Rich Teo is the co-founder and CEO of Asia of Paxos, the company issuer of USDP. He leads the company’s regional operations and initiatives. ^[1]

Early Life & Education

Rich received a BBA from the University of Michigan’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business. He majored in Accounting, Finance, Corporate Strategy and International Business. Prior to that, they attended Raffles Institution for their A Levels and Anglo Chinese School for their "O" Levels. ^[2][6]

Rich's interest in financial technology started during his service in the Singapore Armed Forces as a Combat Signaler, where he utilized technology to facilitate communication and logistics coordination among various units. Following his military stint, Rich his career in the finance industry. ^[6]

Career

Richmond Teo has more than a decade of experience in analyzing and investing in public and private financial technology companies. Previous to Paxos, he held the position of Principal at Cedar Hill Capital Partners, where he was responsible for managing the firm's investments across the capital structure of different financial services institutions. He was also a Financial Analyst at Citi, where he focused on mergers and acquisitions involving exchanges, trading technology, banks, and brokers. ^[1][3]

I’m most likely the only person in the room who agrees with your crazy idea. Whether it’s starting a bitcoin exchange in 2012 or betting against the US housing market in 2006, research, knowledge and a bit of imagination goes a long way. ^[5]

Paxos

Teo is the Co-Founder and CEO Asia of Paxos, a financial company responsible for issuing USDP. The company was founded in 2012 and is based in New York City, with offices in London and Singapore. ^[4] He shared his insights on how Web 3, crypto, market volatility, and wealth creation interplay at Bloomberg News’ Asia Wealth Summit:

The crypto market needs a good custodian and a good structure to hold assets on behalf of clients. Paxos provides a crypto brokerage for PayPal and Mercado Libre, and for our tokenized cash business, we hold $20 billion in tokenized assets. That separation is very important—the next wave [of crypto adoption] will see more people choosing to have a separate custodian for transparency, so they know someone’s holding their assets safely. ^[7]

According to reports, in February 2023 the US Securities and Exchange Commission had issued a warning to Paxos Trust Co., indicating the possibility of a legal action. The SEC communicated to Paxos through a Wells Notice that the BUSD listed on the platform might be considered an unregistered security.