Today Fnality International announced the appointment of Michelle Neal as CEO after Bloomberg reported last month that founding CEO Rhomaois Rham was planning to step down from the wholesale DLT payments firm. Ms Neal is currently EVP and Head of Markets at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (NY Fed) and will join Fnality in Q1 2025. She has extensive industry experience at BNY Mellon, Deutsche Bank, Nomura, RBC and the Royal Bank of Scotland.
Fnality is the DLT settlement platform that launched its Sterling Fnality Payment System last year, with backing from 20 global institutions. Angus Fletcher is the CEO of Fnality UK. The company’s system relies on an omnibus central bank account which holds funds to back the tokenized central bank money. It has plans to launch US dollar and euro solutions, which would require the approval of the relevant central banks.
Late last year Fnality’s prospects of a US push improved when the DTCC and Goldman Sachs joined as investors. At the NY Fed, Ms Neal is responsible for an $8 trillion balance sheet and implementing market operations. Hence, were the Fed to consider approving Fnality, having her as CEO might give them peace of mind.
Given Fnality’s multi jurisdictional focus, it also helps that Ms Neal has spent significant parts of her career on both London and New York.
DLT and digital asset experience
Additionally, she has knowledge and experience with DLT. The NY Fed has its NY Innovation Center, which has been involved in research for tokenized deposits, wholesale CBDC and cross border payments. Ms Neal is the Executive Sponsor for the Innovation Advisory Council.
She also was an interim advisor for LedgerEdge, a blockchain-based trading platform for corporate bonds founded by David Rutter, the CEO of enterprise blockchain firm R3. She advised the company for nine months prior to its launch in May 2022. It shuttered last year after failing to gain traction. Hence, Ms Neal is aware of some of the challenges in the space.
“We express sincere thanks to Rhom for his outstanding leadership since the inception of Fnality,” said David Eisner, Fnality Board Chair. “We are thrilled to welcome Michelle to the company at a tremendously exciting time, as Fnality prepares for geographical expansion and accelerating adoption of the digital financial ecosystem that the Sterling Fnality Payment System is already uniquely driving. Her experience as a leader in our industry speaks for itself, and our Board is convinced that she will be a driver of enormous momentum and growth at Fnality.”
Meanwhile, when we reported on Mr Rham’s planned departure, we explored Fnality’s prospects in more depth, including the likely need for another funding round.
