The Top 25 Cryptocurrency Executives for 2022

The Financial Technology Report is pleased to announce The Top 25 Cryptocurrency Executives for 2022. These founders and executives have been at the forefront of the next technological evolution, which is challenging the status quo for how we think about storing and exchanging value. Their expertise is often deeply technical, applying new concepts and laying the foundation for what is yet to come, perhaps somewhat similar to the pioneers of the internet in the 1990s and of mobile technology in the early 2000s. They come from a variety of backgrounds, from aerospace to accounting to philosophy, but what unites them is their recognition of the profound impact decentralized finance will have on the economic future for many across the globe.

This year’s awardees include executives like CEO Brian Shroder, whose company Binance.US is on a mission to provide liquidity, transparency, and efficiency to financial markets and has created an app with which users can easily buy and sell 65+ cryptocurrencies; CEO Jon Lerner of CoinTracker, which enables users to seamlessly and accurately track their cryptocurrency portfolio in one place and calculate and optimize their capital gains taxes on cryptocurrency; and CEO Jesse Powell of Kraken, which was the first Bitcoin exchange to have trading price and volume displayed on the Bloomberg Terminal, the first to pass a cryptographically verifiable proof-of-reserves audit, and is a partner in the first cryptocurrency bank.

Amid a talented pool of nominees, these leaders set themselves apart by their ability to execute on their convictions, moving with great speed to innovate and advance the overall field with their particular contributions to the ecosystem. Within an increasingly volatile market, their companies continue to establish themselves among the leaders across cryptocurrency investing, trading, banking, infrastructure, and other areas. Please join us in recognizing The Top 25 Cryptocurrency Executives for 2022.

 

1. Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum
Title: Founder

Buterin is a Russian-Canadian programmer and one of the founders and creators of Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market-capitalization. In 2013, Buterin conceived Ethereum, an open-source blockchain that supports functions like app and program development with the power of cryptocurrencies, especially its native coin, Ether. He developed the blockchain project in response to the perceived weaknesses of Bitcoin, and with his co-founders launched it in 2015. Ethereum can be used to codify, decentralize, secure, and trade just about anything: voting, domain names, financial exchanges, crowdfunding, company governance, contracts and agreements, intellectual property, and even smart property with its hardware integration.

Buterin joined the Bitcoin community in 2011, launching and writing articles for Bitcoin Magazine before penning the white paper for Ethereum in 2013. He was awarded the Thiel Fellowship Award in 2014 to bring his innovative projects to life, and he won the World Technology Network (WTN) prize for IT software the same year. He has also been named to both the Forbes “40 Under 40” and “30 Under 30” lists, and at 27 he became the youngest crypto billionaire. Buterin has also donated over $1 billion in crypto to the India Covid Relief Fund and a range of other charities. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science from the University of Waterloo, Ontario.

 

2. Brian Armstrong, Coinbase
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Armstrong is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States. Founded in June of 2012, Coinbase is a digital currency wallet and platform where merchants and consumers can transact with new digital currencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin. The company was one of the first to adopt a fully-remote work model, with more than 4000 employees contributing from around the world. The company went public in 2021 and currently boasts a market cap of over $40 billion. Armstrong holds a roughly 19 percent stake in the company, giving him a net worth of $7.9 billion.

Armstrong is a leader and engineer with nearly 20 years of experience in the technology ecosystem. Prior to creating Coinbase, he was a Technical Product Manager and Software Engineer for Airbnb. He also founded UniversityTutor.com, serving as CEO from 2003 to 2012. He began his career as an IBM Intern Team Lead before cutting his teeth as an Enterprise Risk Management Consultant with Deloitte & Touche. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science and Economics and a Master’s Degree in Computer Science from Rice University.

 

3. Brian Shroder, Binance.US
Title: President and Chief Executive Officer

Shroder is the CEO at Binance.US, where he is focused on building the most successful cryptocurrency and digital asset exchange in the United States. Binance.US provides a regulated marketplace, built on cutting-edge technology, for everyday access to digital assets. It has a dedicated app for both iOS and Android with which users can buy and sell 65+ cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, with some of the lowest fees in the industry. Binance.US's mission is to provide liquidity, transparency, and efficiency to financial markets by creating products that leverage crypto to unlock the power of everything.

Shroder's experience and expertise spans several industries and multiple business functions including strategy, corporate development, business development, fundraising, regulatory and government relations, and general business operations. Prior to Binance.US, he worked as an angel investor and start-up advisor, and before that he was an executive at several companies, including Ant Group, where he was the Head of Business Development for Global Partnerships, and Uber, where he was the Head of Strategy and Business Development for the Asia Pacific region. He also worked as a Principal at Boston Consulting Group. Shroder received his MBA from Harvard Business School and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Accountancy and Organizational Leadership from Miami University.

 

4. Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Bankman-Fried is the owner and Chief Executive Officer of crypto exchange FTX. Wanting to more fully incorporate all elements of a crypto transaction with a “by traders, for traders” philosophy, Bankman-Fried created FTX with the honing of the buyer-seller-exchange pipeline as a priority. He has since made FTX into a major presence in the DeFi market; the community considers FTX to be a first-mover, as it was one of the rare centralized exchanges to consider DeFi products when the market segment first debuted. FTX has continued to pursue decentralized finance endeavors by designing the Solana smart contract ecosystem and acquiring Blockfolio.

In addition to running FTX, Bankman-Fried is also the current CEO of cryptocurrency liquidity provider Alameda Research. At the outset of his career, he joined Jane Street Capital’s ETF team as a trader. From 2014 to 2017, Bankman-Fried traded equities, currencies, futures, ETFs, and designed special trading software for the firm. Ultimately, he cut his TradFi career short in order to launch Alameda Research. Two years later, he jumped into an active crypto role with the creation of FTX. Bankman-Fried graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a degree in Physics.

 

5. Zac Prince, BlockFi
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

With more than a decade of experience in finance, Prince is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of BlockFi, the all-in-one financial services and wealth management platform built for crypto investors. Founded in 2017 by Prince and Flori Marquez, BlockFi was created to provide credit services to markets with limited access to simple financial products. The company sets itself apart from other crypto service providers by pairing competitive rates with institutional-quality benefits. The BlockFi team consists of nearly 800 professionals with deep expertise across financial services and technology, operating from offices in New York, New Jersey, Singapore, Poland, and Argentina.

Prior to starting BlockFi, Prince led business development teams at Orchard Platform, a broker-dealer and RIA in the online lending sector, and Zibby, an online consumer lender. His experience also includes leadership roles at multiple successful tech companies, initially in adtech, where he was a part of two successful acquisitions, Admeld (acquired by Google) and Sociomantic (acquired by dunnhumby). He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies in International Business and Spanish from Texas State University and attended the University of Oklahoma Price School of Business.

 

6. Yoni Assia, eToro
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Assia is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of eToro, the world’s leading social trading platform. Headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, eToro was founded in 2007 with a mission to open the world's markets to everyone around the world, and now boasts a global community of over 20 million users who exchange investment strategies and connect with its unique social feed. With a workforce of over 2,200 professionals and offices in the United Kingdom, United States, and Cyprus, eToro currently has a valuation of $8.8 billion.

Assia showed interest in both finance and computer science at a very young age, and with eToro, he has merged the two. Prior to founding eToro, he began his career as a programmer and development manager. Assia has served on the board of Meitav Dash, one of the largest investment houses in Israel, since 2013. He is a member of the Young Presidents' Organization, was included by Financial News in its Fintech 40 ranking, and has been recognized as a top fintech influencer. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Management from The Open University in England and a Master of Science in Computer Science from Reichman University (IDC Herzliya) in Israel.

 

7. Jeremy Allaire, Circle
Title: Co-Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer

Allaire is the Co-Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of Circle, a global financial technology firm that enables businesses of all sizes to harness the power of stablecoins and public blockchains for payments and commerce. Founded in 2013, Circle is the pioneer of USD Coin (USDC), the fastest-growing, fully-reserved, and regulated dollar digital currency. USDC has grown exponentially to reach more than 41 billion in circulation, and Circle boasts a post-money valuation of $200 million. The company employs more than 240 professionals between its headquarters in Boston, Massachusetts and its New York City office.

Before launching Circle, Allaire was the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Brightcove, a cloud-based online video platform provider, which he led until 2016. Previously, he was an Entrepreneur-In-Residence with General Catalyst Partners and CTO of Macromedia. He was also Co-Founder and CTO of the Allaire Corporation, which was acquired by Macromedia in 2001. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Philosophy, with a concentration in Economics, from Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

 

8. Michael Saylor, Microstrategy
Title: Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer

Saylor is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of MicroStrategy (MSTR), a publicly traded business intelligence firm that he founded in 1989. He has grown Microstrategy to become a highly rated, globally trusted embedded analytics platform capable of providing rapid in-context insights and analysis—in any application and on any device. Through his company, Saylor effectively pioneered a new approach to business intelligence now known as relational online analytical processing (ROLAP).

Saylor founded MicroStrategy at the age of 24, and his time with the company has seen him receive a number of awards for his entrepreneurship. In addition to later founding home automation and security company Alarm.com, as well as voice response service provider Angel.com, Saylor is a named inventor on over 40 patents and wrote a book titled The Mobile Wave: How Mobile Intelligence Will Change Everything. He also founded and serves as a trustee for the Saylor Academy, a nonprofit organization that has provided free education to over one million students. Additionally, he is an advocate for the Bitcoin Standard via hope.com. He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a dual Bachelor’s Degree in Aeronautics & Astronautics and History of Science.

 

9. Mike Novogratz, Galaxy Digital
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Novogratz is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Galaxy Digital, a technology-driven financial services and investment management firm that provides institutions and direct clients with a full suite of financial solutions spanning the digital assets ecosystem. His expert opinion often makes financial headlines, and his advice on cryptocurrency has helped to drive its adoption. Notably, Novogratz was an early investor in Bitcoin, COMPASS Pathways, and SpaceX. Under his guidance, Galaxy Digital now has a hand in all manner of crypto pursuits, from straightforward coin ownership to establishing digital mining companies.

Novogratz was formerly a partner and president of Fortress Investment Group. Prior to Fortress, he spent 11 years at Goldman Sachs, where he was named Partner in 1998. Novogratz served on the New York Federal Reserve’s Investment Advisory Committee on Financial Markets from 2012 to 2015. He also serves as the Chairman of The Bail Project as well as Hudson River Park Friends, and sits on the boards of NYU Langone Medical Center, the Princeton Varsity Club, Jazz Foundation of America, and Artists for Peace and Justice. In addition to serving as a helicopter pilot in the U.S. Army, Novogratz received a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Princeton University.

 

10. JP Thieriot, Uphold
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Thieriot is the Chief Executive Officer of digital wallet and trading platform Uphold, having previously served as the company’s Vice-Chairman for five years. He is also the Co-Founder of the Universal Protocol Alliance, where he spearheads strategy and operations with the goal of onboarding 100 million people to cryptocurrency. Since Uphold’s inception, the innovative platform has facilitated several billions of dollars in transactions, serving more than 184 countries across 23 fiat currencies, 12 cryptocurrencies and tokens, and four commodities.

No stranger to multitasking, Thieriot also co-founded and is the current director of Estancia Beef. His prior experiences include co-founding Catalan Advisors, a fund specializing in sustainable cattle production, organic agriculture, and land investment, and working for Hambrecht & Quist directly out of college for seven years. There, he was responsible for the formation and management of the firm’s activities in Latin America. Thieriot received his Bachelor of Arts in History from Yale University.

 

11. Jesse Powell, Kraken
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Powell is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Kraken, one of the largest and most trusted cryptocurrency exchanges in the world. Founded in 2011, Kraken is consistently rated as the most secure crypto exchange and continually leads in European market share. Kraken’s history is marked by a series of historic firsts: it was the first Bitcoin exchange to have trading price and volume displayed on the Bloomberg Terminal, the first to pass a cryptographically verifiable proof-of-reserves audit, and is a partner in the first cryptocurrency bank. Powell brings 15 years of experience as a veteran of the virtual currency and gaming industries.

Prior to co-founding Kraken, Powell was Founder and CEO of Lewt, a company that delivered services for assisting players in online-based video games with account management and in-game currency. He was also the Founder and CEO of Internet Ventures & Holdings, which provided services to the online gaming community. In 2007, Powell started the Verge Gallery & Studio Project in Sacramento. He became a board member for the Verge Center for the Arts in Sacramento in 2010, a position he holds to this day. Powell earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Philosophy from California State University, Sacramento.

 

12. Sergey Nazarov, Chainlink
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

In the world of blockchain, Nazarov has been ubiquitous for more than a decade. In 2020, he co-founded Chainlink Labs, a leading provider of secure and reliable open-source blockchain Oracle solutions. Chainlink is built to facilitate the transfer of tamper-proof data from off-chain sources to on-chain smart contracts, connecting them to asset prices, web APIs, IoT devices, payment systems, and more. Nazarov joined the crypto world in 2011, and in 2014, he co-founded SmartContract.com, which ultimately merged with Chainlink. He has served as CEO of both organizations, and he currently leads the development and growth of Chainlink.

Nazarov is an experienced leader and serial entrepreneur with expertise in a wide range of internet technology. Before starting Chainlink and SmartContracts, Nazarov also co-founded Secure Asset Exchange and CryptaMail, serving as CEO for both. Previously, he was a General Partner at QED Capital, Co-Founder and CEO of ExistLocal Inc., and an Associate with FirstMark Capital. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy and Management from New York University.

 

13. Konstantin Richter, Blockdaemon
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Richter is a serial entrepreneur, investor, and advisor. He started his career at Deutsche Telekom with a focus on network strategy and innovative commercial models across cell-networks. His curiosity about new digital monetization and payment processes led him to a stint at Nokia before he became an entrepreneur successfully building out SaaS/marketplace platforms (Audiotube, Lookbooks, Wiredrive), with his last successful exit in 2017. He has been active in the blockchain ecosystem as an advisor and contributor since 2015, with entities like Gem, Po.et, and MadHive, before creating Blockdaemon towards the end of 2017 with the goal of bringing institutional-grade infrastructure to the blockchain protocols, crypto native, and traditional financial institutions. Blockdaemon is committed to democratizing node-operations by providing simple tooling to connect to blockchains and to participate in consensus.

Richter is also the Managing Director at Santiago Advisory and sits on the advisory board for several companies. Prior to Blockdaemon, Richter was the Director of Global Media Partnerships at Nokia, a Senior Manager/Director at Deutsche Telekom AG, and a Strategic Change Consultant at PwC.

 

14. Ben Weiss, CoinFlip
Title: Chief Executive Officer

As more investors take the plunge into Bitcoin and other cryptos, CoinFlip has innovated and expanded access to buying, selling, and cashing out with its 2,700 ATMs across the United States. As CoinFlip's Co-Founder and CEO, Weiss guides the company's long-term business strategy, provides financial oversight, and maintains strong relationships with banks and regulatory bodies. Weiss co-founded CoinFlip with Daniel Polotsky in 2015 with the goal of empowering new adopters and longtime investors alike with open access to cryptocurrency. Headquartered in Chicago, the bootstrapped company employs more than 140 professionals and was named the 2021 No. 1 fastest-growing company in Chicago by Crain's Chicago Business.

As the company’s CEO, Weiss has seen CoinFlip’s revenue increase to more than $50 million in 2020 while also leading an inclusive and supportive company culture. He has received personal accolades for his rapid success, including being named to the 2021 Crain's 40 Under 40 list alongside Polotsky. Prior to serving as CoinFlip’s CEO, he was the company’s COO from 2016 to 2021. Weiss launched the company while he was still attending college, and he holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Vanderbilt University.

 

15. Stephen Ehrlich, Voyager
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Ehrlich is the Chief Executive Officer of Voyager, a leading crypto-asset broker offering retail and institutional investors a turnkey solution for crypto-asset trading. Voyager provides investors with execution, data, wallet, and custody services through its institutional-grade open architecture platform. Ehrlich has developed a reputation as an authoritative voice in the world of brokering over his nearly three decades of experience, and his guidance on market and organizational structure has consistently impressed his peers. Some of his areas of expertise include the creation of organizational structure, managing multiple corporate divisions simultaneously, and the monetization of all aspects of a business and client services.

In a career that dates back to the late 1980s, Ehrlich has succeeded in numerous leadership roles with various financial as well as nonprofit organizations. Before Voyager, he was CEO of Tradier, PennTrade Financial, Lightspeed Financial, and E*TRADE Financial Professional Trading. He was also an advisor at Rock The Post. Ehrlich is the former President of CT Barons Youth Hockey, Hockey in Norwalk, and Greenwich Blues Youth Hockey. He graduated from Franklin & Marshall College with a Bachelor of Arts in Accounting.

 

16. Anatoly Yakovenko, Solana
Title: Co-Founder

Yakovenko is the Co-Founder of Solana. Launching Solana only four days after the March 2020 stock market crash, Yakovenko is now leading what is called the fastest blockchain in the world. Solana is a critical component of a quickly evolving crypto ecosystem on the verge of transforming global financial systems. Hosted on FTX and surging in popularity, the recently launched Solana NFT Marketplace allows users to trade, mint, auction, and authenticate Solana-based NFTs.

Yakovenko holds two patents for high-performance operating systems protocols and was a core kernel developer for BREW, which powered over 100 million CDMA flip phones. Prior to Solana, he was a software engineer for both Dropbox and Mesosphere. Before that, as a senior engineer and eventually a senior staff engineer manager at Qualcomm, he led the development of technology that made Project Tango (VR/AR) possible on Qualcomm phones. He was also a founding member of Alescere, a VOIP startup. Yakovenko earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

 

17. Raghu Yarlagadda, FalconX
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Yarlagadda is the Co-Founder and CEO of FalconX, one of the fastest growing companies in the world. With consolidated, seamless workflows that make it easy to access cryptocurrency trading, credit, and clearing, FalconX gives the world’s largest institutions an edge as they navigate digital assets. In the last year, the company has doubled its customers, increased monthly trading volume by more than 12X, and increased net revenue by 46X. In less than 4 years, FalconX announced a $210 million Series C financing round, valuing the company at $3.75 billion.

Yarlagadda is an engineer by background and he is passionate about building products that create value. Prior to FalconX, he held product leadership roles in Google. He was on Sundar Pichai’s Chrome OS team and led efforts to scale Chromebooks to over $3 billion revenue for Google and its partners. Yarlagadda started his career at Motorola as an engineer in a team that pioneered high definition video transmission over IP stack, laying the technical foundation for many popular video streaming services such as Netflix and YouTube.

Yarlagadda holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, an MS from the University of Texas at Dallas specializing in Signal Processing & Machine Learning, and a Bachelor of Technology from Vellore Institute of Technology.

 

18. Chris McAlary, Coin Cloud
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

McAlary is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Coin Cloud, the world’s only
international network of two-way Digital Currency Machines (DCMs), which give
customers the ability to buy and sell over 40 cryptocurrencies with cash at every
location. McAlary recognized early on that cash consumers needed an easy way to
enter and exit the digital currency economy, and also wanted choices, so he developed a
hardware and software solution that now serves those customers in more than 4,500
locations across the U.S. and Brazil.

McAlary discovered Bitcoin after college and became inspired by how much cryptocurrency could empower people and improve their lives. But it was difficult to buy, and Bitcoin mining had challenges of its own. With a mission of providing digital currency for all, McAlary started investigating self-serve kiosks in 2013. A Bitcoin ATM prototype launched in Canada, but undefined regulations in the U.S. created roadblocks, so he helped develop industry compliance. In 2014, he installed the first Bitcoin ATM on the Las Vegas Strip, then continued to place machines while upgrading the technology and options to create a new class of DCMs. McAlary holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Pomona College in Claremont, CA.

 

19. Frederik Gregaard, Cardano
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Gregaard is the Chief Executive Officer of the Cardano Foundation, the organization that oversees the development and promotes the adoption of the Cardano Protocol technology. Cardano is a public, open-source, and decentralized blockchain platform, with consensus achieved using proof of stake. It was founded in 2015 by Charles Hoskinson, one of Ethereum’s creators. The Cardano Foundation is located in Zug, Switzerland, where it sets the direction for decentralized economic empowerment, working with regulators in different areas to shape blockchain legislation and commercial standards. Gregaard has served as the foundation’s CEO since 2020, driving adoption strategy, through to integration and execution of its missions, to enable fast-track value creation for inclusive and equitable growth using Cardano.

Gregaard brings his vast experience in the professional services and financial industries to the foundation, where he builds partnerships with institutions and enterprises. Before joining Cardano, he served as Director and Head of Digital Financial Services in PwC's financial services advisory practice and as an Industry Expert and Consultant with GLG (Gerson Lehrman Group). Previously, he served as the Director and Head of Institutional Business at Saxo Bank Switzerland. He serves as a Mentor with F10 Incubator & Accelerator, and previously as a Business Mentor with Fintech Fusion. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Business, Finance, and Administration and a Master of Science in Management of Innovation and Business Development from Copenhagen Business School.

 

20. Stani Kulechov, Aave
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Kulechov is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Aave, a decentralized, open-source, non-custodial liquidity protocol on Ethereum. It allows depositors to earn interest on deposits by providing liquidity to liquidity pools and allows borrowers to obtain liquidity by tapping into these pools with variable and stable interest rate options. Founded by Kulechov in 2017, Aave is a decentralized finance (DeFi) money market built on the Ethereum blockchain that allows users to lend, borrow, and earn interest on crypto assets. Aave Protocol is unique in that it tokenizes deposits as Tokens, which accrue interest in real-time, and it boasts a market cap of nearly $3 billion. Kulechov leads Aave’s overall strategy and focuses on developing Web 3.0.

Kulechov discovered his interest in fintech and blockchain-related technologies while in college, especially Ethereum and smart contracts, and became determined to make financial products more efficient. In 2017, he launched ETHLend, a peer-to-peer digital asset lending and borrowing platform, as well as one of the first decentralized platforms. ETHLend was renamed Aave in 2018, and its protocol was launched on Ethereum in 2020. Before founding Aave, Kulechov also developed fintech applications. He holds a Master’s Degree in Law from the University of Helsinki.

 

21. Dave Perrill, Compute North
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Perrill is a 25-year veteran of the IT, data center, and information security industry, currently serving as the Chief Executive Officer for Compute North. Co-founded by Perrill in 2017, Compute North delivers high-performance cryptocurrency mining and infrastructure solutions to customers around the globe. With more than 60 employees working both remotely and from its headquarters in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, Compute North’s world-class management team has deep experience in technology, finance, and energy, all of which have fueled the company’s impressive growth.

Perrill has been immersed in the cryptocurrency mining industry and blockchain technology since its formative days. He founded and subsequently sold two technology companies, including SecureConnect, an internet service provider/managed security provider, which was acquired by Trustwave Holdings in 2012. He also served as CEO of Wand Corporation, a leading point-of-sale and digital menu board provider to the Quick Service Restaurant industry. Outside of work, he has been a member of YPO (Young Presidents’ Organization) since 2015 as part of the Twin Cities, Minnesota chapter. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Management Information Systems and an MBA in Finance from the University of Minnesota.

 

22. Ian McAfee, Shift Markets
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

McAfee co-founded and serves as Chief Executive Officer for Shift Markets, which provides cryptocurrency exchanges and brokerage technology in addition to liquidity, risk management, compliance, and marketing services. Shift is committed to building the crypto ecosystem and promoting equality in foreign trade by improving global access to cryptocurrency as well as providing technology services and turnkey solutions. In his leadership role, McAfee empowers clients to increase market penetration, build global business development strategy, and increase conversions at each stage of the marketing-sales cycle. He has more than ten years of experience across FX and cryptocurrency markets, working to draw traditional and cryptocurrency markets closer together and shape the future of finance.

Before founding Shift Markets, McAfee was with FXCM, where he led numerous large-scale business development initiatives and optimized marketing campaigns while also handling major projects in sales, trading, and market research. He graduated from the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science.

 

23. Asaf Meir, Solidus Labs
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Currently serving as its Chief Executive Officer, Meir founded fintech startup Solidus Labs in late 2017. He assembled a team of former Goldman Sachs engineers and cybersecurity professionals to bridge the regulatory, risk, and compliance gap between crypto/digital assets and the traditional financial world. Solidus Labs offers the first crypto-native, comprehensive, automated, and testable market surveillance and risk monitoring hub tailored for digital assets.

Having gained an impressive amount of expertise in computer science as well as business technology over his career, Meir is now a leading expert and sought-after speaker and advisor on digital asset compliance. Prior to founding Solidus, he was an associate and analyst for Goldman Sachs. Before this, Meir filled several roles at Brandeis University, including as an assistant professor for courses in computer science and economics. He preceded this with programming and product management positions at Microsoft and Metacafe, respectively. Meir received a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Economics from Brandeis University.

 

24. Jon Lerner, CoinTracker
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Jon Lerner is the Co-Founder and CEO of CoinTracker, the market leader in portfolio tracking and tax compliance for cryptocurrency. With over 3% of the cryptocurrency market globally tracked, CoinTracker helps enable users to track their cryptocurrency portfolio in one place, and calculate and optimize their capital gains taxes on cryptocurrency - seamlessly and accurately. CoinTracker’s mission is to increase the world’s financial freedom and prosperity.

In 2021, CoinTracker was recognized by the Breakout List as one of the top high-growth breakout technology companies of the year. Prior to CoinTracker, Lerner was the Co-Founder and CTO at TextNow, the largest provider of free phone service in the U.S. In 2012, Lerner was recognized by Ernst & Young as an Entrepreneur of the Year in the “Young Entrepreneur” in Ontario, Canada. Lerner was also a Software Engineer at Google for several years, where in 2008 he helped build and launch the initial Android platform that now powers 2.5 billion mobile devices around the world. Lerner received his BASc degree with honors in Computer Engineering from the University of Waterloo.

 

25. Kain Warwick, Synthetix
Title: Founder

Warwick is the Founder of Synthetix, a synthetic asset issuance platform built on Ethereum that specializes in minting and creating synthetic tokens. Not only is he running one of the biggest ecosystems in decentralized finance (DeFi) with Synthetix, but Warwick has also made waves as Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of retail payment network blueshyft, which is now the largest cryptocurrency payment gateway in Australia, processing tens of millions of dollars in transaction volume.

Before founding Synthetix, Warwick worked as a project manager for White Labelled in Australia, a pro audio manager at Guitar Center, and IT manager of Whatcard.com. He currently serves in an advisory capacity for Blockchain Australia as well as The Burger Collective. He also authored a novel, “Bending Metal,” about the potentially hazardous future of AI and is a USPTA P1 Certified Tennis Professional. Warwick studied genetics at The University of New South Wales before leaving to move to Seattle and join a startup.