FINTECH IN BRAZIL I SPEAKERS' BIOS

BRUNO BALDUCCINI, Partner, Pinheiro Neto Advogados

Bruno Balduccini has been a partner at Pinheiro Neto Advogados since 2001, and is based in the firm’s São Paulo office.  His fields of expertise are banking regulations; business law; corporate law; financing; investments; M&A; exchange controls; payments; insurance and reinsurance; fintechs and crypto currencies. In addition to his practice in Pinheiro Neto Advogados, he has been a Standing Member of the São Paulo Lawyers Institute (IASP),  of the Banking Law Committee at the OAB (Brazilian Bar Association) and of the Financial Committee of the Brazilian Institute of Business Law (IBRADEMP). Mr. Balduccini holds an LLB from Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo - PUC (1992), and an LLM in International Banking Law from Boston University (1998). He was admitted to the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB) in 1993. He was a foreign associate at Sullivan & Cromwell in New York for one year (1998 - 1999). He is fluent in Portuguese, English and Italian.

ANDRE BOTELHO BASTOS, Co-founder & CFO REBEL

Andre majored in Industrial Engineering at PUC-RJ, and holds an MBA in Logistics and Supply Chain from COPPEAD-UFRJ, as well as an MBA in Business from New York University. He begun his career in Brazil with trainee programs at Johnson Wax and Shell. In 2007, he joined Ideiasnet as a financial analyst and grew to work as a business partner sourcing and analyzing venture deals. He was also a partner at Ipanema Ventures before moving to New York, where he worked at Valor Capital Group and HSBC with M&A. In 2014, he joined Enova in Chicago and met his current partner. Prior to starting REBEL in 2017 he also lead cash flow at Kraft Heinz in Chicago.

LEANDRO MOLINA, Partner, CKR Law LLP

Leandro Molina has over 14 years of experience working as a corporate finance lawyer. He has provided advice to Brazilian and foreign clients accessing the U.S. market, as well as to U.S. companies and funds investing in Brazil and other Latin American countries. Mr. Molina has worked on numerous transactions, counseling and providing assistance in a wide range of projects in Latin America and worldwide, including private equity, venture capital, investment fund structuring and structured finance deals, financing, M&A's and joint-ventures. He has also assisted family offices and VC players in portfolio investments in equity and debt, as well as in other corporate and securities law matters.
Prior to joining CKR Law LLP, Mr. Molina was a senior associate of Pinheiro Neto Advogados, in São Paulo (Brazil) where he practiced for more than 10 years. Earlier in his career, he was a foreign associate at Greenberg Traurig in Miami.

MARCELO FERREIRA, Managing Partner, CHROMO INVEST

Marcelo Damasceno Ferreira,  Managing Partner of Chromo Invest, based in theUS. spent most of his career as a consultant for Arthur Andersen and other firms in the field of controllership, strategy and finance. Holds an engineering degreefrom Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, a Master’s in production Engineer from Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina and advanced degrees in Corporate Finance from Berkeley and an AMP from Harvard Business School. Mr. Ferreira served as a Board Member of Hospital Moinhos de Vento in Porto Alegre – Brazil, an affiliated hospital of Johns Hopkins University in Latin America, as well as Director of Instituto JAMA, a NGO focus on Education in Brazil. Mr. Ferreira is a Gran Fondo road biker in Florida, as well as an avid reader and a mentor for young college students.

JACKSON HWU, Partner, CKR Law LLP

Jackson Hwu is a corporate attorney with more than 20 years of cross-border transactional experience representing U.S. and international clients in corporate advising, mergers and acquisitions, private equity/venture capital transactions and securities offerings (including digital currency).

Mr. Hwu is a trusted adviser to several family offices and investors from Brazil and Latin America in the U.S. Mr. Hwu, a native Brazilian, has developed a unique skillset in representing Brazilian and LatAm emerging growth companies in corporate structuring, VC financing rounds, acquisitions and exits (including Fintechs, Edtechs, Legaltech, Insurtech, E-commerce and AI-enabled companies). He also represents Latin American conglomerates and corporations in all facets of expanding their operations (organically or through acquisitions) into the U.S. and Europe.

Prior to joining CKR Law LLP, Mr. Hwu was the co-founder of PAG, a boutique law firm in Miami focused in venture capital and middle-market corporate and securities transactions. Mr. Hwu acted as Deputy General Counsel for Dufry AG, a public Swiss travel retail company with global operations and as transaction counsel for a major Chicago-based financial services firm (Guggenheim Partners). Earlier in his career, he was a corporate associate at Sidley & Austin (Chicago), Barack Ferrazzano (Chicago) and Weil, Gotshal & Manges (New York). He started his career as a capital markets counsel for Unibanco (now Banco Itaú-Unibanco) in São Paulo, Brazil.