Fintech Blueprint 🤖🏦🧭

Fintech Blueprint 🤖🏦🧭

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Analysis: Coinbase unlocks HTTP 402 to beat Stripe at AI & Crypto Payments
The long-dormant HTTP 402 status becomes a crypto-native payment gateway.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
AI: Investment Banking AI Analysts come to Wall Street, Rogo raises $50MM
Rogo announces their latest Series B fundraising round
 • 
Luke Spill
1
Analysis: The end of Apple's 30% monopoly tax and $30B of revenue
A federal ruling forces Apple to allow external payments and threatens $30B in App Store revenue.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Most Popular
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Long Take: Carta's misstep and exit from secondary markets point to a bigger problem
 • Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Will BlackRock, Fidelity, Bitwise or GBTC win the Bitcoin ETF launch?
 • Lex Sokolin
Long Take: The $2B of tokenized Real World Assets (RWAs) trading onchain in 2023
 • Lex Sokolin
1
Long Take: JPMorgan's bank branch expansion mirrors Apple's retail magic
 • Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Deciphering Solana's remarkable 700% rise, and why Ethereum lags behind
 • Lex Sokolin
6
Long Take: How can Farcaster avoid the death trap of decentralized social media?

Recent posts

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DeFi: The rise of DeFi banks, and Ether.fi's strategy beyond $5B of assets
What's the difference between a neobank and a DeFi bank?
 • 
Laurence Smith
2
1:01:30
Podcast: 400 Startups Building the Post-Web Economy, with Outlier Ventures Founder Jamie Burke
Hi Fintech Architects,
 • 
Matt Low
Analysis: Mastercard, Visa & Stripe huge push into stablecoin and AI commerce
Mastercarding the Internet Economy
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Fintech: Can Revolut beat Robinhood in the US and Nubank in LATAM?
The trade-off between product expansion and overseas growth
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
Analysis: What Circle Payment Network can learn from Facebook, Plaid, & Wise
Circle wants to be SWIFT and Visa combined — but so did everyone else.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
1
42:44
Podcast: The $500MM Startup Making Payroll Painless, with Gusto Co-Founder Joshua Reeves
Hi Fintech Architects,
 • 
Matt Low
Analysis: Our eToro IPO Primer, a global neobroker with $300MM in profit
With $300M in EBITDA, eToro’s IPO may rival Webull, Robinhood, and Coinbase.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
AI: How Stripe, Block, and PayPal are using Model Context Protocol
Model Context Protocol is an Anthropic open framework enabling seamless interactions between AI models and other products.
 • 
Luke Spill
 and 
Lex Sokolin
Analysis: The $10T cost of ChatGPT's economic advice, and AI governance
AI can rationalize flawed decisions with scientific-sounding nonsense.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
DeFi: MicroStrategy's $35 Billion Bitcoin Bet
A Bitcoin in plain sight
 • 
Laurence Smith
38:59
Podcast: Reinventing Traditional Services through Modern Platforms, with David Snider CEO of Harness Wealth
Hi Fintech Architects,
 • 
Matt Low
Analysis: Our Circle IPO Primer, $1.6B revenue reaching for $10B valuation
Interest rates all the way down
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Fintech Blueprint 🤖🏦🧭
Fintech Blueprint 🤖🏦🧭
Become a world-class financial services investor and operator, leveraging our deep research on Fintech, DeFi, and AI to improve your strategy and achieve success.
Podcasts
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Podcast: 400 Startups Building the Post-Web Economy, with Outlier Ventures Founder Jamie Burke

Company Financials

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Fintech: Can Revolut beat Robinhood in the US and Nubank in LATAM?
The trade-off between product expansion and overseas growth
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
Analysis: Our eToro IPO Primer, a global neobroker with $300MM in profit
With $300M in EBITDA, eToro’s IPO may rival Webull, Robinhood, and Coinbase.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Analysis: Our Circle IPO Primer, $1.6B revenue reaching for $10B valuation
Interest rates all the way down
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Fintech: Klarna IPO Primer; will it reach $30B?
Benchmarking the category-defining Swedish BNPL against Affirm
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
1
AI: Is CoreWeave’s $35B IPO an AI Hyperscaler or a GPU Debt Trap?
CoreWeave is set to be the most anticipated tech IPO of the last few years as investors prepare for the first pure play AI IPO opportunity available to…
 • 
Luke Spill
1
Analysis: Will Revolut’s Gamble on Investment and Stablecoins Pay Off?
Revolut’s new investment app targets eToro and Robinhood with €8.5B AUM.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Analysis: Monetization of financial data at $4B Envestnet, $170B Intuit, and $7B SoFi
Why Envestnet's Data Potential Falls Short Amid $3.5B Sale
 • 
Lex Sokolin
1
Financial Analysis: Understanding Revolut's $2.2B revenue & $540MM+ profits
Higher interest rates have significantly boosted the profitability of leading neobanks.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Financial Analysis: Dissecting Monzo’s new $5B valuation and 9MM UK customers
Breaking down the path to growth in the UK and overseas
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
2
Financial Analysis: Will $5B Trade Republic, Germany’s Robinhood, win the race for European wealth?
Navigating dooming PFOF regulations and a potential cut in interest rates
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
Financial Analysis: Can Affirm beat Klarna in the BNPL market?
A Hail Mary with the Affirm Card and SMB financing
 • 
Michiel Milanovic
Long Take: How Wise disrupted $150T of Cross-Border Payments and earns $1B in revenue
The paradox of building value and reducing your margins
 • 
Michiel Milanovic

How To Build a Company

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Building Company Playbook #8: Dangers of the Growth Hacking Dark Arts
From Fake Growth to Ghost Networks in Web3
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Building Company Playbook #7: Planning and executing your exit strategy
This entry will focus on exit strategy, from M&A to IPO, and the required factors for success
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Building Company Playbook #6: Using token design for financial and product success
This entry will focus on cryptoeconomics and token engineering, and the key considerations when designing token-based projects and systems.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
1
Building Company Playbook #5: Creating your Fintech financial model and raising venture capital
This entry will focus on the issues around generating financial projections, raising capital, and making it through market cycles.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Building Company Playbook #4: Building Fintech & DeFi software products
A continuation of our series on building Fintech & DeFi companies
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Building Company Playbook #3: Creating a B2B fintech go-to-market strategy
And the differences with the B2C path
Building Company Playbook #2: Creating a B2C fintech marketing strategy
And the differences to the B2B path
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Building Company Playbook #1: How to design your Fintech business model
This is the first part of a series on building companies from the Fintech Blueprint
 • 
Lex Sokolin

Investment Thesis

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Long Take: From Centralized AI to Personal Bots in the agentic economy
The Financialization of AI Companions
 • 
Lex Sokolin
2
Long Take: How the Machine Economy combining AI, blockchain, and Fintech is growing
Examples of deeply innovative projects pushing at the frontier
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Dissecting the 2023 Macroeconomy, from personal savings to global politics
Revisiting our macroeconomic framework for the year to date
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Launching Generative Ventures, an engaged venture capital fund focused on the machine economy of Fintech, Web3, and AI
An optimistic investment thesis for our industry
 • 
Lex Sokolin
54:24
Podcast Conversation: Lex Sokolin's 2022 investing and building thesis -- the evolutionary relationship between Tech, Finance, and Web3
Hi Fintech Architects,
 • 
Matt Low
Why ConsenSys Codefi is the bridge to blockchain-based manufacturing for commerce and finance; plus 12 short takes on top developments
Hi Fintech futurists --
 • 
Lex Sokolin

Cornerstone Philosophy

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Long Take: Emergence of Generative Artificial Intelligence sector, and powering DAOs with shallow labor
Gm Fintech Architects —
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Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Deriving Polygon Supernets and Avalanche Subnets value accrual through the Laws of Nature
Gm Fintech Architects —
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Long Take: The Roaring Twenties of Populism, Institutionalism, and Technology's Meaning
Gm Fintech Futurists — a bit of philosophy for you at the close of the year.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Long Take: Getting ahead in Facebook's Metaverse by earning the Harvard of NFTs
Hi Fintech futurists --
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Food for Thought: A meditation on capitalism, the grey goo, and the Borganisms
The cycle of capitalism.
 • 
Lex Sokolin
Long Take: The absurdity of how the Internet is both beautiful and awful, and the memetic infection of Finance
Hi Fintech futurists --
 • 
Lex Sokolin
2
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