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Every cross border payment gets checked twice. Once by the sending bank, once by the receiving bank. Nobody questions why. This week I speak with Richard Beverley, CEO and Founder of Block Infrastructure, and he makes the case (and solution) that screening it once, not twice, is the fix the industry has been avoiding.
Block Infrastructure runs two products built on the same idea: share verified data instead of duplicating it. It streamlines KYC and KYB verification so institutions don't recheck what's already been confirmed. Its transaction screening product pre screens payments for sanctions and compliance risk using zero knowledge screening, so no bank has to expose its own customer data to do it.
We get into why AI turns ambiguous compliance "maybes" into fast, binary decisions, how a five person team plus an army of AI agents now replaces what used to take a full engineering department, why chasing niche markets beats going straight at the big banks, and the founder lesson that nobody will ever treat you as their priority, plus Richard's honest read on Founders burnout.
What you'll learn
- Why screening a payment once instead of twice cuts compliance cost and closes the FX gap that makes cross border payments expensive
- How screening lets banks catch sanctioned payments without exposing their own customer data
- How AI turns ambiguous compliance maybes into fast, binary yes or no decisions
- Why founding teams now pair a handful of senior engineers with AI agents instead of scaling headcount, cutting costs six to sevenfold
- Why not adopting AI now is the fastest way to fall permanently behind
- Why chasing niche, fast moving markets before big banks is the smarter go-to-market sequence
- Why resilience, not a great idea, is what actually gets a fintech founder through the sales cycle
Timestamps
00:29 — Why financial services is "built wrong"
04:16 — Why chasing big banks first will burn your capital
06:24 — The hidden cost: compliance gets checked twice
09:23 — $2.9 billion lost last year in compliance holds
14:24 — Why correspondent banks are disappearing
20:37 — How Block Infrastructure screens for sanctions
28:12 — Adopt AI now, or "reinvent the wheel"
35:15 — The biggest founder mistake: nobody is your priority
40:04 — Five engineers and an army of AI agents
45:51 — The honest answer on founder burnout in the AI era
👉Connect with Richard:
Block Infrastructure: https://www.linkedin.com/company/block-infrastructure/home/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richard-beverley-1044431a/
👉Connect with Monica
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/monicamillares/
Purpose Driven FinTech. English: https://www.youtube.com/@monica_millares/videos
Purpose Driven FinTech. Spanish: https://www.youtube.com/@MonicaMillares_Español/videos
Disclaimer: This episode does not constitute professional nor financial advice and does not represent the opinion nor views of my current, past, or future employers. The guest has agreed to record and release our conversation for the use of this podcast and promotion on social media.
