Summary
Following the recent TFIP-17 proposal for Extending the TrueFi Foundation Board of DirectorsForum Proposal 3, this statement puts forward Tom Lombardi’s candidacy as a Board Member for the TrueFi DAO Foundation. The following outlines the qualifications, contributions, and new ideas for the role.
Qualifications:
Tom Lombardi has over two decades of experience in investment banking, quantitative finance, and blockchain technologies such as Bitcoin and DeFi. He went “all-in” on his career in crypto in 2016 after the realization of Bitcoin’s value proposition and the launch of the Ethereum network.
Prior to the FTX debacle in 2022, Tom contemplated a concept called ReDeFi.credit to bring more compliance and transparency to on-chain credit markets. Additional industry research can be found here. Tom has not been active within the TrueFi community as of late, but contributed an idea two years ago around increased borrow transparency specific to situations under default and restructuring scenarios.
Experience:
Tom is an Adjunct Professor of Finance at Pepperdine University teaching Crypto Finance in the Business School. He was formerly a Managing Director at 3iQ Digital Asset Management (recently acquired by Monex Group), a firm that launched the world’s first regulated and listed bitcoin closed end fund. Prior to that, Tom was a founding member and Director of Wave Digital Assets in Los Angeles, a Registered Investment Advisor exclusively managing crypto assets. He was also the Head of Growth for the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance, working with global companies on how to embrace blockchain technology.
Tom started his career in investment banking and quantitative finance at Bank of America. After graduating from the Graziadio Business School at Pepperdine University with an MBA, he was an Associate at West Partners private equity firm and the CEO of ParkSleepFly.com (acquired by CAVU). Running a Web2 software company with 23 employees required close collaboration with engineers, designers and marketers for go-to-market launches.
Tom is a student of decentralized markets, financial regulations and emerging market structures, particularly related to the intersection of TradFi and DeFi. He passed the Series 65 securities exam (active) as well as the Series 63, SIE and the CSC in Canada (inactive). See his LinkedIn page for more details.
Contributions:
- Leverage 15 years of TradFi experience with 8 years of crypto/DeFi to navigate TrueFi through market opportunities, risk vectors and the industry evolution.
- Provide guidance from the viewpoint of decentralized lending constituents: borrowers, lenders and portfolio managers.
- Educate potential partners on the TrueFi value proposition of credit creation, lending transparency and the expansive demand base.
New Ideas:
- Optimize for sources of lenders new to Web3 such as family offices, high net worth individuals and bespoke asset managers. This requires new approaches to fiat onramps, diligence requirements and financial reporting integrations.
- Explore Asset Backed Lending (ABL) opportunities to bring well understood structures to Web3 trust models and architecture.
- Find ways to enhance borrower transparency with on-chain metrics, public info monitoring and regular borrower activity updates.
