Fintech Meetup is first and foremost about exchanging ideas, and this year’s turnout and larger scale aim to make that easier than ever.
“This is where business gets done,” said Tyler Gebhart, marketing manager for the conference. “That’s really a major draw for the people coming to close deals and propel their business forward.”
This year’s Fintech Meetup runs from March 10 to 13 at the Venetian in Las Vegas. The event caters to professionals at the intersection of financial services and technology, a category that widens every single year, says Chairman Sanjib Kalita.
“So that could be someone working at a bank looking at new products, payment lending, retail banking or insurance,” said Kalita, who also helped found the Money 20/20 conference. “It could be the technology providers or a retailer that is offering some of those services.”
Based on pictures alone, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s all a mass speed dating event. But the quick one-on-one chats—complete with a giant clock counting down the minutes until the next one— are the linchpin of everything in the surrounding rooms.
“It provides an engineered serendipity where you can walk into the room and see the people who actually matter,” Gebhart said.
Upon registration, attendees are asked to fill out a profile. An algorithm matches them with 100 other people they can click on or dismiss depending on their level of interest.
Some of the biggest players in the industry are among this year’s sponsors: Visa, Mastercard, Experian, Equifax, MoneyLion, as well as lesser-known-but-powerful names like Banktech Ventures and Commerce Ventures, known for investing in new technologies in the field.
With 6,000 guests and more than 450 companies on the trade show floor, a few ventures are bound to take root.
“We’re gonna have about 60,000 meetings,” Kalita said. “It’s actually quite amazing to see.”
A Results-Driven Atmosphere
It’s not just bluster.
At a pre-conference event in New York, Kalita and his team hosted two fintech startups that sprouted from a simple idea to a company with angel funding and customers in less than a year.
“And they attributed it to Fintech Meetup,” Kalita said.
“One is in the data lending and AI space. She worked at a bank before, and she came to Fintech Meetup and basically met her first angel investor there, met the first institutional investor and met several folks that wound up being customers,” he said.
“The other startup is in the securities space. This person had meetings with several potential customers and got a lot of great feedback on what they were building.”
This actionable atmosphere, where simple chit chat ends in tangible results, makes all the arduous preparation worth it for Kalita.
“For me, that’s the fun part,” he said. “I’m an entrepreneur. I’ve worked on four startups with two exits, and I know how hard it is. Anything I can do to help, I get a lot of satisfaction from.”
New Sheriff In Town
The re-election of Donald Trump has been cause for optimism in the financial technology sector.
Shortly before his inauguration, Trump launched a new crypto token, $TRUMP. It’s worth a total of $5.28 billion as of Friday morning, though its value has fallen sharply since its release. It’s an example of a “meme coin,” tokens that derive popularity from their novelty value and have little utility as an actual form of currency.
The president has also cozied up to Tesla and SpaceX billionaire Elon Musk, who heads the newly created Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, likely named after Musk’s own meme coin.
Moreover, Trump signed an executive order titled “Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology.” It builds on a previous Biden-era directive, though it emphasizes a firm ban on central bank digital currencies (CBDC), an attempt to bring government-backed stability to the volatile market. It also protects Americans’ rights to mine, validate and keep digital assets, in contrast to Biden’s more measured approach that considered the environmental risk factors of constant digital mining, a process of verifying blockchain transactions that’s known for using a lot of electricity.
All in all, it’s a favorable environment for financial technology. The price of Bitcoin, the most well known cryptocurrency, has reached an all-time high of $105,689.60 as of Friday morning.
“Financial services are heavily regulated,” Kalita said, “and with the new administration changing regulations—and even the philosophy around regulation—there’s a lot more conversations about how to take advantage of the new new era.”
Registration for Fintech Meetup is open. Tickets start at $500 for employees in transition and $1,700 for students and early-stage startups. Those hoping to get paired for meetings should register by February 14.
