Paul Lavin - PEP - Promoting Economic Pluralism

Paul Lavin

Paul is CEO and co-founder of startups GiveCredit (previously Lean on a Friend) and Social Kinetic Technologies. GiveCredit uses personal networks and trust as an alternative to data driven decisioning for consumer credit. The approach has broad application but is currently focused on the UK payday market as it is the most dysfunctional market area in need of disruption. The datafication of finance and data driven credit decisioning fails less affluent consumers as their lack of wealth dominates results and deems them �untrustworthy�. SKT uses the same ideas and technology for non-UK regulated activities and is currently focused on a health insurance project in East Africa.

Previously, Paul was a fund manager and founding partner of Goodhart, a global alternative investment firm with a non-consensus investment style. He identified the credit crisis in advance and made money for clients during the event. The issues around the credit crisis spurred a general interest in credit, money and credit-money transactions which ultimately lead to GiveCredit/SKT. General views relevant to the UK payday market have been published here. Paul began his career in finance as an actuarial trainee.