Tony Redondo of IPBN member company Cosmos Currency Exchange had a 35-year-long career in the banking and corporate worlds, half of which was spent in the City of London. In 1985, at the age of 19, Tony was working without a computer, email, or internet, when business was carried out in the old school way, when human beings were talking to one another.  

He said, "At the turn of the Millennium, e-mail kicked off, dot com came and went, and computers took over. Now we are in a situation where a lot of financial services, including currency payments, have been completely taken over by technology. For 99% of my competitors, the business model is very simple: Provide a generic self-service platform and an app— a one-size-fits-all approach from the brokers' point of view. It makes an awful lot of sense because you invest the money in creating a very clever algorithm and platform which you then launch with very little overhead.” 

With currency payments, a self-service model creates 2 problems: The first problem for clients is the currency exchange rates change every three seconds. If you have a payment to make, or you're receiving funds from an overseas client, who on Earth has the time to sit there watching the market? And quite frankly, even if you do have the time, would you have the skill set to know what to look for? And it gets even more complex the further down the line you go. 

Cosmos Currency Exchange tips self-service on its head and streamlines what can be an otherwise complicated process.  

Tony explained, “If you are used to the British banking system, we work with a six-digit source code and an 8-digit account number, but we're the only country in the world that does that. If you want to make a payment to Europe, you need an IBAN and a BIC code. If you're to make a payment to the United States, you need an account number, a SWIFT, and routing numbers, and it can be quite daunting for clients to log on to a generic platform, go through security, and do the transaction." 

Tony had been looking to set up Cosmos Currency Exchange for a while. He saw a gap in the market and the rise of the fintech sector, giving him the ability to move into the market with a much lower cost. “Traditionally, you'd set up a currency brokerage like you'd do any business with premises and staff and do everything in-house. With technology these days, I can work with partners remotely in London. They do their back-office bit while I do the front end with a revenue share agreement. 

There are about $7.5 trillion dollars that move through the currency market each day. It's never been easier to have overseas suppliers, overseas clients, or both, meaning that international payments must be made and payments have to be received. The problem is the banking system hasn't kept up.  

According to Tony, "Instead of giving the clients a generic platform and they have to self-service, we do it the old school way without pay-per-click and marketing campaigns— we work by word of mouth, discovery calls, and finally, a bespoke currency payment solution that's unique to the individual criteria of each client, and the transaction is initiated at the optimal time to ensure clients get the most for less."

Cosmos maps out, the journey of the funds, which countries are involved, and what the compliance issues are, and then guides the clients every step of the way, whether they are private individuals or importers, exporters, or businesses with overseas offices or shareholders. Tony concluded, “We cover the whole spectrum.”  

If you are curious about finding out more, contact Tony by email at tonyredondo@cosmoscurrencyexchange.com and start simplifying and saving. To see a brochure about Cosmos services, click here!