Khalid Kabeer is a fintech and financial-inclusion executive with more than two decades of leadership in microfinance and MSME lending across Pakistan, the Middle East, Europe and Africa. A Fellow Chartered Accountant who started in audit and textiles, he helped build Kashf Microfinance Bank as its first CFO, ran global operations and then led Vitas Group as CEO, steering it toward a data-centric, digital-first lending model and founding its early-stage fintech investment arm, Vitas Ventures. He is now Chief Product Officer at AdalFi, a Lahore-based credit-scoring and lending-technology company taking instant, pre-approved digital credit to scale.
Jason Mikula is the publisher of Fintech Business Weekly, an independent newsletter that reaches more than 90,000 subscribers with critical, no-favors analysis of banking, fintech, and crypto. After more than a decade scaling consumer lending businesses at Enova, LendUp, and Goldman Sachs, he became one of the most-cited independent voices on Banking-as-a-Service and fintech regulation, writing the award-winning book on BaaS and co-hosting the Fintech Business Podcast. He works from outside Amsterdam, covering the U.S. fintech-banking ecosystem from across an ocean.
Alpaca is a developer-first brokerage infrastructure company providing APIs and a self-clearing custody platform that lets fintechs, banks and trading apps embed access to US stocks, options, crypto and fixed income for customers in 40+ countries. Often called the AWS of finance, it powers more than 300 financial institutions and millions of brokerage accounts globally.
Lead Bank is a state-chartered, FDIC-insured commercial bank turned API-first Banking-as-a-Service platform. Acquired in 2022 by an investor group led by former Square Capital chief Jackie Reses, the 1928-vintage Missouri community bank now provides regulated banking infrastructure - payments, card issuing, lending, and deposit accounts - to fintechs, consumer brands, and digital-asset companies.
Jacqueline 'Jackie' Reses is the Chair and CEO of Lead Bank, a Kansas City-based chartered bank she acquired in 2022 and transformed into a banking-as-a-service powerhouse serving fintech builders. Previously, she built Square Capital from zero into a multi-billion dollar lending business at Square (now Block), served as a board member at Alibaba through its historic 2014 IPO, led 41 transactions as Yahoo's Chief Development Officer, and spent seven years at Goldman Sachs in M&A. A Wharton-trained economist from Atlantic City, she co-authored 'Self-Made Boss' and holds patents in payments, credit, and cryptocurrency. Lead Bank closed a $70M Series B in September 2025 at a $1.47B valuation backed by a16z, Ribbit Capital, Coatue, and Khosla Ventures.
Tony Cueva Bravo is a Venture Partner at Hustle Fund, angel investor, and the founder of Emerging Fintech - a weekly newsletter and podcast covering frontier fintech across Latin America, Asia, and Africa. A Peruvian-born engineer who earned his MS in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Michigan, Tony has lived and worked across three continents, driven 50% MoM growth at Rebill (the Stripe of LatAm), won dual startup competitions in Peru and Chile, and built a reputation as one of the sharpest fintech voices in emerging markets. He invests at the pre-seed stage and serves as a fractional operator for early-stage founders who need a thought partner to unlock growth bottlenecks.
Sheel Mohnot is a San Francisco-based fintech investor and co-founder of Better Tomorrow Ventures (BTV), a $300M+ seed-stage fund backing fintech companies globally. A two-time fintech founder himself - having built and exited FeeFighters (acquired by Groupon, 2012) and Innovative Auctions - Sheel brings rare operator credibility to early-stage investing. He co-founded The Pitch podcast, co-leads BTV's The Mint accelerator, and is one of fintech's most-followed voices on Twitter/X with 150K+ followers. Known for his fintech-only thesis, global portfolio (33% outside US), and a Taco Bell metaverse wedding officiated by Kal Penn.
Matt Harris is a Partner at Bain Capital Ventures and one of the most tenured fintech-focused venture investors in the world, with over 30 years dedicated exclusively to financial technology. Known for his 'Fintech: The Fourth Platform' thesis that predicted fintech would create $3.6 trillion in value, Harris backed breakout companies including OnDeck Capital (as first investor), Flywire, Justworks, and GoCardless. He serves on the Innovation Advisory Council of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and ranks #3 on Institutional Investor's Fintech Finance 40.
Unit is an embedded finance platform that lets software companies add bank accounts, cards, payments, and capital to their products via API — without becoming a bank. Founded in 2019 by Israeli entrepreneurs Itai Damti and Doron Somech, Unit reached unicorn status in 2022 at a $1.2B valuation, becoming the first BaaS provider to hit that milestone. The company processes $80B+ in annual transactions and serves 2M+ end-customers across 140+ software platforms, from workforce management apps to real estate marketplaces.