – Thomas Schickler spend nearly 30 years in transaction banking at HSBC,JP Morgan, and CITI Bank.● 03:29 – Liquidity Marketplace is launching, first in the United States, the ability forits clients to borrow and lend from each other.● 05:31 – Businesses typically face all-in costs of 15-45 extra base points.● 07:01 – The fourth quarter in 2018 will involve trades with pilot clients.● 07:22 – They have experienced some struggle in getting corporate treasurers to trythe service.● 10:20 – Liquidity Marketplace is launching in the United States in the fourth quarterof 2018.● 12:15 – They will launch in Europe, the UK, and Asia, and will add asset classes.● 15:35 – Liquidity Marketplace is currently a team of seven people.● 18:00 – In the last two years that they have been in business, the main obstaclehas been not being able to move as fast as they would like—withfundraising requiring a lot of time.● 22:23 – Thomas Schickler is most excited about proving a meaningful propositionfor constituents.3 Key Points:1. Liquidity marketplace enables its clients to borrow and lend from each other.2. Liquidity Marketplace makes money by charging the issuers for a corporate-to-corporate transaction in 10 base points range.3. The community of clients at Liquidity Marketplace includes courageous early adoptersand very large companies that are interested but are waiting to see how it works outfor others first.Tweetable Quotes:- “We’ve (Liquidity Marketplace) set out to transform liquidity markets for institutionalclients. By institutional clients I’m referring to Fortune 1000 companies, banks, andnon-bank financial companies.” – Thomas Schickler.- “The institutional liquidity space, from a fintech perspective, is like a sleepybackwater.” – Thomas Schickler.- “It’s the regulatory and legal due-diligence we have to do which will be our primarycosts as we look to expand.” – Thomas Schickler.Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Thomas Schickler – LinkedIn for Thomas Schickler● Liquidity Marketplace – Website for Liquidity Marketplace Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 36th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Ben Harrison, Partner and Head of LPEngagement & Partnerships at Portag3 Ventures, one of the top venture capital firms in thefintech space.● 00:56 – Portag3 is made of two funds that handle areas like blockchain and A.I..● 02:19 – Ben has just over 16 years with Great West Life.● 05:08 – Financial customers want the same user experience that they are familiar with from Amazon and Google.● 10:28 – In order to have a better understanding of the change that is happening, invest in and partner with those that are doing it.● 13:31 – The cost of starting a start-up as dropped dramatically during the last decade.● 16:12 – When start-ups get absorbed by huge institutions, the corporate culture should remain the same to maintain those talented developers.● 20:30 – Success in Asia from an insurance company standpoint success is measured in selling 100s of 1000s or millions of insurance policies in a year.● 23:22 – When there are major investments involved, there are broad power shifts.● 24:40 – What is the platform that is going to streamline blockchain.● 27:00 – Portag3 Ventures invests in great, talented people in the founders and high comfort with the technology, performance, and scalability.● 29:53 – Ben Harrison is most excited about seeing the interest in the bigger companies being willing to have partnerships.3 Key Points:1. Portag3 Ventures’s first fund was made up of Power Financial, Great West Life, andIGM.2. Approximately, 10 years ago the average price of launching a start-up company was $5 million, now it is about $500,000 dollars.3. To adapt to change and stay ahead of the curve—you have to be willing to partner up.Tweetable Quotes:- “Portag3 is an early stage venture fund.” – Ben Harrison.- “Customers just expect now the types of experiences that they receive from Google or Amazon or Netflix.” – Ben Harrison.- “So it’s not so much that fintech is going to topple the business world, it’s now questions about these big platform tech players.” – Ben Harrison.Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Ben Harrison – LinkedIn for Ben Harrison● Portag3 Ventures – Website for Portag3 Ventures Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 35th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Chad Davis, the Co-Founder of LiveCA, which is an accounting firm rather than a fintech. What makes LiveCA an excellent company to talk about on Fintech Impact is that it is a next generation company with no fixed address, it has about 60 employees from all around the world, and it communicates and renders their service offers using a number of technology tools and fintech tools—some that have been featured on previous episodes of this show.●01:31 – LiveCA focuses on providing clients with technology and tax services.●03:01 – Chad, his wife, and their children used to live in the Cayman Islands.●05:51 – LiveCA have about 50-60 people working remotely without any central office.●09:07 – Slack, Zoom, the Google suite of apps, Collage, and Humi are some of the tech tools for communication and human resources.●10:10 – LiveCA offers tax, standard year-end work, United States consulting, mergers, treasury and accounts payable, bookkeeping, and aggregating multiple digital payment services.●14:27 – You have to have key people that believe in what you do.●16:33 – The 80% or 90% of LiveCA ex-employees that have left tend to move on to competitors or start their own firms.●17:27 – You need support and controlled growth to not overextend too fast.●20:00 – Living in an RV with his family and being flexible allows him to “grow smart.”●22:20 – Chad Davis is excited about moving into a trainer role and creating opportunities for the team to try new things in a supported environment.3 Key Points:1. Services that LiveCA Tax, standard year-end work, Unite States consulting, mergers, treasury and accounts payable, bookkeeping, and aggregating multiple digital payment services.2. Xero is an accounting system that LiveCA prefers.3. Controlled growth is important to avoid watering down your services and spreading your value too thin.Tweetable Quotes:-“At the end of the day, we just put ourselves in everybody’s shoes.” – Chad Davis-“We just try to remove the risk of people saying ‘yes’ to working with us. We start removing things like set-up fees and hourly rates, the conversations just start flowing really naturally” – Chad Davis-“For us, that in-person social interaction with cues that you see in body language and tone, you really can’t see when you are working virtually.” – Chad DavisResources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●Chad Davis – LinkedIn for Chad Davis●LiveCA LLP– Website for LiveCA LLP●@ChadDavis – Twitter for Chad Davis Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 34th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Tea Nicola, CEO, and Co-Founder of Wealth Bar. Wealth Bar is both a robo adviser and robo planner in Canada that works to provide integrated planning and investment solutions to clients. Learn the story behind this fintech company, what they are offering present and future clients, and what it took to bring this company to fruition.●     00:53 – WealthBar doesn’t have physical offices—everything is done online or over the phone.●     01:26 – Tea earned her Electrical Engineering degree and interned at Nicola Wealth Management in Vancouver.●     02:10 – She worked as a financial advisor for several years.●     05:26 – WealthBar’s efficiencies help lower the cost to pass the savings to the consumer.●     08:05 – Clients can onboard themselves and deposit money without an advisor. ●     09:48 – One of the biggest differences between WealthBar and their competitors is the level of financial planning that WealthBar does.●     11:36 – On the accumulation side, WealthBar has a module built into their website where users can enter basic information and see where savings will take them.●     13:26 – There is full inside and outside sales support for financial advisors.●     20:21 – Proper financial advisement takes education on the advisor and client side.●     21:36 – There are still people that want advisement even if they could do it themselves.●     22:06 – WealthBar currently has a team of 30 people based in Vancouver.●     22:48 – Changing the way that advisors work with their clients and represent their professionalism are the opportunities that Tea is most excited about.3 Key Points:1. Clients can onboard themselves and deposit money without an advisor. 2. WealthBar offers a conversation with an advisor within the first five seconds that you are on the website, and again within the first 20 seconds when you sign up.3. All of WealthBar’s client-facing portfolio managers are also CFPs, accommodating areas like retirement planning and estate planning.Tweetable Quotes:-     “WealthBar is one of Canada’s leading robo advisers, and by robo advisor we mean that we do everything a traditional financial adviser would do.” – Tea Nicola.-     “People don’t have a very high understanding of finances at all, and often times they just need that reassurance.” – Tea Nicola.-     “For the more complex financial planning we actually use Snap Projections.” – Tea Nicola.Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Tea Nicola – LinkedIn for Tea Nicola● WealthBar – Website for WealthBar Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 33th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Johnathan Holland, the Founder and CEO of Curexe, that provides tools for enabling online foreign exchange transactions at reasonable rates—including a new product that will allow users to take payment with Interac. Time Stamped Show Notes:●     00:55 – Curexe assists businesses to send and receive money.●     01:34 – Johnathan Holland started Curexe four years ago.●     02:59 – He looked at how Canadian banking hadn’t properly connected to                    technology yet.●     04:33 – He started listening to motivational speeches on YouTube for inspiration.●     05:48 – He began working with his CTO and got into a Canadian entrepreneurial                    leadership program called The Next 36.●     09:16 – Johnathan came to Toronto from St. Catharines.●     10:22 – Curexe only charges a flat rate of 1% to send money out, 2% to accept                    money.●     11:18 – Curexe is targeting small business owners looking to scale globally.●     12:45 – Curexe has a blog with content to capture customers and provide value.●     14:02 – Their new product is a debit card called SmartPay.●     19:17 – Curexe handles about 20 currencies.●     21:43 – The hurdles have been things like it taking 2 and a half years to convince                    a bank to give them a merchant account for a money service business.●     26:05 – You have to be resourceful and hustle.●     28:20 – Have a differentiating product that is valuable to get customers and scale                    up.●     30:38 – The long term vision for Curexe is showing Canadians that businesses can                    scale globally to be the next PayPal.●     33:29 – Johnathan Holland is excited about forcing banking to change to creating                    more value and a smoother experience. 3 Key Points:1. You aren’t going to know looking forward how it is all going to work out…but you can   connect the dots when you look back.2. Research shows the U.S. and Canadian income per capita are constantly diverging   because Canada isn’t building the big YouTubes and Googles of the world in terms of   businesses.3. Your network is the biggest thing. Tweetable Quotes:-     “We (Curexe) help businesses that need to send and receive money.” – Johnathan       Holland.-     “If you are a business owner and you need to send money to a supplier in another       country, we (Curexe) can help you do that right from our online platform, for a        cheaper price tag than what a bank would typically charge.” – Johnathan Holland.-      “Accepting money would be via invoice or in an online checkout, which is       accentually a direct debit way of paying without ever leaving your online store.” –       Johnathan Holland. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Johnathan Holland – LinkedIn for Johnathan Holland● Curexe – Website for Curexe  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During this 32nd episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Randy Cass, the CEO, Founder, and Portfolio Manager of Nest Wealth. Nest Wealth is the second largest robo adviser in Canada, and a platform provider of digital solutions for the client onboarding experience in asset management. The conversation digs into what has led Randy Cass to creating Nest Wealth, how the company has evolved and expanded, and how they fit into the financial space in Canada.●01:11 – Nest Wealth helps firms, individuals, even employers move whatever process they’ve been using historically and allows them to run it all digitally in the B2B space.●02:07 – Randy decided he didn’t want to be a lawyer and later started trading currencies derivatives at TDSI.●05:15 – He performed a hosting job on BNN for several years with guests that were CEOs, CFOs, and also the heads of regulatory bodies.●07:00 – Nest Wealth was originally started as a direct-to-consumer robo advisor.●07:47 – When compressed margins arise, it becomes about getting more efficient in your operation and scaling your operations above past levels.●12:00 – All on a single stack, Nest Wealth is a Sass-based company and a licensed product that controls their technology.●14:26 – A large financial institution wanted to by Nest Wealth in the past.●17:58 – The average consumer on the direct-to-consumer side of Nest Wealth:78% of consumers have done multiple transfer-in assets in the first six months.●19:00 – Nest Wealth puts more control of the financial process on consumers.●25:03 – In 2013, Nest Wealth launched in the midst of the media saying there will never be a digital advisor in Canada.●27:39 – The financial advisement space isn’t disappearing because of robo advisors, it just needs to continue to focus on adding value.●34:03 – Customers are generally open to change, especially when it benefits them.●40:14 – Nest Wealth is currently the only direct-to-consumer platform with a flat fixed fee regardless of how much someone puts into their account.●43:01 – Randy Cass is most excited about driving transparency and better creating outcomes for investors.3 Key Points:1. On the direct-to-consumer side of Nest Wealth, 78% of consumers have done multiple transfer-ins of assets in the first six months.2.The average account balance of assets contributed to an account doubles in the first six months from the initial contribution.3.The average client on Nest Wealth has an account of about $175,000.Tweetable Quotes:-“Think of us (Nest Wealth) as an engine that powers digital wealth.” – Randy Cass.-“I left to start Nest Wealth as a direct-to-consumer robo advisor.” – Randy Cass.-“Once there is a substitutable similar product in the marketplace, you’re going tohave price competition and margin compression throughout the entire industry.”– Randy Cass.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●Randy Cass – LinkedIn for Randy Cass●@Randy_Cass – Twitter for Randy Cass●Nest Wealth – Website for Nest Wealth Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 31st episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Kesem Frank, Co-Founder, and COO of Nuco, a company that helps implement blockchain technology for financial service companies—in banking and securities. Kesem will speak about his career in Nuco, the effects of the blockchain, and cryptocurrencies, of which he has his own.●     01:00: – Kesem started Nuco with two partners: Matthew Spoke and Jin Tu.●     02:30: – Nuco was faced with the question of serving or building?●     03:24: – He was working in technology, but went to school for law and business.●     08:12: – Blockchain adds a new way to validate data.●     12:09: – Cuts currently take 16-19 days to reconcile where the problem occurred.●     14:19: – Blockchain is like a universal ledger to help stakeholders know the truth of what is happening in the value chain.●     18:30: – The future of blockchain: private stake owners that have skin in the game that are going to run their own blockchain.●     20:50: – Does the fact that I want to do business with you mean I have to blindly trust you?●     23:09: – We have to make sure that capital markets are played fair.●     26:09: – The Canadian Exchange likes what Nuco is doing with natural gas, and wants them to apply that to other areas and wants the inter-blockchain communication issues to be addressed.●     29:09: – The conversation in the blockchain industry is evolving from what is the best blockchain to how do we take these excellent innovations and create one cohesive fabric that works as an ecosystem.●     32:09: – A relay is an intermediary that steps in between two blockchains and mitigates between them—but isn’t a good solution.●     36:40: – Bitcoin has had slow adoption in North American countries.●     39:09: – Aion is a non-for-profit blockchain organization while Nuco has become its own business.●     42:50: – The difference between the current age of platforms is not as fair as decentralization. 3 Key Points:1. The trust engine was most crucial to Kesem Frank with blockchain.2. How do you go to market where you don’t already do business?3. A blockchain should be what goes in between any two blockchains. Tweetable Quotes:           -   “How do you actually bring it (blockchain) to a business and create a return that you                could quantify?” – Kesem Frank.           -   “When a cut happens it takes the exchange 16-19 days to figure and reconcile who                 dropped the ball.” – Kesem Frank.           -   “(Blockchain) Universal ledger that is helping all of these fragmented multitude of                stakeholders kind of know what is true and what’s not.” – Kesem Frank. Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● https://www.finally.technology/ – Website for Finally Technology● Kesem Frank – LinkedIn for Kesem Frank● Twitter – Kesem Frank’s Twitter  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 30th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Amelia Young the Founder of Upside Consulting, which works within the fintech space, advising enterprises on how they can meet the challenges of the technology world and how it impacts finance. ●     00:49 – Amelia founded the Upside Consulting firm about 12 years ago●     01:33 – She started off her career an equity analyst and trader, did investor relations, and ended up in corporate strategy.●     04:15 – The biases that are relevant to our financial well-being: Choice Overload, Doing Nothing, The Hangover Principle.●     08:14 – She got involved in fintech because it opens up a wealth of tools to simplify the process.●     13:14 – Amelia is an Executive in Residence with the Scotia Bank Digital Banking Lab.●     16:20 – Open Banking is that consumer bank information is their own property and that they have the right to share their information with who they want.●     28:51 – Amelia completed a substantial research project on Millennials and Investing for the OSC.●     38:06 – If you don’t have at least $100,000 for financial management, it is hard to find an advisor to spend the time with you.●     39:40 – Complete Financial Advice: Insight into where you money is going, Savings Nudges, Goal Setting, and Construction and Maintenance of an Asset.●     43:31 – People that live in the wealth business tend not to think about daily banking.●     45:31 – She is excited about fintech’s potential to assist Canadian’s financial well-being.●     48:54 – Financial literacy is highly important to teach kids and everyone in general. 3 Key Points:1. Biases that effect our financial wellbeing:2. The biases that are relevant to our financial well-being: Choice Overload, Doing Nothing, The Hangover Principle.3. China is by far the world leader in fintech adoption and Canada was third from the bottom. Tweetable Quotes:-     “Our goal is to help our clients benefit from the transformation of the wealth       management industry.” – Amelia Young.-     “Open banking, if done properly, should be more secure. But, people need to really       get under the covers and understand what is involved in these things to get that.” –       Amelia Young.-     “Canada was one of the first adopters of contactless payment.” – Amelia Young. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● LinkedIn – Ameilia Young’s LinkedIn● Upside Consulting – Website for Upside Consulting  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 29th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Danish Yusef, the CEO and Co-Founder of Zensurance, a Canadian organization that manages the insurance needs of startups and small businesses. ●     01:09: – Zensurance helps small business manage and curate their insurance affairs.●     01:40: – Danish is a software engineer by trade, and worked as a developer at IBM.●     03:50: – Most people in the insurance industry have grown up in the industry— change is slow.●     05:15: – These days you can’t buy stock in insurance companies.●     07:30: – Zensurance is building internal risk models to assess the risk of a business type based on factors like industry, location, and size.●     10:40: – Zensurance started with technology companies, then they added construction, health care, consultants, cannabis, and sports—general liability and cyber insurance are popular policies.●     13:26: – Auto insurance could phase out in the next 10-15 years.●     21:10: – Zensurance currently works with about 25 insurance companies.●     26:03: – The Ryerson DMZ growth accelerator program was beneficial to Zensurance, and November 2016 was when the first round of funding came through.●     30:57: – The Zensurance team is about 17 people, only in Ontario and Alberta at the moment, and have helped over 5,000 businesses.●     32:15: – Danish is excited about the possibility of being able to automate advice. 3 Key Points:1. A small $500 insurance policy could be touched by eight different people before its   issued.2. Two-thirds of Zensurance customers by their services after hours.3. Zensurance started with technology companies, then they added   construction, health care, consultants, cannabis, and sports. Tweetable Quotes:“Zensurance helps small business manage their insurance.” – Danish Yusef. “We (Zensurance) work in the property and casualty insurance space, not the life, and health and benefits.” – Danish Yusef.“Auto insurance is probably going to go away in 10 or 15 years. So the industry is betting on cyber security taking the place of auto insurance, because half of all premiums are on the auto side.” – Danish Yusef. Resources Mentioned:Facebook – Jason Pereira’s FacebookLinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedInhttps://www.finally.technology/ – Website for Finally TechnologyDanish Yusef – LinkedIn for Danish YusefTwitter – Twitter for Danish YusefZensurance – Website for Zensurance  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 28th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Eva Wong, the Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Borrowwell. As a Canadian credit score and lending recommendation engine, Borrowwell helps people manage their credit score and gives them advice on how to apply for credit cards and other solutions to improve their credit.●     01:14 – Borrowwell was the first company to give Canadians their credit scores for free.●     02:07 – Eva Wong doesn’t come from financial or business background.●     04:20 – When you carry a balance on a credit card you are actually borrowing money on their previous purchases but on every purchase after that—at over 20%.●     04:50 – Borrowwell offers loans from ($1,000-35,000) online that can be customized interest rate (under 6% into the mid-20%) based on their credit score.●     07:00 – They are funded by Equitable Bank, a few angel investors, and VCs that include White Star Capital and Portage.●     09:21 – Many people are unfamiliar with their credit file and advice.●     13:11 – They currently have 45 teams members in Toronto after starting 3 years ago and have over 500,000 members that they serve.●     14:47 – They work with about 40 partners and most of the largest banks.●     18:09 – Factors for determining interest rates for their loans include: credit scores, debt service ratio, credit utilization, and the loan amount.●     20:56 – Information is updated once a month.●     22:54 – Diversity is slowing improving.●     26:00 – Eva is excited about the impact that Borrowwell is having.3 Key Points:1. Borrowwell helps consumers by giving them a free credit score, offering a loan product, along with credit advice.2. Borrowwell offers a loan product online that can be customized interest rate (under 6% into the mid-20%) based on their credit score.3. There are currently 45 teams members in Toronto working for Borrowwell and over 500,000 members that they serve.Tweetable Quotes:-     “At Borrowwell, our mission is to help Canadians make great decisions and credit.” – Eva Wong.-     “If you look at bank profits by country…if you look after China Japan, and the U.S., all of which have much, much larger populations than Canada, Canada is the next.” – Eva Wong.-     “We just crossed 500,000 members, which we think makes us one of the largest Fintech companies in Canada. ”– Eva Wong. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Eva Wong – LinkedIn for Eva Wong● @eva_toronto – Twitter for Eva Wong● Borrowwell – Website for Borrowwell Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 27th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Davyde Wachell, a Stanford graduate in artificial intelligence and the CEO of Responsive AI. ●   01:26 – The integral trust of clients comes from: service excellence and actionable insights. ●   02:30 – Davyde studied AI before it became overwhelmingly popular. ●   03:20 – Responsive AI identifies through aspects of who the client is or where they are in their life, that could be acted on to help both the client themselves and the enterprise serving the client.●   08:50 – Davyde believes that Canadian institutions and culture have a specific way of looking at innovation, which Is very consensus-driven ●   11:16 – 2017 and 2018 were the years of “fake news.”●   17:25 – How do you make sure people live up to the policy?●   18:41 – The future for the company is to see how wealth management can add value for clients and financial advisors. ●   20:14 – Process automation and AI create the chance to create better outcomes and push away tasks that slow down the workflow. ●   21:25 – Human beings using AI tools will outperform raw AI and raw human beings. ●   26:17 – Davyde foresees that the AI hype will calm down in the next three years and people will realize transfer learning and complex heterogeneous problems aren’t easily solved with AI.3 Key Points:1. The integral trust of clients comes from: service excellence and actionable insights. 2. Responsive AI technology is only for wealth management serving mass affluent and high net worth clients. 3. Humans that use AI tools will outperform raw AI and raw humans. Tweetable Quotes:-   “Those of us tracking wealth tech know that digital is a big story, and it’s expected to reach $4.6 trillion by 2022.” – Davyde Wachell. -   “Wealth is built on trust. And our clients will trust us when we serve them well and they feel taken care of, and when they trust our judgement.” – Davyde Wachell.-   “What our AI looks at is identifying through aspects of who the client is or where they are in their life, that could be acted on to help both the client themselves and the enterprise serving the client.” – Davyde Wachell.  Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Davyde Wachell – LinkedIn for Davyde Wachell● Responsive AI – Website for Responsive AI Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 26th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira has an interview with Don Whalen, the Co-Founder and CEO of PreciseFP, a Unites States-based questionnaire company. PreciseFP makes it easy for financial advisers to make custom questionnaires that integrate into various utilities. ●01:03: – PreciseFP is involved in gathering data and engaging.●02:14: – Don started off in IT for a company called SAP.●04:49: – PreciseFP is highly customizable for financial advisors through a secured process.●08:14: – Advisors initially thought that clients wouldn’t fill out the questionnaires and that older people would feel alienated—neither was the case.●14:47: – PreciseFP’sonly competition is “Google Docs, paper, and PDF.”●15:35: – Canada, United States, and the United Kingdom are among locations with PreciseFP access.●18:50: – Version 5: simplifying the interface, client surveys, more template library content, and IPS.●21:42: – The current price for PreciseFP is $60 a month for a one-user seat and ID sharing isn’t allowed—$30 per additional user.●26:09: – The company has 10 members, and mostly are developers.●27:11: – Don is excited about talking to advisors, and listening to the way PreciseFP has transformed their business. 3 Key Points:1.PreciseFP is a data gathering and a client engagement platform that has been around for 12 years.2.Two initial fears of PreciseFP that proved to be wrong: clients wouldn’t fill it out and older people wouldn’t want to use it.3. Version 5 of PreciseFP will have data quality measures. Tweetable Quotes:-“The power of our system, of our platform, the advisor can make the experience custom.”– Don Whalen.-“We have to keep that client data complete, but also current.”– Don Whalen.-“I would steer advisors away from our competition, which at the end of the day, is Google Docs, paper, and PDF.”–Don Whalen. Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● https://www.finally.technology/– Website for Finally Technology●Don Whalen– LinkedIn for Don Whalen● PreciseFP – Website for PreciseFP Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:In this 25th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Richard Arundel, the North American General Manager for Currencycloud, that is a solution for international exchange online through a series of APIs. Richard discusses his involvement in the company and the ways in which it is expanding.Show Notes:●01:11 – Currencycloud offers a payment software that enables companies to optimize their payment process.●03:01 – Currencycloud began in 2012.●07:26 – They are a B2B company with customers that include AirHelp.●13.27 – They charge a small percentage based on the flow.●17:02 – Very often companies don’t know what kind of exchange fees that are being charged.●18:02 – Obstacles that Currencycloud has faced: defining who these are, their value proposition, and how fast customers, could be serviced, and getting compliances right.●19:39 – Compliance has been an opportunity not a threat to Currencycloud.●23:09 – Currencycloud can send payments to pretty much any unsanctioned country, and they have local payout options in over 30 countries, and there are 40 different currencies they can currently process.●24:51 – The size of the market and opportunity excite Richard about his industry.3 Key Points:1. Obstacles that Currencycloud has faced: defining who these are, their value proposition, and how fast customers, could be serviced, and getting compliances right.2.The challenge is how to partner with banks and make customers aware that there are options.3.Currencycloud can send payments to pretty much any unsanctioned country, and they have local payout options in over 30 countries, and there are 40 different currencies they can currently process.Tweetable Quotes:-“If I am giving up the payment process to these banks or to these other third-party people, then I lose complete control over a.) my customer experience and b.) the cost for the customer, which also affects their revenue.” – Richard Arundel.-“There are companies out there that charge 2.75% or 5%. But often you don’t know what you’re being charged.”– Richard Arundel.-“When we originally set the company (Currencycloud) up, Fintech was really just a buzzword. But now it’s I guess more of a movement, more of a thing. We were lucky enough that we were dealing with some really interesting customers from day one.”– Richard Arundel.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●Richard Arundel – LinkedIn page for Richard Arundel●Currencycloud – Website for Currencycloud Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:In this 24th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Charlie Conron, the CTO, and Co-Founder of Life Design Analysis, an online tool for analysis and illustration of different insurance policies and products available to customers. Life Design Analysis is both a sales tool and tracking tool that allows financial advisors to track their policies and mine the data.Show Notes:●01:09 – LDA is designed to help advisors service existing policyholders as well as present new opportunities.●01:44 –Charlie Conron went to school for mechanical engineering and has been self-taught in coding.●05:00 – LDA noticed an opportunity to streamline the big pool of fragmented data that was available.●11:10 – LDA has some Whole Life capability in the system and has built an interface with every carrier software.●13:23 – Ways LDA clients typically use their software: the PDF for digital report, reports on laptops or tablets, and a sharable proposal as a leave-behind piece.●18:04 –LDA has built an easy way to request from the carriers to get information for inforce policies.●20:16 – About five carriers have kits feeds for inforce data.●24:23 – Life Design Analysis is working on integrations with Cronos, Blue Sun, and Razor Plan.●25:21 – The LDA team is approaching 10 members with people in London Ontario, Toronto, and in British Columbia.●26:09 –The biggest challenges have been the cooperation of some industry partners, and the quality of data.●32:22 – Charlie is excited about the education about robots and the consumer experience getting smoother.3 Key Points:1. Charlie Conron’s stepfather Larry Kinlin, the Founder of Life Design Analysis, is a 50+financial veteran.2. Life Design Analysis solves the problems of how to present insurance so it’s more understandable to the consumer and they offer sales and compliance options for advisors. 3.The ways LDA clients typically use their software: the PDF for digital report, reports on laptops or tablets, and a sharable proposal as a leave-behind piece.Tweetable Quotes:-“We (LDA) really wanted to be your go-to software for the complete insurance sales process, so whether it’s a prospect or serving an inforce client.” – Charlie Conron.-“Critical illness rates are built into the system. They are a great comparison contrasting a T10 to a 75.” – Charlie Conron.-“Because a lot of new proposals come through our system, we’ve added this ability to mark a policy as sold, which will save the entire renewal schedule.” – Charlie Conron.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●Charlie Conron – LinkedIn for Charlie Conron●LifeDesign Analysis – Website for Life Design Analysis Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the 23rd episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, and Jason Pereira interviews Ben Styles, the General Manager of product and Partner Development for Xero, one of the world’s leading online accounting software programs. Learn more about Ben’s work with Xero, and how the company is impacting the Fintech industry.●02:56 – Xero started with the concept of a single ledger in the cloud, then an account or a bookkeeper for a small business able to work in this space in real time.●03:45 – Ben Styles has been focusing his energy in digitizing businesses and products.●06:12 – Xero zeroed in on removing manual entry.●09:21 – In two of Xero’s core markets there are between 500-1000 small businesses joining Xero a day. the small business owners, the people that work in the small businesses, and the accountants and bookkeepers that work for those small businesses.●18:18 – Picking partners is a challenge the Xero has, as most businesses do.●22:25 – Xero is weary about totally digital currencies.●23:12 – Nations where Xero has high penetration like Australian and the U.K. they are seeing many small businesses that have suppliers or customers that are also Xero customers.●24:42 – Ben is excited about the realization amongst small businesses about how powerful running their entire business in the cloud can be for them for growth and company management.●30:46 – Workflow Max is an important tool for accountants and bookkeepers to run the workflow within their accounting practice.●31:49 – Projects software is about is about real-time time tracking and job managing of billable work, and making it available on mobile and desktop.3 Key Points:In two of Xero’s core markets there are between 500-1000 small businesses joining Xero a day.Xero is now at 1.4 million small businesses globally.Xero has customers in 180 countries. We’ve got operations in New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, London, San Francisco, New York, Denver, and now in Canada.Tweetable Quotes:-“Having the single view of the ledger was going to be the core of solving cloud accounting.” – Ben Styles.-“We (Xero) are now at 1.4 million small businesses globally.” – Ben Styles.-“We’ve (Xero) got customers in 180 countries. We’ve got operations in New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, London, San Francisco, New York, Denver, and now in Canada.” – Ben Styles.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●LinkedIn– Ben Styles’ LinkedIn●Xero– Website for Xero Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 22th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host shares a recording of his presentation at the Wealth Professional Summit on Leadership and Technology that occurred on May 30th, 2018 in Toronto at The Westin Harbour Castle. Jason’s discussion covers a series of tech tools that are of use to financial planners and advisors. Show Notes:●     01:06: – Technology Tools for Practice Management and Efficiency is the name of Jason Pereira’s talk.●     01:42: – A trend in the FIntech space is Application Programing Interface (API) that allows systems to communication with each other like Facebook to Google.●     02:51: – Zapier focuses on creating APIs.●     03:50: – Canadian-based Hootsuite allows you to preprogram social media content and does his podcast for under $100 per episode.●     06:34: – ScheduleOnce allows people to see your availability for meetings and request a meeting and SalesForce.com for CRM and data platform.●     08:53: – Ring Central is a voice over internet protocol company that will allow you to have a standardized phone system but also allows you to call from your work number from anywhere.●     12:02: – Woodgate Financial at IPC Investment Corporation sends clients 4 things: 1.) Invoice, 2.) Access to a personal financial management platform 3.) Online Questionnaire 4.) Risk-assessment Question●     13:15: – Fathom is a reporting and visualization tool that produces stunning reports for business profitability.●     14:00: – Honest is a personal financial management platform that does data aggregation, relationship tracking, data vault, and secure communication channel.●     15:40: – Precise FP is an online questionnaire and is a FinaMetrica risk-tolerance questionnaire.●     18:15: – Finally Technology is a company Jason and his partner launched to solved Fintech Technology problems, including a CRA data-scraping tools for SalesForce.●     21:44: – Jason created an Insurance Needs Assessment Tools spreadsheet.●     24:41: – Last Pass is a password management system to place all your passwords in a digital locker.●     27:19: – Google Authenticator is is a software token that implements two-step verification options.●     28:29: – Slack is for collaboration and SalesForce chat for chatting through SalesForce.com.●     31:00: – The future of financial planning is letting AI handle client data points and focus on human relationships and needs.●     35:34: – Where are you feeling pain?3 Key Points:1. Ring Central is a voice over internet protocol company that will allow you to have a standardized phone system but also allows you to call from your work number from anywhere.2. Woodgate Financial at IPC Investment Corporation sends clients 4 things: 1.) Invoice, 2.) Access to a financial management platform 3.) Online Questionnaire 4.) Risk-assessment Question.3. Fintech Technology problems, including a CRA data-scraping tools for SalesForce.Tweetable Quotes:-   “So you know how we talk about goals-based planning in this industry? Guess what, we can actually have goals-based reporting for the first time.” – Jason Pereira.-   “The invoice I send them (clients), it’s actually done through our accounting system Zero. Zero is a cloud-based accounting system, that frankly is a million times better than anything I have ever used before.”– Jason Pereira.-   “The reality is that data rights are one of the biggest contentious issues in the world right now.”– Jason Pereira.Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● https://www.finally.technology/ – Website for Finally Technology Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During the 21st episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Othalia Doe-Bruce, the Public Relations Officer for One Ledger, that creates an API level so that blockchains can communicate with each other. The discussion revolves around what One Ledger has to offer, how it is being funded, and the Blockchain Hub education group. ●     01:24: – One Ledger technology is trying to resolve the issues related to blockchains not being able to communicate with one another.●     02:29: – Othalia has been working in the investment management field for over a decade and became interested in blockchain and Bitcoin.●     03:22: – One Ledger was founded by David Cao, an engineer architect from China.●     04:06: – The benefit of interoperability between blockchain networks is being able to pick and choose between the different features that each may have.●     08:25: – Polymath is a partner of One Ledger and one of the biggest VCs in Asia has already invested in the company.●     12:11: – One Ledger isn’t currently monetizing, but it plans to do so in the future.●     13:25: – One Ledger is planning to do an ICO and have already begun preselling and will offer the ICO publically in the near future.●     16:30: – They are targeting B2B and clients that can help them monetize the platform after the ICO.●     18:27: – The challenge for One Ledger has been finding blockchain developer talent.●     19:41: – Blockchain Hub at York University provides a plethora of adaptive courses to meet the current needs of the industry.●     22:44: – One of the most prominent consulting groups for blockchain in the United States is students at Berkley.3 Key Points:1. Polymath is a partner of One Ledger and one of the biggest VCs in Asia has already invested in the company.2. One Ledger will be a decentralized platform, and essentially, it will belong to the token holders and the community.3. One Ledger is targeting B2Band clients that can help them monetize the platform after the ICO.Tweetable Quotes:-   “For One Ledger, we have…as a partner Polymath, another type of blockchain platform. And what Polymath is trying to do is facilitate the issuing of securitized tokens.” – Othalia Doe-Bruce-   “The beauty of block chain is that it is a decentralized platform, right, so One Ledger will be a decentralized platform, and essentially, it will belong to the token holders and the community.” – Othalia Doe-Bruce-   “Blockchain Hub is a non-profit organization affiliated with York University, and that’s primarily education and then research and commercialization of blockchain start-ups.” – Othalia Doe-Bruce.Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Twitter – Twitter for Othalia Doe-Bruce● One Ledger – Website for One Ledger Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this 20th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira is actually the one getting interviewed this time by his colleague, financial advisor Guy Anderson. The goal will be to identify and define the acronyms, nomenclature, and tech speak that is typically used in Fintech Impact, and in the industry at large. Consider this Fintech 101. ●02:38 – API: stands for application protocol interface. APIs are rules or a language that a company puts out there for something else to talk to its programs.●05:10 – AWS: stands for Amazon Web Services for cloud computing. Companies that use AWS include: Netflix, and Dropbox.●08:37 – GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation, a series of data regulations and digital rights established by the European Union. ●17:36 – Whatever you put online, consider there forever. Stupid things posted in the past could prevent you from getting certain jobs in the future.●18:02 – Platforms: technological systems that allows other people to build other functions over top of it.●20:31 – Narrow AI is artificial intelligence that essentially focuses on one task, like Apple Siri. Machine learning is throwing a ton of data at a computer system for it to mine and look for patterns of recognition that the human mind can’t recognize—teaching itself to learn as new data comes in.●27:00 – Blockchain: the underlying architecture and code of every cryptocurrency that exists, creating a timestamp and transaction data that is resistant to modification of the data, and is an open, distributed ledger that can record transactions between two parties.●34:11 – Cryptocurrency transactions aren’t instantaneous but they are ultra-fast compared to bank transactions: which are “controlled ledgers.”●34:49 – So much of the financial system before cryptocurrency has been based on trust.●35:50 – You have to convert money into cryptocurrency coins, transfer those coins to who you are doing your transaction with, and then they convert it back to money again.●37:36 – You can send money anonymously from other users with cryptocurrency anywhere in the world because they are sent to private keys, and there are also public keys.●37:50 – People can create their own cryptocurrencies relatively easily.●42:20 – Bitcoin has implications for impacting anti-money laundering. 3 Key Points:1. API: stands for application protocol interface. APIs are rules or a language   that a company puts out there for something else to talk to its programs.2.You have to convert money into cryptocurrency coins, transfer those coins   to who you are doing your transaction with, and then they convert it back tomoney again.3.You can send money anonymously with cryptocurrency   anywhere in the world because they are sent to private keys, and there are   also public keys.Podcasts that explain Crypto & Blockchainhttps://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/http://investorfieldguide.com/hashpower/ Tweetable Quotes:-“APIs allow integration across different modules.” – Jason Pereira.-“I think I once saw a survey that something between 40-60% of all cloud services offered on the internet are offered through AWS .” – Jason Pereira.-“Europe typically looks at it (technology) from a consumer-first standpoint. As opposed to the North American attitude of looking at it from a business-first standpoint.” – Jason Pereira. Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the 19th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, and Jason Pereira interviews Eric Arnold, the Chief Executive Officer at Planswell, an online financial planning software platform that is really targeted at individual consumers, helping customers implement their financial self-planning. Eric shares how Planswell was started, its capabilities, and ways in which it continues to expand.●     01:36 – Eric began his career starting many businesses including tea at shopping      malls, driveway sealing, independent music distribution, children’s birthday parties, and window cleaning.●     03:11 – Eric and his wife moved to Toronto from Aurora for her to attend the University of Toronto and he took on a job as an investment advisor at Wood Gundy.●     06:14 – In 2016, investor dollars went into building up Planswell and have since made over 30,000 financial plans for people—about 20,000 in the last six months.●     07:12 – The client experience begins with clients hearing about Planswell from ad campaigns or referrals, going through about 40 questions in 3 or 4 minutes, and they are then walked through their strategy plan.●     10:56 – The 3 Pillars to Implementing a Plan: Acclimation of investments, Insurance, and Mortgages.●     12:00 – Planswell Portfolios is a stand-online PM, a no-call a robo advisor license.●     12:45 – On the insurance side, Planswell is a fully licensed insurance brokerage essentially, it’s called an MGA in the industry, which is the highest relationship that you can have with insurance manufacturers●     17:06 – A lot of the plans Planswell have implemented were before they were even onboarding.●     20:13 – Currently, Planswell has about 50 team members, doubled from last year, and next year the staff should increase to between 100-150.●     20:56 – Over 25% of the potential investors Planswell has pitched to have invested.●     25:20 – The general feedback from the financial advisor community is that many are uneasy about their futures.●     26:50 – The demographics of Planswell skew a little older and coming from high net-worth brokerage and homeowners. The average client age is 40 years.●     29:46 – About 5% of advisors are actually making plans for clients.●     32:12 – Everyone is on a salary and receive performance incentives to get them excited about onboarding clients effectively and efficiently.3 Key Points:1. Planswell has since made over 30,000 financial plans for people—about 20,000 in the last six months.2. The client experience starts with clients hearing about Planswell from ad campaigns or referrals, going through about 40 questions in 3 or 4 minutes, and they are then walked through their strategy plan.3.The 3 Pillars to Implementing a Plan: Acclimation of investments, Insurance, and Mortgages.Tweetable Quotes:-     “Planswell is a way to figure out what you need to do on a monthly basis to maintain your lifestyle into the future.” – Eric Arnold.-     “We are like a fully licensed insurance brokerage essentially, it’s called..an MGA in the industry, which is…the highest relationship that you can have with insurance manufacturers. – Eric Arnold.-     “We definitely see a future where there are probably still a lot of advisors. I don’t see a future where top advisors are making $3 or 4 million a year, I don’t think the financial institutions thinks that either.” – Eric Arnold. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● LinkedIn – Eric Arnold’s LinkedIn● Planswell – Website for Planswell Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the 18th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, and Jason Pereira interviews Anthony Stich, the Chief Operating Officer of Advicent, the largest provider of financial software in the world. Anthony shares information reguarding Advicent’s product line which includes NaviPlan, the power of their advancements and influence, and the ways in which they are able to service their clients. ●  01:06 – Advicent is the financial software developer that created NaviPlan. They                    are in seven countries and on four continents. They also have client portals, advisor dashboard, and API technology.●     01:31 – They have about 100 enterprise clients, about 60 of which are blue chip clients, and service about 100,000 users.●     02:03 – Advicent’s roots trace back to 1969 by Gus Hansch, a CFP referred to as “The Father of Financial Planning.”●     03:18 – Anthony Stich began with Advicent, which is a name comprised of advice + enterprise, four years ago, and his career began in marketing first.●     04:25 – NaviPlan, by user counts, and adoption rates, is the biggest financial planning software in the world with a cash flow first priority.●     06:56 – NaviPlan’s average enterprise contract length is between 10-12 years.●     10:30 – NaviPlan is highly customizable thanks to building their portal on top of                    APIs.●     14:08 – Figlo is Advicent’s European tool, available in five countries, with an office in Rotterdam outside of Amsterdam. Figlo used the APIs first.●     15:51 – Adviser Briefcase is their marketing and communication engine that has about 700 documents that have been reviewed by FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority).●     17:01 – As far as integration, Advicent is enterprise-first with back offices with all the core processors of the top five custodians.●     23:35 – Advicent has about 300 team members, most are in Milwaukee Wisconsin, the Fintech capital of the world. There are also members in Toronto, Winnipeg, about 50 in Rotterdam, and scattered throughout the United States.●     30:36 – The mission state at Advicent is to enable everyone to understand and impact their financial future, and it is about the end client.  3 Key Points:1. Advicent has about 100 enterprise clients, about 60 of which are blue chip   clients, and service about 100,000 users.2. NaviPlan’s average enterprise contract length is between 10-12 years.3. Advicent has about 300 team members, most are in Milwaukee Wisconsin,   the Fintech capital of the world, the rest in here are also members in Toronto,   Winnipeg, Rotterdam, and throughout the United States. Tweetable Quotes:-   “We’ve built a portal on top of APIs. What we’ve done is decoupled the user experience from those engines itself. And by doing so, we’re allowing larger enterprises and institutions the ability to use that API within their ecosystem.” – Anthony Stich.-    “We’ve given them the keys to the kingdom. We have unlocked the powerful calculations of NaviPlan, and allowed people to access them and put them wherever they so choose” – Anthony Stich.-    “Not only are we thought leaders in consulting our partners through these regulatory challenges, we are also developing in advance.” – Anthony Stich. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● LinkedIn – Anthony Stich’s LinkedIn● Advicent – Website for Advicent Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This 17th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf, Founder and CEO at Flinks, a Canadian-based data aggregation software company that pulls data from various financial institutions, allowing third parties to use that data. Over the course of the discussion, Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf explains how Flinks began, what products they are offering, and how the data aggregation world is taking shape.●     01:02: – Flinks began about 16 months ago in Montreal, connecting software with financial institutions as a data mover.●     01:37: – Before Flinks, Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf was a tech consultant for lending companies, working on origination automation.●     05:30: – One of the products that Flinks is launching is called Behavioral Score, analyzing consumers transactional behavior with their consent, and providing risk assessment scores—think of it as Credit Score 2.0.●     07:38: – Flinks doesn’t have any plans to use identifiable data for now, focusing more on the behaviors of the data of the end users.●     12:16: – Flinks doesn’t currently work with that many start-ups or financial institutions. The average clients are Canadian software companies with between 30-150 employees, and they service a total of about 8 different market segments.●     14:46: – They have experienced a lot of openness from financial institutions, but there is often a lack of communication and plan direction within institutions.●     18:28: – Two major recent events helped change regulators’ perceptions financial aggregation or financial data access: 1.) Composition Report Borough in December 2017 stating regulators should more openly except financial aggregators.2.) The mention of open banking in the financial budget.●     21:30: – As of now, Flinks is self-funded, with about a million dollars raised from friends and family to maintain control.●     22:14 – Flinks was incorporated in December 2016 and generated its first revenue in May 2017.●     23:02: –They have grown from three founders to a team of 27 people and have put a lot of effort in developing company culture and core values.●     24:46 – They aren’t planning a consumer portal but will have online forms and it will be a B2B product.●     25:25 – Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf is excited about the opportunities that the industry is making available.3 Key Points:1. Flinks is launching a Behavioral Score, analyzing consumers transactional behavior with their consent, and providing risk assessment scores—think of it as Credit Score 2.0.2. The average Flinks clients are Canadian software companies with between 30-150 employees, and they service a total of about 8 different market segments.3. Flinks is self-funded, with about a million dollars raised from friends and family to maintain control.Tweetable Quotes:-   “I think what we can say about the Canadian market is that, because we have a small amount of financial institutions covering a high percentage of the population, it makes us basically work a lot on the quality side and the speed of the data.” – Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf.-   “The average Canadian has like about three different banks accounts from three different institutions.” – Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf.-   “Some financial institutions basically use aggregators but at the same time put in their terms and conditions that you should not share your information.” – Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf.Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf – LinkedIn for Yves-Gabriel Leboeuf● Flinks – Website for Flinks Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the 16th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, and Jason Pereira interviews Peter Demangos, the Co-Founder of Collage, a human resources benefits technology platform that works in tandem with broker partners. Peter explains how Collage was created, the ways in which it is pushing technology in the financial advisement and human resources spaces, forward, and the ways they plan to scale.●     01:06 – Collage aims to assist mid-sized companies in Canada with 200 employees or less, but the average tends to be 20-100 employees.●     02:28 – Peter’s original passion began with health and wellness at the corporate level that led him to the benefits space.●     03:18 – PDF Employee Benefits that focuses on health and dental is a company that Peter started and which he still runs today.●     08:09 – Collage works with all of the insurance companies across Canada.●     11:21 – The Collage team has been complimentary with each partner bringing vital skills to the table. Fund-raising, hiring and figuring out the right process were extensive and intensive procedures.●     15:11 – The reaction from advisors in the benefits space was a lot of questions, but also a lot of support.●     23:39 – Collage is between 30-35 employees now, with their headquarters in Toronto and a support and sales team in Montreal.●     25:50 – There are about 20,000 employees on the platform, the average customer is around 40-50 employees.●     26:41 – The more noise in the space is bitter-sweet. Customers realize they need to take action and competitors add clutter for customers to sift through.●     28:10 – Peter is excited about advisors that don’t add value phasing out and seeing the ample opportunities to assist the strong and committed advisors.3 Key Points:1. Collage solves all of the HR, payroll, benefit, and administrative related tasks for small to id-sized businesses.2. Collage is between 30-35 employees now, with their headquarters in Toronto and a support and sales team in Montreal.3. There are about 20,000 employees on the platform, the average customer is around 40-50 employees.Tweetable Quotes:-     “Collage is an all-in-one HR platform built specifically for the mid-sized market in         Canada. For us, mid-sized means 200 employees and below.” – Peter Demangos.-     “The reality is the more noise breaks the feeling of customers, now they recognize      that they need to do something about their HR. ” – Peter Demangos.-     “I’m very proud of the advisory space that we have in Canada, and the relationships       and the trust that exists between clients and the advisor.” – Peter Demangos.Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● LinkedIn – Peter Demangos’s LinkedIn page● Collage – Website for Collage Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During the 15th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Pauline Shum Nolan, the Co-Founder and CEO of Wealthscope, an online tool for accessing portfolios. Pauline shares the creation and opportunities available with Wealthscope, which digs beyond performance, into various parameters like factor-based investing, fees, and long-term projections of income.●  01:09: – Wealthscope is a web application, looking to “open the black box in retail wealth management.”●     02:18: – Pauline began as a professor of finance for the last 25 years, and worked with the university penchant plan for the last 14 years the on the institutional side.●     04:40: – Wealthscope has a free B2C version for students, and investors, but will launch a premium version for investors that are willing to pay for more customized opinions through a subscription.●     08:01: – Wealthscope built in analytics for proof of concept which allowed them to raise some pre-seed money for an in-house IT team. Downside protection is a big focus.●     09:06: – Wealthscope has a proprietary portfolio scorecard that rates and grades risk-adjusted performance, downside protection, income, fees, and diversification including exposures. ●     12:15: – They are crafting the accumulation phase for retirement planning and are working on the drawdown phase.●     13:52: – As far as grading for fees, if you are paying 2.5%, you are getting a poor mark.●     16:06: – They use supervised machine learning with about 25 asset classes for Canada, and build different portfolios factoring in human capital.●     21:06: – Data sources that Wealthscope is drawing from include: subscriptions to Exchange Traded Securities and Morningstar, and the use of a risk- tolerance survey.●     26:03: – Wealthscope is currently a team of 10, including Pauline’s two business partners—one being an angel investor.●     28:30: – It is important for investors to understand what is driving the risk.3 Key Points:1. Wealthscope has a proprietary portfolio scorecard that rates and grades along five dimensions: risk-adjusted performance, downside protection, income, fees, and diversification including exposures. 2. They use supervised machine learning with about 25 asset classes for   Canada, and build different portfolios factoring in human capital.3. It is important for investors to understand what is driving the risk.Tweetable Quotes:-   “At Wealthscope, we’ve launched the beta of the B2C version, which is free.” – Pauline Shum Nolan.-   “You (Wealthscope) are the first true second opinion service I’ve seen that is completely objective, as you are not tied to product in any way. That within itself is something that has been sorely mission from the marketplace.” – Jason Pereira.-   “Risk management over the long-term is a lot easier, and a lot more important as returns.” – Pauline Shum Nolan.Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Pauline Shum Nolan – LinkedIn for Pauline Shum Nolan● Wealthscope – Website for Wealthscope Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During the 14th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, interviews Paolo Sironi, Fintech thought leader and author who currently works at IBM Watson Financial Services at the IBM Industry Academy. Paolo shares information that he has gained about our relationship with money, how it is changing, and the ways in which Fintech plays a role in that relationship.●01:06: – Paolo Sironi is Italian, splitting his time between Frankfort Germany and Milan Italy.●01:19 – Through his role at the IBM Watson Financial Services at the IBM Industry Academy, he works with a 100-person team worldwide that engaged in conversations with the Fintech industries.●03:35 – Paolo began his career in banking as the head of quantitative business management for financial institutions for about 15 years, then moved to Germany in 2008 pushing towards Fintech, and in 2012 IBM brought his Fintech and brought him into their fold.●10:00 – The global financial crisis demonstrated to a lot of investors that the regulators have to toughen the rules so that more value is transferred to the investors.●12:56 – Companies have the opportunity to revise their business model from transaction volumes to services with added value for the clients where the relationship is more valuable than the experience.●16:09 – Silicon Valley missed the ball when it has come to Fintech because they approach it with the same psychology that makes customers purchase through Amazon.com, and they think this equally applies to financial and insurance products.●22:22 – Paying is more engaging than posting pictures because it is something we all have to do. ●29:27 – IBM uses the phrase “cognitive” instead of “artificial intelligence” when referring to A.I.●33:31 – What clients buy from financial advisors is not performance or risk, the client pays for the comfort of making a financial decision. That’s why they need a conversation, which builds trust.●38:02 – WeChat, a multi-purpose Chinese social network got a license this year to sell investment funds directly.●39:29 – Disruptive innovation is when an industry is saturated and customers don’t understand the value proposition any longer—and someone comes along offering a cheaper and/or simpler to use solution. While sustaining innovation is offering an improved version of your product.●48:37 – With the goal of retirement, you have to make many decisions before: saving, investing, insuring, lending, and donating.●50:40 – The next global financial crisis may be triggered by retirement because our retirement system is very imbalanced everywhere. Investing will need to start earlier.●52:07 – Paolo Sironi has written several financial technology books: “FinTech Innovation: From Robo-Advisors to Goal Based Investing and Gamification,” “Modern Portfolio Management: From Markowitz to Probabilistic Scenario Optimization,” and “MiFID II: Value-Generation for Investors.”3 Key Points:1.The United States is where technology was born. Europe focuses on regulation. China concentrates on the business model.2.Digital is a “pull” technology because it is demand-driven and investing and insurance is a “push” technology because it is offer driven.3.Disruptive innovation is when an industry is saturated and customers don’t understand the value proposition any longer—and someone comes along offering a cheaper and/or simpler to use solution. Sustaining innovation is offering an improved version of your product.Tweetable Quotes:-“In the U.S., in particular, technology was born, and still this is the case largely speaking. Europe likes regulation which is important. China is the business model.” –Paolo Sironi.-“This industry has to change from a transaction mechanism where you make money by selling products which have an embedded commission or fee, into packaging those products into something which is called advice that the clients are willing to pay for transparently.” –Paolo Sironi.-“The cost can bite your sandwich, while the risk can eat your lunch.” –Paolo Sironi.Resources Mentioned:●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Paolo Sironi– LinkedIn for Paolo Sironi●Website – Website for Paolo Sironi Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During the 13th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews David Katz, the Executive Vice President of Benecaid, a traditional health benefits platform where he runs a separate division called Honeybee their digital platform for their delivery of benefit solutions for advisors, underwriters, lawyers, and end-to-end users. David shares his journey to the creating of Honeybee, how it has progressed, and the industry problems that it is addressing.●     01:31 – Honeybee is designed to allow employers to set up benefits account for their employees, health and allowance accounts, and the employees can use those account to personalize their benefits.●     01:54 – David started his career as a lawyer practicing corporate commercial law for a little over four years.●     05:39 – He really enjoyed the marketing and customer acquisition side.●     06:01 – David focused on building an online community with Porfolios.com or professional commercial artists for advertising projects—with over 80,000 creatives on the platform. ●     10:41 – People using learn about benefits once you get your first job.●     12:52 – When he looked at Honeybee the focus was on the problems that they have to solve: rising cost of benefits, multigenerational problem, lack of perceived value of these plans, and an employer’s culture.●     17:17 – Companies can get to Honeybee a number of ways, but it starts with the advisor, who can have Honeybee on a tablet, do a video conference, or just send a link to a client who can self-serve.●     17:47 – Employers provide some information about size and demographics of their company, match them with products, have them configure their group into “hives,” the employer sets up a health account, pick or not pick a dental plan, decide if you will add more for family, and funding for each hive.●     26:32 – Bundling has made things easier for Honeybee.●     29:03 – Allowance categories adds benefits for items such as kids, fitness and pets.●     33:48 – Their offer network which gets create by the employee works similar to affiliate marketing networks. ●     35:39 – Honeybee has a per employee per month fee for the company from about $12.50-$20 with a portion of that going to the advisor.●     38:34 – Honeybee wasn’t funding through bootstrapping for through VCs.●     41:22 – Obstacles have stemmed around product, coming from the carriers.●     44:31 – David Katz is excited that they can integrate with every form of business productivity software.3 Key Points:1. Honeybee focused on the problems that they have to solve: rising cost of benefits, multigenerational problem, lack of perceived value of these plans, and an employer’s culture.2. Data sharing is a huge component of where Honeybee is going, but in a measured way.3. The steps for Honeybee set-up include: employers provide some information about size and demographics of their company, match them with products, have them configure their group into “hives,” the employer sets up a health account, pick or not pick a dental plan, decide if you will add more for family, and funding for each hive.Tweetable Quotes:-   “Honeybee is designed to allow employers to set up benefits account for their employees, health and allowance accounts, and the employees can use those account to personalize their benefits.” –David Katz.-   “You really have to think hard about distribution, and really understand what sells online, what transacts offline, and where the different value points are.” – David Katz.-   “Nothing gets on our platform if it doesn’t help the employer.” – David Katz.Resources Mentioned:·        Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook·        LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn·        Honeybee – Website for Honeybee Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 3rd episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira interviews Pawel Brzeminski, the founder and CEO of Snap Projections, a new and exciting Canadian software solution to assist financial planners. They discuss the scope of Snap Projections, as well as tools and challenges facing the Canadian market.●     01:31 – Snap Projections is a financial planning software for Canadian financial advisors, investment managers, and financial planners.●     02:12 – Pawel came to Canada over 15 years ago and has a technical background in software engineering,●     03:45 – In late 2014, he started building the product, and launched in May 2015.●     06:34 – There are a lot of complex moving pieces with preparing financial plans for clients that Snap Projections assists with in order to make the progress simpler.●     09:30 – The software was made to be effective, easy to use, easy to communicate to the client, robust, accurate, transparent, customizable, and interactive.●     13:38 – After entering data, users are able to copy a scenario and test it out.●     17:45 – Funding is a challenge company has faced, being that they are independent without any equity partners in it. They also have over 500 feature requests on their list.●     23:59 – Wealth transfer involving “baby boomers” is causing people to ask themselves if they will have enough money to live off of.●     24:40 – Snap Projections has a sustainability feature to calculate how much they can spend to live a long-term sustainable lifestyle.●     28:14 – They try to focus on monitoring what financial advisors need, not what their competitors are doing, because they don’t want to make the same mistakes that they may make.●     29:33 – Snap Projections’ podcast is called “Growing Your Financial Advisor Practice” and Jason Pereira is on episode 6.3 Key Points:1. The software was made to be effective, easy to use, easy to communicate to the client, robust, accurate, transparent, customizable, and interactive.2. Wealth transfer involving “baby boomers” is causing people to ask themselves is if they will have enough to live off of.3. They try to focus on monitoring what financial advisors need, not what their competitors are doing, because they don’t want to make the same mistakes that they may make.Tweetable Quotes:-   “Europeans and people in Canada here, and the U.S. as well, they think about money differently…for example, there is not a lot of credit card use in European.” – Pawel Brzeminski.-   “Education actually, the advisor can help increase the financial literacy of the client…the refer ability goes up.” – Pawel Brzeminski.-   “We both have the “Baby Boomer” population in Canada and the U.S. And that wealth transfer that we’ve been hearing about in this industry forever is finally starting to happen.” – Jason Pereira.Resources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn           ● Snap Projections – Website for Snap Projections           ● Pawel Brzeminski – LinkedIn for Pawel Brzeminski           ● Podcast for Snap Projections – Snap Projections podcast featuring Jason Pereira Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary: This is the 11th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, and Jason Pereira interviews Clayton Feick, the Vice President of Sales and Business Development at Quandl, a big data company in the financial space that sells data points to vendors. Forbes has names Quandl one of the top 50 Fintech companies to watch. Clayton shares information about what separates Quandl from their competitors, how they are providing value in the fintech space, and what exactly alternative data is. ●     01:41 – Quandl is the leading provider of alternative data in the world. They also                    provide financial and economic data.●     02:04 – Clayton has been involved with Quandl for about two years, and spent a                    decade at Thomson Reuters prior to that.●     02:31 – Quandl is a proudly Canadian company, based in Toronto.●     03:56 – Alternative data is information that has never been used before in capital                    markets or in financial services, and packaging it up or extracting insight                    from it can give an investor an edge.●     08:19 – Quandl launched a product around the tracking of Tesla sales.●     15:18 – They have a smart data science team that try to think like a hedge fund                    while evaluating data, with half Quandl’s team focused on data                    engineering, data science, and development.●     22:55 – There are huge possibilities to use data for government, sociological                     studies, and how humanity actually acts—not how we claim they act.●     26:21 – Quandl has billions and billions of API calls every month, and store all their                    data in the cloud. They have revenue-sharing agreements with vendors.●     31:46 – Two venture capital firms that participated in their two fund-raising rounds:                    August Capital and Nexus Ventures.●     32:31 – They are constantly focusing on finding new forms of data that is insightful                    and unique.●     36:33 – Quandl gets excited when they find new data sets that the world has never                    seen before.●     37:40 – The Economist wrote an article called: “Data is the new Oil.” Data is everywhere, and news to be properly mined and refined to be as useful as oil.●     38:00 – Quandl was the only Canadian firm on Forbes’ Top 50 Fintech companies                    list for 2018. 3 Key Points:1. Alternative data is information that has never been used before in capital markets or in financial services, and packaging it up or extracting insight from it that can give an investor an edge.2. Quandl has over 250,000 individuals that are consuming data from us on a regular basis.3. Quandl was the only Canadian firm on Forbes’ Top 50 Fintech companies list for 2018. Tweetable Quotes:-     “We have over 250,000 individuals that are consuming data from us on a regular       basis.” – Clayton Feick.-     “More and more firms are making the decision to get into alternative data, get into       the technologies behind it and data science.” – Clayton Feick.-     “You see some of the regulations in Europe around MiFID II and sell side firms need       to now charge for their research, it can’t be bundled with trading commissions.” –&nbsp

Summary:In this 10th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira interviews Aly Dhalla, the CEO and Founder of Finaeo, a platform to help independent advisors make their job easier with digital toolkits connected to a back office to work through their front office needs—from prospect to policy in one workflow. Aly shares what Finaeo’s goals are, who their core audience is, and their technological prospective to financial planning.●     02:01 – Aly Dhalla introduces what Finaeo is.●     02:31 – Aly shares information about his professional background as a financial advisor.●     04:20 – Finaeo began delivering quotes via chat bot to provide them on demand.●     06:00 – Three targets for Finaeo include:                    1.) Early advisors who are 0-2 years in the industry looking for infrastructure.                    2.) Growth stage advisors with 3-5 years in the industry making $75,000-$125,000 annually in income.                    3.) Advisors towards the end of their career that are looking to exit in 3-5 years.●     06:59 – Finaeo software process involves an initial needs analysis form for an advisor’s client, who can then log into the software and use the opportunity builder stage. The system sets up auto reminders.●     11:45 – Finaeo currently does logic-driven data analysis, mining it for patterns.●     15:52 – Finaeo is willing to partner with their competition.●     17:29 – Connectivity with carriers is the number one issue that Finaeo is facing●     19:17 – They will remain very focused on insurance distribution.●     23:52 – Bionic advisor manta stands for the culmination of human and machine, with machine taking over computation, administration, and workflow. The human component handles building relationships and giving advice.●     26:33 – Finaeo is free for advisors to work with the CRM software.●     29:38 – Clients tend to find Finaeo through referrals, blogs, eBooks, podcasts, and webinars.●     31:33 – As far as capital they have raised, the first $250,000 came from financial advisors, another $500,000 from the tech community and industry influencers. Their partner that lead their seed round of $2.25 million became Impression Ventures.●     35:54 – Their first product was built by a single engineer in three months●     38:26 – Faneo’a team is currently 14 full-time people (11 in Toronto, 3 in Vancouver) and are looking to grow to 20 by the end of 2018, with most of them in engineering.3 Key Points:1.  Three targets for Finaeo include:                    1.) Early advisors (0-2 years in the industry)                    2.) Growth stage advisors (3-5 years in the industry)                    3.) Elder advisors (looking to exit in 3-5 years.)2.  Bionic advisor manta stands for the culmination of human and machine,     with machine taking over computation, administration, and workflow. The     human component handles building relationships and giving advice.3.  Finaeo’s first capital was $250,000 from angel financial advisors, another $500,000 from the tech community, and their partner that lead their seed round of $2.25 million became Impression Ventures.Tweetable Quotes:-    “Our end-state goal is to be digitally bolted onto every insurance company and provide an open Amazon-style marketplace, where advisors can pick and choose from a suite of products.” – Aly Dhalla.-    “We think that machine learning is going to drive the next generation of advisor, and help them scale.” – Aly Dhalla. -    “Technology is the future of distribution, is the future of compliance, is the future of communication with clients.” – Aly Dhalla. Resources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● Finaeo – Website for Finaeo● LinkedIn – Aly Dhalla’s Linke

Summary:In this 9th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Rona Birenbaum, a Toronto-based financial planner, and the CEO of Viviplan, a Canadian Robo planner that uses technology to more effectively provide financial planning to clients and a better price point. They chat about how Rona came to create Viviplan, what it aims to do for financial planning, and how it is growing.01:09 – Rona sums up Viviplan.●01:27 –Viviplan came out of Rona’s experience as a fee only financial planner for over 20 years.●02:37 – Viviplan was accepted into the Ryerson DMZ-BMO Fintech Accelerator program in the summer of 2017.●04:27 – Clients go through a rigorous but friendly onboarding process to gather the information to develop a comprehensive, tax-sensitive, goal-driven financial plan●07:03 – The onboarding is all developed in-house.●09:13 –Public relations coverage in The Globe and Mail and MoneySense has helped get the word out marketing-wise—along with podcast appearances.●11:33 – To handle that overflow of inquiries and interest Viviplan is hiring another full-time planner.●13:27 – College graduates trained for financial planning are coming to the realization that the only available jobs are sales jobs.●18:14 – Viviplan doesn’t have in-house implementation, and they want to keep product and advice separate.●20:58 –For the comprehensive plan clients get feedback, education, information, and direction on all aspects of their financial life. There are also lighter plans for people with less questions, without a full analysis.●23:14 – Feedback from early users has been enthusiastic.●26:17 – The biggest challenge is money. Rona is currently financing the company personally. Also, she desires the right partner that will fit in smoothly.●29:26 – She is excited about building out a network of trusted professionals nation-wide.3 Key Points:1. Viviplan clients go through a rigorous but friendly onboarding process to gather the information to develop a comprehensive, tax-sensitive, goal-driven financial plan2.College graduates trained for financial planning are realizing that the only available jobs are sales jobs.3.Viviplan doesn’t have in-house implementation, and they want to keep product and advice separate.Tweetable Quotes:-“In order to do planning, you’ve got to sell.” – Rona Birenbaum.-“Technology in my view, will not replace the need for people in financial planning.” – Rona Birenbaum.-“We want to build out a platform of trusted professionals, vetted professionals, that our clients can then go to, and feel confident that they’re going to get the service to they need to implement what we have recommended.” – Rona Birenbaum.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●Viviplan – Website for Viviplan●Twitter – Rona Birenbaum’s Twitter page Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:During the 8th episode, Jason Pereira, interviews a colleague of his by the name of Zaheer Merali. Zaheer is an entrepreneur, investor, and consultant to several start-ups and has worked with many technology companies. Jason talks with Zaheer about the past and present evolution of financial planning solutions.●   01:08 – Zaheer works primarily with venture funds and start-ups in the Fintech space and healthcare.●   03:15 – He studied in school for seven years in the consulting space: strategy consulting across North American in multiple industries like renewable energy, healthcare, mining, media, insurance, and fast food.●   03:40 – Zaheer worked for seven years at Scotia Bank with some time spent in wealth management.●   05:29 – We have gone from one financial platform to tech stack and service stack solutions.●   11:19 – Several new software stacks are built as a backend with an API to a frontend.●   12:24 – Extreme growth in financial planning software is exploding.●   17:50– Blockchain is here to stay, offering new ways of working with back office systems. ●   22:24 – There is value in honing in on one problem and developing it further.●   23:45 – You can’t transfer money between banks in the United States and Canada on weekends is because the servers aren’t open—they keep bankers’ hours.●   28:50 – The automation of workflows is leading to efficiency gains.●   31:10 – What is our career path in financial planning?●   35:08 – We are seeing compression on how much customers are willing to pay, what kind of fees can be charged, and what services need to be included.3 Key Points:1. Some popular financial planning software in the United States didn’t exist three years ago, some that two years ago had 2-3% market share, and today has close to 10% market share.2. There is a ton of value in picking off one problem to work on and expanding that piece.3. You can’t transfer money between banks in the United States and Canada on weekends is because the servers aren’t open.Tweetable Quotes:-  “Many of the new software stacks you’ll see are basically built as a backend with an API to a frontend.” – Zaheer Merali.-  “We sometimes take the easy route of mistaking consistency of look and feel as an indication of quality.” – Zaheer Merali.-  “Blockchain is here to stay.” – Zaheer MeraliResources Mentioned:● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Zaheer Merali – Zaheer Merali’s LinkedIn Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:In this 7th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Yon Perullo, the CEO of RiXtrema, a United States-based fintech that specializes in helping financial advisors build their practice and assist with the fiduciary responsibilities that they face in their practice.Show Notes:●01:01 – RiXtrema started in risk-management in the financial advisement space and evolved into many areas of fiduciary risk management.●01:32 –Yon began his career as a Director of Quantitative Analytics at FactSet and moved to managing hedge funds and mutual funds.●03:29 – Yon came to RiXtrema as an early adopter.●04:11 – RiXtrema created the Portfolio Crash Test for advisors to load their portfolios for their clients to get robust scenario testing.●10:48 – One of the tools that was developed out of the Portfolio Crash Test is called the IRA Fiduciary Optimizer.●13:40 –The 401kFiduciary Optimizer is another tool that RiXtrema developed that can, among other things help advisors prospect, to help for new customers.●18:10 – One of the big selling points behind RiXtrema’s fiduciary tools are that participants have potentially better outcomes at lower costs.●21:49 – The acquisition of Larkspur included their Planishere software that is a searchable, online database of qualified plans,●22:22 – The Executive Tab which is a list of the executives at the firm that you are trying to reach.●25:59 –The Annuity Optimizer allows advisors, or anybody, to compare an existing annuity and the cost of rolling into another annuity.●34:27 – Yon’s role currently is to pull the reigns back a little on development, and focus on integrating what they have already created, and leveraging it into other avenues.3 Key Points:1. RiXtrema provided the Portfolio Crash Test for advisors to load their portfolios for their clients to get strong scenario testing.2. RiXtrema’s acquisition of Larkspur included their Planishere software that is a searchable, online database of qualified plans.3. The Annuity Optimizer makes it possible for advisors to compare an existing annuity and the cost of rolling into another annuity.Tweetable Quotes:-“Clients want simplicity in the way their workflow happens.“ – Yon Perullo-“We just launched something in the two tools that we are calling the Executive Tab, which is a list of the executives at the firm that you are trying to reach.“ – Yon Perullo-“The paradox of choice: everybody wants to have all the options available to them.Then they are just going to default to whatever is easiest.“ – Jason Pereira.Resources Mentioned:●LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn●Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook●Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial●RiXtrema– Website for RiXtrema Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:In this 6th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Shawn Brayman, the CEO of PlanPlus, a prominent Canadian source of financial planning software. Jason and Shawn discuss how PlanPlus has grown, their focus on research, and how to evolve financial planning services ethically for their customers.Show Notes:●     01:23 – PlanPlus is Canadian-based company doing financial planning with a                     multi-currency, multi-jurisdictional, and multi-lingual global platform—                     focused on research and best-practices.●     02:48 – PlanPlus spun out from a larger Hewlett Packard ISV back                    in about 1985.●     05:14 – PlanPlus acquired FinaMetrica from Australia, the home of risk tolerance                    testing.●     05:49 – In 2001, PlanPlus went to the cloud early.●     06:42 – They have planners in 20-30 counties and about 50 that are supported                     with the software.●     11:34 – The merger with PlanPlus and FinaMetrica currently involved 60-70 of                    PlanPlus’ clients using FinaMetrica.●     21:10 – Fintech is a redefinition of how we can apply technology.●     26:33 – Millennials are used to immediacy. If Amazon can ship purchases in the                    same day, why does it take so long to pull together data for financial                    planners?●     30:30 – Amazon is talking about getting into checking accounts.●     32:27 – PlanPlus’ has a research commitment to focus on science and not personal                    biases.●     38:42 – The Journal of Financial Planning and the Financial Services Review by                    the Academy of Financial Services are the key industry journals.●     40:07 – Canada is in the bottom 10% on planet Earth for what they charge in                    embedded fees.●     44:15 – In Australia, only 25% of financial planners pass the competency test. 3 Key Points:1 PlanPlus acquired FinaMetrica from Australia, the home of risk tolerance  testing.2. Millennials are used to immediacy. Data for financial planners needs to catch up to that faster speed.3. The Journal of Financial Planning and the Financial Services Review by the Academy of Financial Services are the top industry journals. Tweetable Quotes:-     “Basically, PlanPlus was actually a spin-out from a larger Hewlett Packard ISV back       in about 1985.“ – Shawn Brayman-     “Customer-wise, we have planners or advisors…running around 20 to 30 different       countries.“ – Shawn Brayman-     “Canada is in the bottom 10% on planet Earth for what we charge in embedded        fees.” – Shawn BraymanResources Mentioned:● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook● Woodgate Financial – Website for Woodgate Financial● LinkedIn – Shawn Brayman’s LinkedIn page● Twitter – Shawn Brayman’s Twitter page● PlanPlus – Shawn Brayman's Twitter page Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:In this 5th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Cato Pastoll, the Co-Founder and CEO of Lending Loop – an alternative lending source. Lending Loop mixes peer-to-peer lending with crowdsourcing along with artificial intelligence. Find out the story from Cato Pastoll about how in 15 months Lending Loop has managed to give out over $16 million in loans – and has an average monthly business growth of 20%. Show Notes:●     01:02 – Lending Loop is an online lending marketplace. They connect                    Canadian investors that are looking for more attractive returns on their                    savings with small businesses that are looking for a more affordable source                    of financing. ●     01:34 – Both of Cato’s parents were small business owners, which taught him the                    difficulties in finding financing. These lending platforms have been popular                    in the UK since 2005 and since 2008 in the US, but not in Canada. Lending                    Loop started in 2016.●     04:00 – Marketplaces aren’t easy to start or scale – and it has been hard to do in                    Canada because of the regulatory hurdles.●     05:14 – Lending Loop lets you sign up as a lender or a borrower. They curate                    applications, review them, and make sure they are credit-worthy. Only 10%                    approval rate, over $16 million lent and about $2 million per month with a                    20% monthly growth rate.●     06:24 – Loans are crowdsourced, you can pledge as little as $25 towards a loan.                    You can build a portfolio with $2,500 across 100 different companies if you                    wanted to.●     07:44 – You are able to establish the criteria for the types of businesses you lend                    to. Their auto-lend platform will allocate your money for you. Regular bank                    deposits into Lending Loop are possible.●     08:45 – The rates range from 5.9% to the mid-20%.●     10:46 – QuickBooks is integrated with Lending Loop.●     13:12 – Lending Loop makes money from an origination fee of between 2.5 to 6.5%                   of the loan as a one-time fee, as well as a spread of a 1.5% annual fee                   on every repayment.●     14:20 – Businesses are given a letter grade based on the risk of repaying their                       loans – which also determines their interest rate, with worst percentage                    being only about 10% risk of default.●     16:33 – All of their success and all of their failures are posted directly on their                    website for full transparency. The largest loan to date has been about   &n

Summary:Welcome to the 4th episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, where Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews the CEO and Co-founder of Onist Technologies – Brad Kotansky. Onist Technologies is an Arizona-based online platform that allows users to aggregate all of their financial data and to be able to work with multiple professionals. Brad Kotansky breaks down exactly what Onist Technologies is and what they are creating for the financial technologies industry and consumers. Show Notes●     01:32 – Onist connects households and family members with their financial data,                    accounts, and documents and are allowing granular access. They are sort                    of like the company Mint on steroids.●     03:55 – Seed for Onist began with Brad’s Dad needing him to take care of his                    finances.●     06:04 – The business-to-consumer market is a focus, with 15-18% of current users                    not being consumers.●     06:56 – For financial advisors, it is not about beating the SMP, it is about risk                    tolerance – especially with elderly clients that don’t need high risk options.●     10:10 – Having the client map out who the key stakeholders are in the family offers                    optimum insight. Corporate organizational charts can be created within                    1-10 minutes that can be updated to save money.●     11:38 – Onist thinks about collaboration in two parts: connect clients to the platform                    and allowing for direct messaging – include clients and professionals.●     12:52 – CTO has 20 years of machine learning and AI experience.●     14:28 – One third of the United States population is over 50 years old. 20 million                    people are going to be added to that group in the next 10 years.●     15:08 – The 18-49 demographic will grow by 6 million in the next 10 years.                    Fintech’s focus is on millennials who are less intimidated by technology.                    The average age of a caregiver in the United States is 49.●     17:31 – Security and privacy are two separate areas for Onist. Personal data and                    asset data are stored in separate data bases.●     20:23 – Onist isn’t trying to go after the Mint market. Out of the 50+ market, 45%                   share their login info.●     21:14 – Onist tries to prevent elder abuse of accounts by being a read-only site.●     22:22 – Data access is a tricky topic and a major issue with different countries                    trying to push the envelope in that area.●     27:37 – Blockchain is a paradigm change that is in the process of happening. Chip                    technology and tap-to-pay happened earlier in Canada than the United                    States.●     30:52 – Security standards take time to change across the board.●     34:25 – Onist costs nothing for the platform for the moment, there will be a

Summary:During the 3rd episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Paul Resnik, Co-founder and Director at FinaMetrica. As a risk assessment company, FinaMetrica provides tools for financial advisors to figure out the risk tolerance of their clients. Paul Resnik shares his history in the industry, the uphill battles that FinaMetrica has faced, and what it will take to turn financial advising into more of a science than an art.Show Notes01:55 – Paul Resnik started FinaMetrica in 1994, but Paul has been in the industry                    for almost 50 years.●     02:17 – Changes in Australia occurred: the ability to consolidate investment                    products onto a single platform and people not being prepared for their                    portfolios crashing.●     04:25 – Risk asseement was met with hesitation back in 1994 and now. Planners                    often find it intrusive.●     07:26 – FinaMetrica took four fours to assemble the 25 questions used in their                    psychometric test – after trying out 150 questions. They have done almost                    1.2 million tests.●     09:08 – Men tend to be more risk tolerant than women. Financial workers and                    highly confident people tend to be more risk tolerant than their clients.                     Factors that tend to not have any impact are age, education, and                     experience.●     11:47 – FinaMetrica charges the most in the global marketplace for their risk                    tolerance test. Their clients tend to be personal financial advisors in the                    approximately 20 countries that they work in.●     12:17 – FinaMetrica starts with a 25 or 12 question questionnaire to measure                    financial risk tolerance juxtaposed against ethical, physical, and social                      tolerances to determine an average score and range.●     16:56 – They link results to portfolios that have ranked at a similar level against a                     range of scenarios including: nominal returns, highs and lows, adjusted for                    inflation, 10 worst falls, how long it took to crash and recover, and 10                    highest rises.●     21:56 – FinaMetrica, based in Australia, is merging with PlanPlus, a financial                    planning company based in Toronto Canada. 90% of FinaMetrica’s                    revenue is international. They integrated their systems roughly 10 years                    ago and have looked for joined clients.●     24:49 – The cost to implement FinaMetrica into their practice: $800-900 a year in                    various countries.●  &nb

Summary:In this second episode, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Kevin Kliman, CEO and Founder of Humi – an HR software company. Kevin shares the highlights of his journey, what his company Humi is seeking to accomplish, and Humi’s impact on the financial space.Show Notes00:41 – Humi is a fintech company because in addition to its subscriber model, they                    introduced payroll and becoming the group insurance broker for the                    companies that they deal with.●     01:24 – Humi acknowledges that Zenefits – a SAS company - created their                    business model: give away software and make money off of insurance                    sales.●     01:41 – Zenefits rose to a valuation of over $1 billion.●     01:46 – Kevin Kliman and Humi graduated from Y Combinator – one of the                    biggest incubators in the United States.●     02:42 – Kevin explains Humi as a cloud-based benefits, payroll and HR software,                    trying to solve the problem of time being wasted reconciling multiple                    isolated systems instead of running their business.●     04:54 – Humi is Kevin’s first tech start-up and he is not from the world of insurance                    and benefits. He is a licensed dentist and has experience building                    businesses and soft-ware based companies on the side.●     06:42 – Kevin Kliman became excited by the business model of Humi and met his                    partners: Matt Loszak the technical lead, Simon Bourgeois the COO, and                    Drew Millington the head of sales.●     09:16 – The payroll application stemmed from merging with a company that was                    already building it and it was attractive in its simplicity and being                    web-based.●     11:54 – Pricing model for companies coming on their is a SAS license fee with a                    nominal cost per employee per month. Companies that choose to                    make Humi their insurance broker will not be charged for the software.●     13:05 – The partner route is attractive to Humi, which has 30+ people, but it comes                    down to bandwidth.●     15:12 – Humi sees a lot of promise in being an end-to-end solution for both                    employers and employees.●     18:00 – The goal is becoming a leader in the HR, payroll, and benefits space, and                    revamping performance management for companies.●     20:05 – Humi’s team went from zero to 30 in 2-3 years.●     22:41 – Humi’s target customer has changed significantly from companies that are                    10-30 people from companies that are 50-200. Bamboo HR has been a  &nbsp

Summary:Welcome to the very first episode of the Fintech Impact podcast, with Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host of this show that offers expert insight into the Fintech world of financial technology. Today, Jason interviews David Nugent, the CIO and Co-Founder of Wealthsimple, Canada’s largest robo advisor and digital investment solutions for clients. Show Notes:●     01:10 – Wealthsimple is a robo advisor that started in the Fall of 2014, and now                    services about 60,000 clients with offices in Canada, United States, and the                    UK.●     01:34 – Power Financial is the main backer of Wealthsimple thanks to about $165                    million in capital with a millennial investor client base and B2B offerings.●     03:13 – David Nugent’s personal journey includes: starting out in the business at 22                    “asking businesses owners for their life savings” as an advisor and shifted                    from advice to technology.●     04:42 – Wealthsimple focuses on the customer experience. Most of the team                    comes from technology and design, less from the financial world –                    addressing problems from a usability standpoint. ●     05:11 – Millennials are great clients because they are at the start of their careers,                     have a lot of future earning power and life transitions ahead, and possible                    inheritances.●     05:59 – On the advisor side of the business, it’s how do you help advisors service                    more of those clients that are intimidated, while still allowing them do the                    planning.●     09:04 – The reaction to the advisor company towards Wealthsimple in the financial                    planner sector has really been onboard.●     10:13 – Wealthsimple is unique in that they are a robo advisor that operates in                    multiple counties. The UK has proven to be at the forefront of regulatory                    change.●     11:14 – The scope of size of the U.S. is that the financial industry in Canada is                     smaller than that of just the state of California.●     12:22 – There is a challenge in the cost of acquisition.●     14:56 – Wealthsimple has maintained a great relationship with Power Financial,                    who have made about a dozen acquisitions in wealth, insurance, bank, and                    credit card areas.●     16:40 – The average age of a Wealthsimple customer is 31.●     17:57 – As far as accounts in the United States, about 50 cents on the dollar has                    been allocated to socially responsible investing. ●     20:02 – One dollar accounts are possible to democratize investing and remove all     &nbs