Suggestions
Robert Belsky
VP of Finance @ Trellis | Founder of Bob's Bookkeepers: Finance for Fashion | Investor & Advisor
Robert Belsky is the VP of Finance at Trellis Law and the Founder of Bob's Bookkeepers: Finance.4 He has a strong presence on LinkedIn, where he regularly shares insights and updates related to finance, bookkeeping, and business.34
Professional Background
Robert Belsky is known for his:
- Profound work ethic
- Attention to detail
- Ambition
- Willingness to succeed1
These qualities are evident in his character and professional approach.
Expertise and Interests
Robert's LinkedIn activity shows that he is passionate about:
- Financial systems and behaviors: He helps busy professionals create effective money management systems for both personal and business finances.3
- Bookkeeping and CFO services: He often uses hashtags like #bookkeeping and #cfo in his posts, indicating his focus on these areas.3
- Banking and finance industry trends: He shares insights on topics such as regional banks and their strategies.4
LinkedIn Presence
Robert Belsky's LinkedIn profile can be found under the username "robert-belsky".2 He is quite active on the platform, sharing articles, insights, and updates related to his field of expertise. His profile demonstrates a strong professional network, with over 337 connections.2
Robert's engagement on LinkedIn showcases his expertise in finance and his commitment to sharing valuable information with his network, positioning him as a thought leader in his field.
Highlights
Synthetic risk transfer - a new name for an old behavior. Regional banks are selling CDS on different loan pools, focusing on auto loans at this point. The risk may be spread, but it doesn't disappear. There are some similarities to '08. Depending on how concentrated these risks become, we could see some systemic issues. Incentives at smaller banks are still not right.
At the end of the article there's this gem of a quote - "If defaults on the auto loans exceed projections, the fund could take a loss."
The optimist in me thinks investors are likely mindful of the lessons from '08 and are accurately forecasting these defaults.
But the pessimist sees a lot of unchanged behavior and incentives from back then. Who is on the hook if the bank goes under? Will we let the investors hold the bag?
https://shorturl.at/BNIIz
#RiskManagement #Banking #Finance #Investing
Two things are fascinating about the Wells Fargo, Bilt partnership that went sour (but is trying to be resuscitated):
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How easy it is for internal revenue projections to be wrong -- the card program is losing $10M a month for Wells. User behavior in payments businesses is just tough to forecast. The bad assumption was around likelihood that cardholders would carry balances. In this high-interest rate environment, you can earn good interest on deposits. The spread between that and the rewards points can still be lucrative if they find ways to drive deposits up. It's not a bad bet, they probably just overweighted the revenue contribution from interest income in the model.
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How important long-term contracts can be -- "Wells has told Bilt that it doesn’t intend to renew the contract, which is scheduled to end in 2029, unless economics are changed in its favor." -- Bilt has another 5 years to make this work. With that amount of time, there's a lot a startup can do to shift things in their favor and make the partnership work.
