Commerce Conversations · 2026-01-16 · 27 min
Setting the Stage: What Is First-Party Fraud? First-party fraud = authenticated, fully KYC’d customers who are who they say they are… but “not doing nice things” (abuse, friendly fraud, promo gaming). Shanthi Shanmugam After 2021 - 2022, banks and deposit-heavy institutions saw a double-digit increase in fraud losses tied to their own customers rather than external attackers. Shanthi Shanmugam Traditional fraud stacks focus on onboarding and transaction gating; disputes and first-party fraud sit in an operational backwater with little data science or investment. Shanthi Shanmugam Shanthi’s Path to the Problem (Robinhood, Chime, and Disputes) Shanthi spent six years at Robinhood working on everything but fraud (crypto launches, redesigns, support) until GameStop-era volumes forced her into the world of disputes. Shanthi Shanmugam She and her co-founder (ex-Chime) both realized a bad dispute experience was one of the top reasons a customer stopped using them as a primary financial relationship. Shanthi Shanmugam Institutions spend heavily to acquire customers at the front door and quietly lose them out the back door when disputes feel slow, opaque, or unfair.
Why Banks Can't Afford to Wait on Tokenized Deposits, with Jon Briggs71 / 100Building Bank-Grade Infrastructure for the Next Generation of FinTechs, with Tom BiancoWhat’s Coming in 2026: The Commerce Ventures Predictions EpisodeThe New Era of Embedded Payments, with Brandon LloydTokenized Deposits: The Next Payments Rail, with Tom Brown