Former NLX Chief Takes Interim CEO Job at UK Fintech Body

Charlotte Crosswell will take over as the CEO of Innovate Finance from the end of August 2017 after the departure of Lawrence Wintermeyer, who has held the post since May 2015.

She will lead the group, which was established in 2014 to advocate for UK fintech firms, on an interim basis until a successor for Wintermeyer can be found, the group said in a release.

Crosswell is no stranger to either the fintech space, as a non-executive director of The City UK, another lobby group associated with the UK’s financial sector, and as the former CEO of Nasdaq NLX.

NLX was the US exchange operator’s ill-fated attempt to launch a derivatives exchange, based in London, to challenge rivals for a share of the lucrative European derivatives market. Launched at a time when other US exchange operators were making inroads into the European market—including the Intercontinental Exchange, with its 2012 acquisition of NYSE Euronext, and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Group, with its 2014 launch of CME Europe—NLX proved initially popular but failed to gain lasting traction among market participants.

Nasdaq announced that it would close the venue on January 31, 2017, and it has since been wound down, according to a Nasdaq spokesperson.

Even as interim CEO, Crosswell is taking over at a challenging time for the UK’s fintech sector. London, along with San Francisco and New York, was seen as one of the dominant centers for the fast-growing fintech scene, particularly in terms of start-ups, owing to forward-thinking regulatory initiatives such as Project Innovate from the Financial Conduct Authority, and due to its geographical position and access to Europe.

However, the British vote to leave the European Union on June 24, 2016, heavily impacted London’s standing, thanks to continuing uncertainty over whether the UK will remain in the single market, if European nationals will be allowed to remain in the UK, and over what form a trade treaty—if any—with the EU will take.

This has been reflected in the amount of investment heading into London. Innovate Finance’s own research in February 2017 showed that venture capital inflows for the UK’s fintech sector reached $783 million in 2016—a decline of 34 percent from the previous year.