coindesk.com
Lazaro Campos, the former CEO of Swift, the global financial messaging network, has joined London-based stablecoin yield company OpenTrade as chairman.
The appointment, announced Friday, comes nearly six months after the firm raised $17 million to expand its operations. It brings a former head of one of the world’s largest banking networks to a company helping fintechs, exchanges and digital wallets offer returns on stablecoin balances.
OpenTrade said Campos will help it expand as more financial firms adopt stablecoins.
“I've spent most of my career on the infrastructure the world uses to move money. Stablecoins are the next chapter, and yield is what makes them useful to businesses and the people they serve,” Campos said.
OpenTrade said it has processed more than $1 billion in transactions over the past 12 months and now holds $300 million in total value locked (TVL), a measure of assets deposited in its platform. In May, when it announced its funding round, the company reported more than $200 million in assets locked and $250 million in transaction volume over the preceding year.
Campos previously led Swift, a financial network that connects more than 11,000 financial institutions worldwide and moves up to $1.5 quadrillion annually. During his tenure at Swift, the network’s transaction volumes nearly doubled, according to OpenTrade.
He also served on the Bank of England’s Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) infrastructure and the Clearing House Automated Payment System (CHAPS) board and on the board of digital bank Starling. He currently chairs Payoneer Europe.
OpenTrade, founded in 2023, provides infrastructure that lets businesses offer dollar- and euro-denominated returns backed by real-world assets (RWAs), without building their own investment systems.
Mercury Fund and Notion Capital led the company’s May funding round with participation from a16z crypto, AlbionVC and CMCC Global. It has raised $32 million to date.
CEO David Sutter said Campos will help the company expand its services as more financial firms adopt stablecoins.
