David Velez

David Velez founded Nubank in 2013 in Sao Paulo, Brazil, after spending years at Sequoia Capital where he covered Latin American investments. Born in Medellin, Colombia in 1981, he graduated from Stanford University and worked at Morgan Stanley before joining Sequoia. His insight was simple but powerful: Brazil's banking market was an oligopoly where five banks controlled 80% of assets and charged some of the highest fees and interest rates in the world, while delivering poor customer service. Nubank launched with a single product: a no-fee credit card managed entirely through a mobile app, with a distinctive purple color that became iconic in Brazil. The combination of zero fees, excellent customer service, and a modern digital experience drove viral adoption. Nubank grew from zero to 100+ million customers in about a decade — making it the largest digital bank in the world by customer count, larger than any traditional bank's digital customer base globally. The product suite has expanded dramatically beyond the original credit card: checking accounts, personal loans, insurance, investment products, buy-now-pay-later, and business banking. In 2021, Nubank received a full banking license in Brazil and went public on the NYSE at a valuation that briefly made it the most valuable bank in Latin America — more than Itau Unibanco, which had taken over a century to build. Velez's current strategic priorities are proving that massive customer scale translates into sustainable profitability (Nubank has achieved record profits in recent quarters), expanding in Mexico and Colombia where Nubank is still in early stages, and cross-selling higher-margin financial products to its existing base. The key risk is credit quality — as Nubank lends more aggressively in a region prone to economic volatility, any credit deterioration could rapidly erode profitability. But Velez's track record of disciplined execution and his ability to challenge one of the world's most entrenched banking systems make him one of the most consequential fintech founders globally.