PEP Episode 022 — Insights from the Helm of Fintech with Leaders in Payments with Greg Myers

Podcast Description:

Unlock the secrets of fintech leadership with Greg Myers, whose career leap from JP Morgan Chase and First Data to the podcasting universe has placed him at the forefront of industry insights. As the brains behind the Leaders in Payments podcast, Greg recounts the evolution of his platform, where the narratives of CEOs are not just tales of success but are interwoven with personal anecdotes that humanize the titans of fintech.

Our episode gets even richer with Bryce Van De Moere, a sage of legal frameworks in the payments sector, elucidating the hurdles merchants face with the MATCH list and the ongoing efforts to ensure their protection. Navigate the treacherous waters of chargebacks and friendly fraud with us, as we empathize with merchants trapped by the very system designed to protect consumers. Learn how businesses can armor themselves against fraudulent chargebacks and the complex dynamics governing their relationship with payment processors like MasterCard and Visa. Moreover, we’ll bring into focus the trends sculpting the payments industry, from Diversity, Equity, Inclusion Month to celebrating Women Leaders in Payments.

Get ready for a journey through the technological transformation of payments companies and the necessity of merchant education in a rapidly changing landscape.

Podcast Transcription

Bryce Van De Moere (00:00):

So you talked to CEOs,

Jeremy Stock (00:01):

Maybe

Bryce Van De Moere (00:01):

Somebody Yeah. You know, I was like, couldn’t hurt, couldn’t hurt. Yeah.

Jeremy Stock (00:05):

Greg, we were, we were kind of hoping there you, we could maybe grease some wheels on the future episode,

Bryce Van De Moere (00:09):

No doubt. <laugh>,

Greg Myers (00:10):

Maybe we’ll take that offline and see what we can do.

Bryce Van De Moere (00:13):

<laugh> deal.

Jeremy Stock (00:16):

Welcome to the Payments Experts podcast, a podcast of Global legal law firm.

Speaker 4 (00:24):

We

Jeremy Stock (00:24):

Hope you enjoy this episode. Welcome to the Payments Experts Podcast, a podcast of global legal law firm. Today we’re very excited to have in studio, we have senior associate attorney Bryce Vander Moore, as well as special guest Greg Myers of the Leaders in Payments podcast. Greg, thank you so much for joining us today.

Greg Myers (00:47):

Yeah, thank you for having me. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Jeremy Stock (00:50):

Greg, we were just now talking, um, that, you know, we found you, I found you online, saw your podcast, see that you’re in the payment space. Um, I think we, as the Payments Experts podcast probably could learn a lot from you. Um, how long have you been doing what you do and tell a little, you know, a little bit of, uh, your story to our audience, if you don’t mind to get us started?

Greg Myers (01:11):

Sure, absolutely. Well, I’ve been doing this for going on five years. Um, last week launched our 300th episode, so Wow. Congratulations. I’ve been doing it for a while. Um, yeah, a little, little background about me is, uh, I started in payments about 20 years ago with JP Morgan Chase and their payments division. Uh, was there about eight years when on to First Data. That was back before the Fiserv acquisition. I’ve always been in the marketing side, so working closely with sales teams and, and the marketing side of the business. Um, sort of started this podcast on a whim, um, had the idea between Christmas and New Year’s of 2019 and, uh, said, Hey, there’s no podcast out there that gives CEOs and founders of companies a platform to tell their story. So I reached out to 10 CEOs that I knew from being in the industry, and eight of ’em said, sure, I’ll be on the show if you build it. And I was like, well, crap. Now I gotta figure out how to do a podcast <laugh>. So I spent the next, uh, month or so figuring that out. Launched in, in late January of 2020, and sort of as they so say the rest is history.

Jeremy Stock (02:16):

Wow. That’s, you know, in the podcast world, five years is a lifetime, you know, the way things change and evolve. And that’s, that’s really fantastic and congratulations on that 300 episodes. Thanks.

Greg Myers (02:26):

Appreciate it.

Jeremy Stock (02:27):

So, Bryce, uh, he’s gonna tell you, I I’m gonna ask Bryce to tell you a little bit about what we do. He actually works with First Data a lot, <laugh> a lot, and Chase a lot. Yeah. Uh, and so hopefully it won’t be, uh, we won’t pick too much on your, on your former, uh, you know, employers. Um, but Bryce, would you mind filling Greg in on kind of your role in this firm?

Bryce Van De Moere (02:48):

Yeah. But, uh, actually first I’d like to back it up just a little bit though. The CEO Greg, the CEOs that you approach and you have on your podcast, uh, what, uh, what role, I mean, businesses are you currently drawing your, your, uh, CEOs from, like, what, what are, what are your

Greg Myers (03:04):

Reasons? So, so really any payments company, FinTech, um, you know, run the, runs the gamut of that ecosystem from, you know, your, your traditional ISOs all the way to your fintechs that serve banks and credit unions. So it’s pretty, pretty broad across, you know, the whole, what I would call payments and FinTech together.

Bryce Van De Moere (03:25):

Got it. Okay. Um, well, uh, in response to your question, Jeremy, well what, well, I do a lot of things. I wear a lot of hats over here, but predominantly for purposes of this podcast, uh, I do a lot of work trying to get merchants off of the match list, uh, you know, be, um, approaching whoever we think may have placed them. A lot of times the merchants come along, they have no idea why it’s, how it’s happened or why it’s happened, or even who did it. So ultimately, the biggest part of the job is just trying to figure out who we need to talk to, uh, and then try to get them to cooperate. Uh, try them to try to get them to turn over documents so that we can determine the, uh, how, what they’re using to justify the match placement in the first place. And then hopefully we, it’s, we can address it, we can rebut it and get them removed, but, and that, that’s where I spend the majority of my time in the payment space.

Jeremy Stock (04:19):

Greg, I’m curious, uh, from your podcast perspective now, I’m not so sure if it’s would be important to go back to when you were with, uh, first Data and, and Chase, but how often or if ever does Match List come up, um, on, on your podcast? Is this something that, that people are talking about? Is, is it on your radar?

Greg Myers (04:40):

Uh, you know, it’s not, not talked about very much. Like specifically, I don’t think we, we necessarily get down, you know, into the weeds that at that level very often. I think, you know, I, I think everyone talks about, you know, safety and security and, you know, making sure their customers are good customers and fighting fraud. I mean, we’ve, we’ve interviewed several people in the, in the fraud space over the years. Um, so those types of things come up and, you know, safety and security obviously is, is big in the industry, but, you know, the whole match thing, I obviously, I know what it is from being in the industry, but it doesn’t really come up that much. Honestly. I think it’s, you know, it’s, it’s such a, um, I won’t say a small part, but it’s, it’s kind of in the weeds compared to where, you know, we talk about most of the time on our show.

Jeremy Stock (05:26):

Yeah. We’re, we’re very much in the weeds here, aren’t we, Bryce <laugh>,

Bryce Van De Moere (05:30):

We aren’t.

Jeremy Stock (05:31):

Yeah, exactly.

Bryce Van De Moere (05:32):

Unfortunately. Yeah.

Jeremy Stock (05:33):

Yeah. It’s, uh, the type of thing, you know, the, the types of guests you have on your show, Greg. Um, you know, like you said, it’s that, that CEO level oftentimes, um, the higher level, uh, 10,000 foot, you know, perspective on the payments space and payments industry. What do you see as, you know, kind of the, the burgeoning topics? What, what is front mind and front of plate as we’re going into 2024 now, we’re, it is kind of crazy to think we’re approaching mid 2024 already.

Greg Myers (06:05):

Yeah. I mean, I, I think, you know, the topic of AI is in every conversation. Hmm. So how are payments and FinTech companies using AI in their business? That comes up almost every time. Um, you know, the topic of fraud comes up a lot. It’s, uh, if you went to Money 2020, the last couple of years, tons of fraud vendors everywhere, right? So a lot of, a lot of that is, is, is something that we talk about. Um, you know, the other interesting one is, is this whole instant payments. Um, I’ve had a couple of people on recently where we’ve talked about, you know, what, what does Fed now mean now that it’s been brought online? What, what are they doing in other countries, you know, UPI and India, Pix and Brazil, you know, those are, you know, kind of the, the a to a account to account payment kind of things that I feel like are are coming to the US soon.

Greg Myers (06:56):

Um, several companies out there are doing that. So that’s a big topic. Hmm. Um, and, and like I said, overall fraud security. Um, you know, it is funny, I was this conversation earlier today and someone asked about crypto, and it’s like, yeah. Uh, two years ago that was on in every conversation in the last year. Don’t talk about it that much. Yeah, that’s interesting. But I will say over the last couple of episodes, it’s come up again. So, um, you know, that’s something else that I think is on people’s radar. But, you know, I, I think one of the hottest topics is AI. And, you know, there, there’s some talk about m and a. Now I’m starting to hear a little bit more, you know, buzz about, about m and a. Maybe things Will, will pick up in 2024. And I mean, obviously, you know, capital One discover at a macro level, but, uh, I think there’ll be some other kind of m and a stuff that goes on this year as well.

Jeremy Stock (07:44):

Interesting. You know, Bryce, I’m not sure if you recall, we actually have an episode we spoke to, um, oh boy, I’m remember his name right now, uh, about Fed Now. And it was a great episode. Um, and boy, if I could just remember his name, I apologize for, for blanking on that. Um, what are your thoughts on Fed now? We had a very interesting conversation. Alan Copeman, that’s who it was. Alan Copeman. Um, and he has a podcast as well. And, and he was, you know, um, you can go watch the podcast. Anyone here can, uh, you know, he was fairly critical, shall we say, of the idea of Fed Now, et cetera. I’d be curious, would you mind, uh, pontificating on, on your thoughts? Wex philosophical, if you don’t mind, <laugh>?

Greg Myers (08:26):

Yeah. I, I, I mean, you know, obviously I don’t know the details and there’s a, there’s a lot yet to be done, I think, in that space, but I think in the B2B world, there’s a, there’s room for it, there’s a place for it, right? The, the Fed now another rail system to, to move money, I think is a good thing. Um, you know, where I find it interesting is how can things like Fed now be used in a, you know, consumer to merchant payment, right? That’s not happening much here in the US at all. Um, where you’re, you know, paying, I mean, billers, obviously you can set up a, you know, recurring billing through your checking account and things like that. But, you know, to go to the counter and pay like that I, I think is, is an interesting concept. And I think building that infrastructure, and when it comes to Fed now, what I often hear people say is, it’s great.

Greg Myers (09:16):

We need it. The use cases are still being determined, you know, it, it’s, it’s more of a push kind of thing. And, um, you know, there needs to be more use cases around it. How do we develop that? So, I mean, I’m a big believer in competition and, and adding, you know, fed now to, uh, as another rail to move money, I think is a good thing. It’s whether or not, you know, companies can build on top of that, and it, it gains the traction that it needs to gain. And, um, you know, I hear banks are, are adopting it at a pretty good clip. So, I mean, I think it’s, I don’t see it as a bad thing. I think maybe MasterCard, visa, amex, they might not, uh, you know, see it as a great thing, but, uh, you know, they have their reasons.

Bryce Van De Moere (09:54):

Yeah. They don’t want anybody horned in on their territory. <laugh>,

Jeremy Stock (09:59):

They

Bryce Van De Moere (09:59):

Got a sweet deal, and they don’t want anybody to make the mess with it.

Jeremy Stock (10:01):

That’s, that’s the truth price. Yeah.

Bryce Van De Moere (10:03):

Uh, Greg, if I can interject actually, you, you had mentioned, uh, fraud vendors earlier, and, and fraud is a topic that we deal with, uh, quite a bit. We, we have merchants falling under a fraud umbrella quite often. Can you elaborate on what you mean by fraud vendors?

Greg Myers (10:22):

Um, yeah. I mean, you have companies like Count and, and others who, um, you know, are preventing fraud. Whether that’s from the onboarding of new clients to, you know, the backend of monitoring transactions. Um, you know, that’s the kind of fraud that I think is continuing to increase. It seems like the bad guys are always a step ahead. So we’ve got a lot of those sort of fraud vendors that are, you know, you’ve got some that are very good at different parts of it, and you’ve got some trying to be the whole ecosystem. You’ve got some that are now using, you know, insurance products so that you can ensure your fraud and, you know, fraud losses. And, um, it, it’s, it’s an interesting space. Um, but that’s sort of the, the type of, you know, companies that we’ve talked to.

Bryce Van De Moere (11:07):

Understood. Yeah.

Jeremy Stock (11:08):

That’s interesting. You know, uh, Greg, on the topic of, of fraud, another element that we deal with a lot. We get a lot of merchants who reach out to us literally on a daily basis, um, dealing with chargebacks, credit card payment disputes. We’ve, we see it again and again to the point where, you know, this quote unquote friendly fraud, uh, you know, I always joke around and there’s nothing friendly about it. It’s absolute fraud. Um, merchants are continually the ones left holding the bag. You know, I talked to someone just yesterday, um, they’re a big auto part manufacturer. They manufacture specialized car parts, uh, for particular off-roading vehicles, you know, high-end stuff, average check a price, you know, five to $15,000, et cetera. And these card holders purchase, let’s just say $35,000 worth of parts, go put the parts on their car, take pictures, put it on their Instagram, it’s on their Facebook. They’re sh shown driving it around with these fancy new parts. And then three months later, even six months later, they charge back and they get all their money back. And the, the, uh, merchant is sitting there without the parts and without the money. Does this come across your radar at all? What are, what are your thoughts on, on kind of where the payments is in terms of chargebacks? ’cause to me, it seems like it’s a pandemic that’s only getting worse.

Greg Myers (12:38):

Yeah. Um, it, it, it is a challenge. I think that, uh, I don’t know that whenever the chargeback systems in the US were kind of put together that they really had that merchant in mind, right? It was a lot about maybe protecting the consumer. Um, I, I think there’s work to be done there. Um, I think there’s, there’s challenge. You can go, you know, you can find, find people who are abusing it to people who have legitimate concerns. And I think merchants do struggle with it. And, you know, different merchant categories obviously struggle with it more. Um, but, you know, I think the, the companies out there that are helping them to fight it are doing their best to provide them, you know, the tools and the technology and, you know, maybe AI can step in and, and help a little with, with some documentation.

Greg Myers (13:24):

Um, but I, I, I think that it, it is a big issue in the industry. I think we’re talking about, you know, fraud and chargebacks and all those, you know, bad things that happen. And, you know, unfortunately, I don’t think they’re going anywhere. I don’t know if we’ll ever live in a world where there’s not fraud and not, not chargebacks. Mm-Hmm. So, you know, hopefully those companies out there that are focusing on that or, you know, building the tools and, and helping and trying to create the processes and procedures that, you know, merchants can take advantage of to protect themselves.

Jeremy Stock (13:54):

Bryce, would you mind chiming in on kinda what, what, what do we do on that end of chargebacks? Where, where are we at with those?

Bryce Van De Moere (14:00):

Well, I mean, we, we have merchants that come to us and ask us to resubmit chargebacks on their behalf all the time, because basically, sometimes the merchant doesn’t have, have any, you know, documentation to support the, the assertion that the chargeback is not valid and, and that the underlying charge is actually valid. But, um, actually, actually, I wanted to, uh, to, to turn to another, another topic actually, uh, that I wanted to explore. Uh, what do you have any insight from, from the, uh, CEOs that you come in contact with as to what it’s like to deal with, uh, MasterCard or, or a visa in, you know, the common course of business? Like, what, what are they like? I mean, our, our perception of them is that they just sit up high in a mountain and they have their rules, and everybody who wants to work ’em has to follow their rules. And they just, they just stay quiet no matter, no matter how their rules are being abused. They just don’t seem to care, like I said before, they got a sweet deal and they’re just not gonna, they’re not gonna rock that boat. Do you have any insight as to what it’s like for a First Data or a Chase, for instance, which I know you have a prior background with. Uh, do you guys have any discussion about what it’s like to deal with ’em?

Greg Myers (15:18):

Yeah, I mean, it’s a, it’s a tough one. I don’t, you know, in the interviews that I’ve done over the last few years, it really hasn’t come up specifically dealing with, with them. I, I think everyone has, you know, sort of their similar opinion, right? As the, the MasterCards and visas that kind of, you know, have their thing and protect it at all costs and feel like they own the ecosystem. Um, but, you know, I, I think maybe that’s getting better. I don’t, I don’t know. I, you know, I feel like that they do want to work to protect the ecosystem, which is vitally important. Um, you know, and I think they do have, um, things that are maybe are nipping at their heels, um, between crypto and some of these account to account stuff. So, so I think they’re gonna have to get better at working with companies in the, in the ecosystem.

Greg Myers (16:07):

Um, but I think you’ll also have people out there that say, Hey, you know, they partner with them and they’re great partners. Um, so I think you are gonna hear a little bit of, of both if you, if you ask enough people. So, um, but you know, honestly, no one has come on the show and said, oh my gosh, I, I hate them. Or, Hey, they’re the, the best companies in the world to work with. So I don’t think there’s, you know, ever been one extreme to the other. It’s like a necessary evil, and we’ll do our best to work with them when and how we have to.

Bryce Van De Moere (16:34):

Yeah. It’s, they’re a terrible company to deal with, and we’re closing up shop tomorrow, <laugh>. Yeah, exactly. ’cause we just shot, you know, we just bit the hand that feeds

Jeremy Stock (16:43):

Us. There’s a lot of truth to that <laugh>, Greg. I was gonna say, you know, if you’re not hearing that very often, you should hear some of the, uh, guests we have on this podcast, <laugh>.

Bryce Van De Moere (16:54):

Yeah. But actually, but go, going back to the charge, to the chargeback discussion, it is just really more a determining whether or not, because again, we deal with chargebacks predominantly in context of match placement. Again, that that’s, you know, our, our, our bread and butter. And it’s just, it’s just determining what is being taken into a, into account when you’re, you know, rolling up chargebacks and determining whether or not match placement is warranted for excessive chargebacks. Because a a lot of merchants don’t know, and I think a lot of payment processors and banks don’t know, or, or really, they’re not paying a lot of attention to it. It has to be a MasterCard charge. It has to be, it can’t just be charge, just your regular world run of the mill chargebacks. And that is predominantly where we’re focusing our energy in regards to getting people off for chargebacks, because ultimately, you know, the numbers are the mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And it’s really difficult to find, find a way to, uh, to get outta that. But one, one way that we’ve found to be successful is just determining the nature of the chargeback. Right? Right. And who they’re coming from. ’cause it, it, it is MasterCard or in some cases American Express or it’s just not, not supposed to happen. But, uh, we suspect it’s happening a ton.

Greg Myers (18:11):

Mm-Hmm.

Jeremy Stock (18:11):

<affirmative>, you know, Greg, we’re kind of discussing, you know, that what we work with on a daily basis and some of these hurdles we face, you know, uh, Bryce does it day in day out, waiting for responses, you know, from some of these, uh, general counsel offices of these various entities, these rather large entities. What are some of the biggest hurdles that, that the people that you’re speaking to on a regular basis in the payment space? What, what are their kind of biggest challenges, uh, that they’re facing right now that that kind of comes up that you wouldn’t mind speaking about?

Greg Myers (18:42):

Yeah, I, you know, I, I think, you know, a lot of it is talent. I hear that a lot. It’s finding great talent and keeping great talent. Um, you know, a few years ago that was, that was a huge topic when, you know, money was everywhere and people were growing like crazy. Um, I think that’s shifted a little, but I still think that whole area of talent is, is a challenge for a lot of companies is finding and keeping very good talent. Um, you know, I, I think obviously for startups and smaller companies in the ecosystem, funding is a challenge, right? Is obviously, um, given the, the interest rates. And, you know, I think a lot of sort, sort of CEOs in the last year, 18 months, had to kinda step back and say, Hey, we’ve gotta go from this hyper growth mode to profitability.

Greg Myers (19:32):

How do we get there? Mm-Hmm. What are the things we need to do? And sometimes that’s tough decisions. You know, you’ve seen companies cut entire segments of their business and, and lay people off just so that they can be profitable. Um, and then you’ve had others who have been able to go out and raise money, haven’t seen a lot of that, but have seen some, there’s been a few announcements over the last week or so. Um, so I think the funding aspect of, of the business is, is a challenge. I think the talent finding and keeping, um, those are probably the two biggest things that I hear on a regular basis.

Jeremy Stock (20:05):

Interesting. Bryce, what do you think? What, what are our biggest challenges? You <laugh>, how

Bryce Van De Moere (20:11):

Long, how much time do

Jeremy Stock (20:12):

You got? Yeah, exactly.

Bryce Van De Moere (20:15):

It’s, it is just, if I were to, if I were to distill it down to like one thing, it is just getting people to communicate with us. I mean, I, I had a, we have a, a case where a processor, uh, informed one of our clients that he had, and I, I, I’m sorry to beat this horse, but, uh, placed on Match and that it was Chase Bank, and we went to Chase Bank, and they were like, it’s not us. So we went back to this processor and I was talking with the, um, with one of the lower level executives, and he was intending to gimme the information that I needed. Uh, but then I got an email, email from the CEO Basically, I, the only way that I can interpret it was, uh, I don’t know certain terms, certain terms, are we gonna cooperate with you? Mm. Uh, short of a short of a subpoena. And so I guess I’m just, and I, I don’t know, I, Greg, I don’t know if you have any insight on this at all, but just the, the reluctance of people to communicate with us, I’m not really understanding where that’s coming from. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> like, what, what are they so afraid of? And I don’t even know if you can answer that.

Greg Myers (21:29):

Yeah. Unfortunately. I don’t think I have a whole lot of insights on that

Bryce Van De Moere (21:33):

One. Yeah. Well, I got, I got, like I said, I got nailed by the CEO E so you talked to ceo, so somebody, you know, I was like, couldn’t hurt, couldn’t hurt. Yeah.

Jeremy Stock (21:40):

Greg, we, we were kind of hoping there you, we could maybe grease some wheels on the future

Bryce Van De Moere (21:44):

Episode, no doubt. <laugh>

Greg Myers (21:46):

Maybe we’ll take that offline and see what we can do. <laugh>

Bryce Van De Moere (21:50):

Deal.

Jeremy Stock (21:52):

So, so Greg, the, you know, your podcast, you’ve been doing this for, um, five years now, 300 episodes in, um, you might talk to us what’s, what’s 2024 looking like and, and, and beyond. Um, give us our audience a sense of, uh, of where you’re headed and, and what they have, what you have in store.

Greg Myers (22:11):

Yeah. Thanks for that opportunity. So, so just to, to level set. So the foundation of what we do, as I mentioned, are CEOs and founder interviews of FinTech and, and payments companies. Over the years, as we’ve built this brand, people have come to us and said, how do we leverage the audience and the brand that you’ve built? So we’ve come up with some standard kind of offerings that we have. Um, and I’ll just mention a few without, you know, doing a, a shameless pitch. But, um, you know, if you have a research report or a white paper or something like that and you want to amplify that content, we’ll do like a three part mini series, something like that, huh? Um, if you wanna do a deep dive on a specific topic, we have a thing called the pulse of payments, where you can do four to six episodes about a specific topic.

Greg Myers (22:52):

So an example of that is we just launched a pulse of payment series around soft pause, which is being able to take, you know, payments with an NFC device, could be an Android phone or whatever. And in genco is, is the sponsor of that. It’s gonna be six, um, episodes, and then we’re gonna do a white paper and a video for them. Um, so those are the kind of things we’ve done some bigger, broader campaigns with NMI. Last year we did this 18 part series. We did three themes with six episodes each. Um, so we’re doing more and more of those kind of things where we’re partnering with industry players. We’ve got a couple coming out, um, in the next few months. I can’t really talk about ’em yet. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. But, um, a couple of similar things to that. And then we do diversity equity inclusion month, which is in March, that, that’s coming up next month.

Greg Myers (23:36):

We do a woman leaders payments month in July, and we do a financial inclusion month in September. Oh, all of those, um, are not necessarily CEO interviews, but they are areas of payments I felt needed some more awareness. So we do those months. We’ve done ’em since the very beginning. They’re sponsorship opportunities, but you don’t have to sponsor to be on the show. So those are kind of at a high level things that a little bit we’ve done in the past, but we’re doing more and more of, of those as we’ve built a broader audience and a, and a bigger brand. Um, a couple other things. We’re doing new in 2024. I’m looking at events a little differently, trying to figure out, um, I’ve been reluctant to podcast from events, but I think that’s going to change. So we’re looking at some, some events and in the rest of this year and, and how we can kind of podcast from those events.

Greg Myers (24:21):

Um, and then, you know, the other kind of thing that we’ve launched actually launched a new podcast called Podcast Pointers, where I’m giving sort of a five minute quick, uh, one topic pointer for B2B marketing people on podcasting. So we have a sister company called Podcast 6 0 9 that helps companies create, launch, manage, grow their own podcasts. So we’ve got several clients in the payment space that we do their podcast for them. We’re totally behind the scenes. Um, but so launching that new podcast and trying to get that moving and, and bring in some more business there. So, you know, shameless plug, if anyone’s looking to launch their own podcast, um, certainly would be interested in having that, that conversation. And I, I mean, you know, it’s co it’s combining my passions, right? My, my passion for payments and my passion for podcasting and, um, kind of bringing to market a new, a new offering to help other companies.

Jeremy Stock (25:18):

No, please Shameless plug away. Yeah. Uh, Greg, seriously, it’s, it’s, that’s fantastic. We’re, you know, we, we love what we do here. I apologize. I think my camera just died. I, so I, you’re just gonna see Bryce now as I’m talking. Um, sorry, <laugh>, uh, we really enjoy this and, and you know, we’re, we’re looking in into ways we can try to expand our podcast as well. So we, we really appreciate the opportunity of having you on today. I, I’m curious, Greg, to this date, uh, talk to us about one of your biggest, one of your biggest episodes, uh, biggest guests. What, what, what was that like?

Greg Myers (25:52):

Yeah, I mean, uh, you guys probably know OB Rawls. Um, OB is kind of an industry Yeah. Icon. And, uh, he’s been on the show actually when he was the CEO of Paysafe a few years ago. I had him back on for my 250th episode. So you can go search for that. I mean, he, he’s an industry icon and an incredible storyteller and, um, great guy all around. So, so that’s an episode I tell people to go listen to. Um, more recently, you know, some of the bigger ones I had, um, max New Chen, who’s the head of payments and, and, um, head of payments at JP Morgan Chase in their payments division. And, uh, you know, obviously high level, right? But, but very insightful. Had a lot of interesting perspectives. So that’s another great episode. Um, and then, you know, across the board, companies like Stax and NM and Fortis, and, you know, those kind of guys that I think are just very in front of the industry when it comes to Mm-Hmm.

Greg Myers (26:50):

To like innovation and how they position their company. Um, so, so we’ve had a lot of those kind of episodes. Um, and then it’s interesting, you know, those are kind of bigger players and then you kind of get down to smaller startups that are more nimble. And, um, you know, part of the podcast that, that I love is we, we get to talk to the CEOs and, and some founders, but hearing those founder stories, I mean, I just had one, it hasn’t launched yet, but just recorded it this week with, with a guy who, you know, he grew up and, um, in like Thailand and Miami or, or something. And, uh, he knows all these languages. Like I, I told him I can barely speak English, and he knows like 10 languages <laugh>. Wow. Just a fascinating guy. And to learn about their hobbies and what makes, you know, what they do to get away from, um, the business. We had people who are pilots and helicopter pilots and surfers and, you know, all these unique things. So hearing the people side of the story is always, always interesting. But yeah, some of those episodes that I just mentioned, um, you know, are really interesting and, and get really good, you know, results as far as downloads and things like that.

Jeremy Stock (27:54):

That’s very cool. You know, Bryce, something we, we talk about a lot, um, I know James brings it up often is one thing we enjoy about our work as well. All of our clients, virtually every single one of them, um, are entrepreneurs, right? They’re business owners, entrepreneurs, and they’re, they thrive on, as you were saying, Greg, they have to be ahead of the, of the curve as much, at least as much as possible, um, or react as quickly as possible to the changing environments. And you brought up, you know, technology and ai, I think what, you know, what’s interesting is to see where we’re headed. You know, Chris talks often are the founding partner of our firm, Greg. He mentions a lot how really payments these payments companies are becoming technology companies in many ways. It’s just, just, it’s kind of an evolution as we speak. Um, so that’s been kind of, uh, exciting for us to watch as well as we have to grow and learn as a law firm, you know, how to service those clients, et cetera.

Bryce Van De Moere (28:49):

Bryce, I think, I think that we also have to, uh, do a better job of encouraging these merchants to get educated about, about, ’cause everything is, is moving quickly. Uh, and a lot of these guys and gals, they just have no idea what they’re doing. They sign on the dotted line. Yeah. They’re ready to get out there. And so I think, uh, podcasts like, uh, like Greg’s are aret are very necessary now more than ever, but a actually, Greg, and do you have a question, Jeremy? ’cause I wanted to ask him, so I’m

Jeremy Stock (29:17):

No, I wanted, yeah, I was gonna give it to you.

Bryce Van De Moere (29:19):

Yeah. You know, I’m, I’m like always, I’m always down for opportunities to throw my money away. So you, uh, <laugh> you, uh, you said that, uh, crypto is back, crypto’s back. ’cause you’re right, it, it was like, it was like boom and every, everything, it was like, what, hundreds of different coins, and then all of a sudden it just stopped. I, I think that, uh, I think it was a, uh, that free bank bankman free guy,

Jeremy Stock (29:43):

Yeah. Yeah.

Bryce Van De Moere (29:43):

Led led to all that. What are, what, if anything, are you hearing about crypto now? I mean, is there, just like, I assume there’s like a con consolidation going on and it’s gonna come back probably a lot more structured, a lot safer. I mean, is is, are any of those assumptions, uh, uh, valid?

Greg Myers (30:01):

Yeah, I mean, I think that that is what I’m hearing. You know, we had the Crip, whatever they call it, crypto winner, right? Where everything went away and consolidation happened. And, um, I, I think where at least us payment kind of nerds are thinking is like, how do we ever get to where it’s a payment method and not just a storage, you know, investment kind of thing, right? And I think that’s where I think the momentum is starting to pick up again. And I think that, you know, government regulations have to be stronger and has to be better. And, you know, getting bad actors out of the system, obviously that helps. Um, so I mean, I think it’s, I think it’s coming back. I don’t, I don’t know if it’ll happen in my lifetime or, or when you’ll be able to go to the grocery store and pay with crypto.

Greg Myers (30:46):

Um, I don’t personally see that happening anytime soon. But, you know, maybe it starts smaller and maybe it starts online, e-commerce, which is happening some there already. But, um, you know, maybe that becomes ubiquitous and where everyone’s doing it and it becomes safe and people have confidence in it. I think that’s a huge factor. Right. Consumer confidence. Or are you, are you confident that you know it’s gonna work when you use it? And are there enough merchants that accept it that it’s worth you having it? So it’s the whole chicken and the egg thing that happens in our industry all the time. But I definitely starting to hear a little bit more about it in the last, I would say, two or three months than I did, you know, the previous probably 12 months.

Jeremy Stock (31:26):

Are

Bryce Van De Moere (31:26):

You a crypto guy? Not to put you on the spot here, but I

Greg Myers (31:29):

Just, I am not actually, I, I mean, I, I very fringe and listen and try to learn, but, um, I haven’t taken the leap yet.

Bryce Van De Moere (31:37):

Yeah. I’m just not smart enough, man, <laugh>. I’m just not, I’m just not as smart. I, I don’t know how to take apart, put back together my computer. So I, I’m not, I don’t see myself having very much success in this, but, but you know, it’s, it’s out there. It’s

Jeremy Stock (31:50):

Coming. Yeah. You know, it’s kind of interesting, Greg, uh, the studio that, that Bryce and I are in right now, uh, we took this over from a former tenant, uh, and he was, he used this space. He was a, he’s a Bitcoin guy, um, and he says he doesn’t touch any of the other coins. He’s strictly in Bitcoin. Uh, and he’s a believer. We talked to him not too long ago, maybe a month or couple months ago at the, at the latest. And he’s, he’s just all in, and, you know, they’re out there for sure. They’re money to be had. I feel it like it’s cyclical. You know, you’re gonna have these, these waves, these peaks and troughs, and there’s gonna, I think every time, I hate to say it, I think there’s gonna be little losers. You know, there’s people that jump in too late and then they get out too early and, you know, it’s, um, it’s a cycle. I think that’s my particular take on it. Well, I’m a little bitter ’cause I’ve lost a lot of money Bitcoin

Bryce Van De Moere (32:38):

Over the years. You, you know, it’s, uh, and I have to, I have to wonder how the banks really feel about it because, and my understanding of it, and I could be totally wrong, but at the end of the day, it’s, it’s, there’s nothing backing it. It’s based on, on nothing. It’s just, it has value because people see that it has value. And, and I understand how I, I understand fully how risk averse banks are in general. I mean, and, uh, I would venture to guess that crypto is probably just about one of the biggest risks that they’re running into these days.

Greg Myers (33:10):

Yeah. Yeah. I would agree with you.

Bryce Van De Moere (33:12):

Yeah.

Jeremy Stock (33:13):

Greg, we’re gonna give you the last word here today. Um, we’re very grateful for you joining us. It’s been great speaking with you. Um, the question I’ll leave you with and, uh, is, you know, what do you want our audience to come away with, uh, from today? Um, and, and leave us please also with where they can find you, um, and how you would like them to reach out to you.

Greg Myers (33:33):

Yeah, well, I appreciate that. Um, you know, I, I, I set out to create a platform for CEOs and founders to tell their story, and that’s what we’ve stuck to. I mean, that’s our bread and butter. So, you know, my goal is to, to educate people on what goes on in our industry, whether that’s people from the industry outside of the industry, investors. I have a lot of people, not a lot, I have people reach out to me that are investors and they love the show just because of the education aspect. So, you know, if you’re interested in payments, if you, you know, if it’s the, if it’s, if you’re a payments nerd or you have a passion for it, I would just say, you know, we’ve got 300 episodes of content that you can go listen to. We’re on all the, the typical channels, right?

Greg Myers (34:15):

The Apple and Spotify. And just for those that don’t know, Google podcast is actually going away. Yeah, I saw. But Apple, Spotify, YouTube, all of them, anywhere you get your podcasts. Um, the other thing is we’re we’re quite global. We, we interview companies from Australia to the UK to other, you know, places in Europe. We’ve had, like I said, a CEO of a digital banking platform company out of Brazil that helped, um, develop picks. Very interesting. Um, so, you know, if you’re interested in kind of that whole ecosystem, I would say just, just go, go online. You know, you can look us up, leaders in payments.com. Um, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn, easy to find just Greg Myers, M-Y-E-R-S on, on LinkedIn, or go to our page. Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I think that’s, that’s kind of what we’re trying to do is, is educate the marketplace, you know, give people that platform to tell the story.

Greg Myers (35:09):

And then, you know, obviously if you’re interested in how, you know, you can leverage what we’ve built from a, you know, kind of a sponsorship and a brand perspective. Certainly, uh, willing to have those conversations as well. And the last plug is, you know, the podcast 6 0 9 is our company that builds and manages and helps the other podcasts grow. So more than happy to have those discussions, um, podcasts, payments. That’s my passion. That’s what I love to do. So anyone that wants to reach out and talk about it, that’d be awesome. And, uh, I can try my best to be responsive, but, uh, if it’s a couple of days, I apologize in advance.

Jeremy Stock (35:45):

No, that’s great. Uh, Greg, thank you so much. This has been the Payments Experts podcast today. We’ve had in studio Bryce Vander, more senior associate attorney at Global Legal Law Firm. My name is Jeremy, I’m our Director of operations. We’ve had Greg, uh, Meyers from payment, uh, excuse me, leaders in Payments podcast. Uh, Greg, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Uh, thank you. And hopefully our, uh, paths will cross again.

Greg Myers (36:09):

Yeah, thank you so much. I appreciate the opportunity very much.

Speaker 5 (36:11):

Yeah, take care. Thank you,

Jeremy Stock (36:12):

Greg. Absolutely. Thank you. Bye-Bye. Take care.

Speaker 5 (36:15):

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Payments Experts Podcast, a podcast of global legal law firm. Visit us online today at global legal law firm.com.