Bcause LLC, creator of the first full-stack cryptocurrency ecosystem, announced today the results of its Board of Managers and Chairman elections certified at its Board meeting last night. Members of the Board of Managers elected Karan Rai as the new Chairman of the Board.
Shareholders of the privately held company elected five new directors – including three highly accomplished financial industry veterans specializing in futures, clearing, and securities and derivatives law and compliance; a cryptocurrency expert from the firm’s lead investor, and one of the company’s founders.
Fred Grede, Bcause CEO, said:
We have been steadily assembling a world-class team to help us implement our vision of providing a full ecosystem of quality cryptocurrency offerings – from digital ‘mining’ and spot, to derivatives and clearing. This election ensures that we have on our Board and team many of the leading minds not only in cryptocurrency, cybersecurity, infrastructure and technology, but also in finance and derivatives. We’re honored to benefit from the advice, counsel and direction of our newest Board members.
Karan Rai is founder and CEO of ASGARD Partners & Co., a New York based investment and advisory firm. He has served on the Board of Bcause since September 2016 and has been affiliated with the company since 2013. He was previously CEO of Theodor Wille Intertrade Inc. and President of ADS Inc. Prior to that Rai was with JPMorgan’s investment banking practice in New York. He was appointed in August to the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council.
The newest Board members elected are:
- Jerry Chan, a veteran of financial technology and cryptocurrency, who serves as Chief of Digital Asset Solutions of SBI BITS, the fintech arm of Tokyo-based SBI Holdings. SBI became the lead investor in Bcause following a Series A equity raise last fall. Chan is also Chief Strategy Officer of SBI Crypto. He held positions at Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan before entering the field of cryptocurrencies, including at Bitcoin start-ups in Japan and ultimately at SBI.
- Scott E. Early, a retired attorney as of 2012 from Foley & Lardner, America’s oldest law firm. With 38 years of legal practice, Early is nationally recognized as one of America’s Best Attorneys for Derivatives. He served as General Counsel to the Chicago Board of Trade, Kansas City Board of Trade and numerous other exchanges. He also was the CEO and General Counsel of the Board of Trade Clearing Corp. (BOTCC) when it was the largest derivatives clearing organization in the world. He has testified before the U.S. Congress on numerous occasions regarding financial issues and legislation, and he has tried lawsuits in state and federal court on a wide variety of financial issues. His clients have ranged from individual traders to the world’s largest investment and commercial banks.
- Ronald H. Filler, a more than 35-year veteran of the futures industry. Filler is Professor of Law and Director of the Financial Services Law Institute at New York Law School who has also served as the Program Director of the school’s LL.M. in Financial Services Law Graduate Program. He is a Public Director and Executive Committee member of the National Futures Association and a Past Chair of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Global Markets Advisory Committee. Filler previously was a Managing Director in the Capital Markets Prime Services Division at Lehman Brothers Inc. Before joining Lehman in 1993, he was a Partner and Executive Committee member of Chicago law firm Vedder Price Kaufman & Kammholz.
- Thomas Hammond, who served as President of ICE Clear U.S. for nearly 10 years until his retirement on Jan. 1 last year. Soon after, he was inducted into the FIA Futures Hall of Fame for his accomplishments in the industry over 37 years. Hammond has served as a board member of AtlasBanc Holdings Corporation since July. He also participates on the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank’s Working Group on Financial Markets. Before joining CME Group in 2003, Hammond served as CEO, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of BOTCC.
- Chris Sikes, one of the founders of Bcause, with more than 25 years of experience in management, information technology (IT), data center operations and computer security. Sikes is the Computer Security Official and IT Project Manager in the Center Operations Directorate at NASA Langley Research Center, and he previously served on the Because Board and as Board Secretary for three years until January 2017. He also served as the company’s Manager of IT Infrastructure and Security. Before joining NASA in 2013, Sikes was the Manager of the Systems Administration and Security group for Jacobs Technology, one of the nation’s largest engineering and technical services-only companies. He also served as Project Lead – Enterprise Applications and then Area Manager for Northrop Grumman and as Systems Manager for Langley Federal Credit Union from 2001 through 2009.
Continuing to serve their terms on the Board are:
- Michael Adolphi, also Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer of Bcause
- Dr. John Ashby, Jr., Founder of Ashby Orthodontics and an owner of US Computing
- Thomas Flake, Founder, Chief Marketing Officer and Treasurer of Bcause
- Jonathan Tanemori, Chief Business Development Officer of SBI BITS