Brian Rankin’s background is not unlike others. Successful business man moves into blockchain and leaves to explore the traditional business world yet again. Unlike his peers, Brian saw something interesting during a time when most retail investors are exiting. Brian saw opportunity and massive growth coming. Inspired and motivated to re-enter the blockchain space, Brian found an unlikely suitor. A project that seemingly is unknown to many, yet poised to disrupt the payment industry. And with Brian’ s experience, this is exactly what he contends will happen.
PLEASE TELL US ABOUT YOUR BACKGROUND AND A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCE AT RIPPLE?
I’ve been working in the Fintech world since 2008, back when mobile banking was new to the world. At ClairMail (acquired by Monitise, then by Fiserv) I managed mobile banking deployments into 50+ banks and credit unions. At Ripple I led the team that deployed RCL (Ripple Consensus Ledger) and cross-border payments solutions into international banks throughout Europe and APAC. In both companies I was privileged to lead teams of absolutely outstanding engineers and managers, truly some of the best people I’ve ever worked with [ teams, hats off to you! ] And I’m a leadership coach. I believe that everybody is naturally creative, resourceful and whole (unless they prove otherwise) and the best part of my day is when I’m coaching & mentoring my team.
WHAT MADE YOU DECIDE TO JOIN MODERN FINANCE CHAIN AFTER LEAVING THE BLOCKCHAIN SPACE?
Quite simply I’ve a big believer in the potential of the blockchain and digital currencies. And the big vision of Modern Finance Chain: to expand cryptocurrency utility to the point of ubiquity. With Modern Finance Chain’s multi-blockchain solution based on flexible and powerful smart contacts, I find it personally compelling because it hearkens back to the root of what digital currencies are all about: truly decentralized, instantaneous, transparent, that’s in the best interest of both merchants and consumers.
There are so many ICOs out there that are based purely on fluff and “make money fast” — in fact, if you want to see the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s take on ICOs then google HoweyCoins, which is the complete opposite of Modern Finance Chain.
ELEVATOR PITCH. HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE WHAT MODERN FINANCE CHAIN IS AND WHAT IT’S TRYING TO DO IN A FEW SENTENCES?
Modern Finance Chain is a smart contract platform providing the ability for multiple digital currencies to be transacted across multiple blockchains — which is huge and very compelling because MFChain can embrace almost any use case that will enhance consumer and merchant’s experience. With multi-blockchain integration, it’s truly a decentralized network with no single dominant coin. And both merchants and consumers are rewarded for using the platform.
CAN YOU EXPLAIN YOUR EXACT ROLE WITH MODERN FINANCE CHAIN?
I’m advising Modern Finance Chain on enterprise integrations. Many small technology startups, especially those that are consumer-facing, find it challenging to integrate with financial institutions and payments gateways. Banks — financial institutions in general — are large enterprises with a serious responsibility: they are custodians of financial asset used by millions of people (checking, savings, investments). This places huge regulatory, legal, compliance, and infoSec burdens on everything they do, highlighting the absolutely critical importance of quality product delivered to exacting specifications. I’m here to help MFChain navigate those waters — they can take advantage of my scars and deliver enterprise quality right out of the gate.
REGULATIONS AND CRYPTOCURRENCY IS A HOT TOPIC. WHAT DO YOU THINK MODERN FINANCE CHAIN NEEDS TO DO TO ENSURE LONG TERM SUCCESS DURING THESE UNCERTAIN TIMES?
So beyond ICOs and talk of digital currencies as securities: the big driver of regulation is that the institutional investors want in. Digital currency investments have a total AUM of about 5% of traditional venture capital. That’s a lot of room for investing in coin. What’s stopping things is lack of institutional-grade investor protection, which won’t change until the regulatory landscape around digital currencies matures.
And Modern Finance Chain’s part? Keep abreast of what’s going on around regulations, but don’t let uncertainty and rumors drive the ship — stay the course and keep executing against the vision. At the same time work with the regulators, not against the regulators, as what they really want is to do what’s best for the security and well-being of the people and institutions who will use digital currencies (yes I’m giving regulators the benefit of the doubt). Finally, listen to the MFChain team members, often they already have the answer to — or at least an informed opinion about — the problem of the day.
WHAT DO YOU THINK MAKES MODERN FINANCE CHAIN UNIQUE VERSUS ITS COMPETITORS?
Several things. Let’s break it down.
- MFChain has their own Mainnet which enables multi-blockchain integration and a multi-currency digital payments system. And (I like this) it uses the BFT/POS consensus model, which scales horizontally very well.
- Merchants have choices: accept multiple digital currencies; convert some or all to fiat currencies as desired; control the surcharges on their systems so they can do what’s right for their individual businesses.
- Consumers can use whatever wallet they have today to transact on Mainnet — no need to go through an exchange. Privacy is king — and consumers control their own privacy settings. And consumers are rewarded — 1% of every purchase using MFX tokens.
- About those rewards — what I didn’t mention is that 16% of the entire token allocation will be set aside as a rewards pool. And the rewards merchants receive can be passed on — in part or whole — to their customers as they see fit.
It’s an awesome innovation platform and incubator. The Mainnet gives the ability for other ICO projects to accept other digital currencies when generating tokens — today most ICOs accept only BTC and ETH. With MFChain we also accept NEO, LTC, XRP, etc — just about any of Altcoin on any blockchain.
PLEASE EXPLAIN WHAT THE MF2X PROTOCOL IS? IS THIS FULLY COMPLIANT OR ARE LICENCES AND REGISTRATION STILL REQUIRED?
The MF2X protocol enables direct crypto-to-fiat and crypto-to-crypto swaps without the need for dealing with a centralized crypto exchange. This allows any digital currency to participate & transact on the MFChain mainnnet, and opens up the MfChain products and services to millions of users. It’s exciting! Still lots of work to do, however we’re already collaborating with Credits to accept their tokens on our Mainnt. And yes, with our AML/KYC capabilities we will be fully compliant and will register as required within any applicable jurisdiction. Our legal team is managing those important details.
PLEASE EXPLAIN THE MFX REWARDS POOL. HOW DOES THAT WORK FOR BOTH CONSUMERS AND MERCHANTS?
The MFX reward pool comprises 16% of the entire initial MFX token allocation; additional allocations to the pool will happen as new blockchain partnerships join the Mainnet. The pool is used to incent both consumers and merchants to transact: consumers are rewarded for every transaction (a percentage of their purchase similar to a cash-back credit card program); for merchants the pool covers fees typically bundled by traditional payments systems: chargebacks, interchanges, assessments, payment gateways — these all go away with the MFX Rewards Pool. I like that it’s totally transparent to both the consumers and the merchants, and the merchants can choose to pass their savings onto their customers. It’s an important component of an entire merchant/consumer ecosystem, which is what MFChain is all about.
ARE THERE ANY PARTNERSHIPS FORMED OR ANY POTENTIAL PARTNERSHIPS COMING UP?
Absolutely! We’re partnered with Ingot Coin and Loopring, which provides us transparent access to their liquidity pools and cryptocurrency partners, and with DDEX as our first exchange listing partner. We’ve also joined the Komorebi Alliance, which I find especially interesting as it’a cross-blockchain group of partners that hedges risk by providing redundancy in the event there’s a performance issue with a partner’s platform, and, converges the industry-specific functions of each partner’s utility token — Token Augmenting Partnerships, to quote Hirander Misra. And we’re announcing two new partners: Zagg, a leader in Gift Cards, Benefits, Rewards and Loyalty industry, who will use the MF2X protocol for payments through MFChain’s payments gateway and will integrate their awards program with the MFX rewards pool. We’ve just partnered with Credits, a Singapore-based blockchain platform for developing dApps, who will use the M2FX protocol to enable the Credits token in the MFChain mainnet.
What’s fascinating to see is that we are reaching out to potential partners — not just any blockchain company but the best and the brightest — and they get the vision, they see the value. They understand that by moving beyond the power of one to the power of team, all of us can be immeasurably more successful & impactful. And at the end of the day that’s what it’s all about: having positive impact in the world.