Forbes - USA (2020-03)

THE FORBES FINTECH 50

Money Moves 2020

BUY CREDIT BLUE-CHIPS

Credit tracker Fair Isaac is an excellent way to play the

digitization of credit. The company’s credit-scoring

technology currently underlies a vast majority of all

credit-card issuance decisions. It’s also beginning to

use artificial intelligence with psychometric and finan-

cial data to create ultra-reliable profiles of consumer

behavior. Relatedly, duopoly Mastercard is a great play

on the growth of e-commerce. Within a decade, Mas-

tercard projects, machines will begin transacting digi-

tal payments as, for example, gas pumps hook up with

computers in cars. Everything will share a connection

with encrypted personal financial information stored

in the cloud, and Mastercard is a natural gatekeeper.

Both Fair Isaac and Mastercard are brisk growers with

high P/Es, but they’re worth it, considering their 1 0 -year

annual returns of about 30 % each. —Jon D. Markman

MARCH 20 20

A $150,000 capital infusion from Y Combinator,

source of seed funding to Airbnb and many oth-

er illustrious startups, answered that question

in 2012. Fred Ehrsam, a Goldman Sachs alum,

joined the venture and gave Coinbase credibility

with the banks that would be wiring money to it.

Venture capitalists, led by Andreessen Horow-

itz, have showered half a billion dollars on Coin-

base. “It’s like if Google made Gmail for bitcoin,”

says Chris Dixon, an Andreessen partner who

serves on the Coinbase board. “And that’s literal-

ly the way they described it.”

Its last round of funding valued Coinbase at

$8.1 billion. Ehrsam, 31, has since left Coinbase

but retains a stake; he keeps busy arranging ven-

ture capital for startups that aim to use crypto-

currencies and blockchains to build transaction

networks for corporations.

T   

he essence of what Armstrong

has in mind can be captured in

the word defi, which stands for

decentralized finance or, if you

prefer, defiance of authority. Defi

is supposed to reach into all aspects of wealth;

someday, supposedly, blockchains will support

trading, peer-to-peer lending and loan collater-

alization without the usual financial institutions

as intermediaries. Intriguingly, Coinbase has a

broker/dealer license. Could it someday end-run

stock exchanges? Maybe.

If the grand vision for Coinbase is to be a gate-

way to decentralized finance of all sorts, the rev-

enue for now is coming from more mundane

things like trading commissions. Coinbase allows

amateurs to go in and out of crypto, or swap one

crypto for another, for fees and spreads that come

to 2% or so. At archrival Binance, these small-

FORBES.COM

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CARTA

SAN FRANCISCO

WALL STREET & ENTERPRISE

Tracks capital tables (shares,

ownership, value, dilution and

options) for private companies,

their investors and employees.

FUNDING: $448 million; latest

valuation of $1.7 billion

BONA FIDES: Now managing cap

tables for 13,000 companies (in-

cluding most valuable fintech,

Stripe) worth a collective $575

billion, with 800,000 investors

COFOUNDER & CEO:

Henry Ward, 44

CHAINALYSIS

NEW YORK CITY

BLOCKCHAIN & BITCOIN

Builds tools to help enforcers

track down criminals, and fi-

nancial institutions comply with

regulations, in crypto space.

FUNDING: $45 million; latest

valuation of $266 million^1

BONA FIDES: 250 customers,

including the U.S. government,

Barclays and Bittrex

COFOUNDER & CEO:

Michael Gronager, 49

CHIME

SAN FRANCISCO

PERSONAL FINANCE

Digital-only bank offers no-fee

checking accounts with free

overdraft protection of up to

$100, access to paychecks up

to two days early and option to

round up debit purchases and

move extra pennies into savings.

FUNDING: $805 million; latest

valuation of $5.8 billion

BONA FIDES: Exceeded 7 million

accounts in January

COFOUNDERS: CEO Chris Britt,

47; CTO Ryan King, 43

COINBASE

SAN FRANCISCO

BLOCKCHAIN & BITCOIN

After making its mark as a

safe, regulatory-compliant

crypto exchange, Coinbase

has branched out to offer a

variety of additional services.

(See story, p. 60.)

FUNDING: $525 million; latest

valuation of $8.1 billion

BONA FIDES: Coinbase Custody

holds $8 billion in assets for 200

institutional clients

COFOUNDERS: Brian Armstrong,

37; Fred Ehrsam, 31

CREDIT KARMA

SAN FRANCISCO

PERSONAL FINANCE

The original free credit-mon-

itoring and credit-score ser-

vice has expanded its offerings

to include free online tax fil-

ing and high-yield savings ac-

counts. Earns fat referral fees

when users bite on its recom-

mendations for credit cards,

loans or auto insurance.

FUNDING: $869 million; latest

valuation of $4 billion

BONA FIDES: More than 100

million users in the U.S., Canada

and the U.K.

COFOUNDERS: CEO Ken Lin, 44;

CRO Nichole Mustard, 47; CTO

Ryan Graciano, 38

DAVE

Ì

LOS ANGELES

PERSONAL FINANCE

This $1-a-month mobile app

offers users checking accounts

with no minimums or over-

draft fees, cash advances of

up to $100, automated budget-

ing and the ability to build

up their credit score through

reporting of rent and utility

payments to credit bureaus.

FUNDING: $76 million; latest

valuation of $1.2 billion

BONA FIDES: 2019 revenue of

$90 million; 5 million–plus users

COFOUNDERS: CEO Jason Wilk,

34; CTO Paras Chitrakar, 41;

chief design officer John

Wolanin, 37

CHRIS BRITT

ÌNEW^ TO^ LIST

(^1) According to PitchBook