The crypto industry has spent years begging for regulatory clarity. Clear rules. Defined jurisdictions. A framework that companies can actually operate under. The kind of boring, necessary infrastructure that every serious industry needs to grow responsibly. And every time — every single time — crypto gets close to that finish Read more…
Let me tell you about one compliance manager. Let’s call him M. His story is basically everyone’s story, just with the names changed. M spent years at PayPal, then got hired by a FinTech startup in 2015 to lead the AML operations team: onboarding, transaction monitoring, due diligence. Since then Read more…
Do you believe in parallel universes? As if there is another version of you somewhere out there, living a completely different life because you made different choices? Well, here’s a theory: what if there were windows or portals or secret screens that could allow you to look into those parallel Read more…
Compliance officers often struggle between wanting to build a solid risk-free fortress and wanting to be curious, learn new things and stay ahead of what may happen.Funnily enough, these two goals are extreme opposites and require completely different skills.When you are building the fortress, you often think “If something goes Read more…
In the FinTech environment, risks and gaps are everywhere. Unfortunately, many regulatory professionals, risk experts and compliance officers believe that informing management about risks, escalating issues, documenting gaps and tracking remediation commitments is a valid strategy for protecting themselves from personal liability. It isn’t always. In some situations, documenting and Read more…
Stripe just offered to buy PayPal. Let me repeat that for the people in the back. A company founded in 2010, still private, is trying to buy the company that invented online payments.If you had told someone this in 2018, they’d have asked what you were smoking and whether you Read more…
There is a wonderful compliance case study hidden inside the FCA’s £3.5 million fine against Coinbase’s UK payments entity. Not because Coinbase broke the law. They clearly did. This story is a magnificent demonstration of what happens when very intelligent people spend enormous amounts of time and money managing a Read more…
There is a side of compliance that rarely gets taught. It is not just about identifying problems. It is about knowing what to do once you see them. Over the past year, I have been hands-on in about a dozen compliance projects, interviewed more than 50 senior compliance leaders and Read more…