Universe Money is a cross-border payments business for corporates, based in the UK and Bulgaria.
The UK based company (Universe Payments Ltd) is regulated by the FCA as an Authorised Payment Institution to carry out payment services and the Bulgarian entity (Universe Technologies Ltd) is registered with the Financial Services Commission as a crypto asset exchange and provider of custodial wallets.
In the UK, crypto is not regulated, however rules related to promotions and investor communications apply. Universe Technologies Ltd operates with a registered cryptoasset firm to provide services in the UK.
The Team
Our leadership team has worked for a number of successful fin tech scale ups including Equals Money, BVNK, PXP Financial, Datacash and Neteller.
Tony Quirke
Chief Executive Officer
Universe Money is led by Tony Quirke, a payments veteran of 20 years, highly experienced in bringing new payment innovations to market.
Tony was formerly CFO of AIM listed payments company Equals Money, specialising in banking and international payments for businesses. He was also part of the founder team of PXP Financial that created a global payment processing business and has been an advisor to various fintech and crypto scale-ups including BVNK and Tap Global.
Des Hellicar-Bowman
Chief Risk and Compliance Officer
The risk and compliance team is led by Des Hellicar-Bowman – an experienced Director of Compliance and Risk and designated MLRO.
Des has 30 years’ experience across banking (HSBC) and payments (Neteller, PXP Financial and Glint Pay)
He has also been an advisor to various fintech scale-ups including BVNK and Tap Global Group plc and is a regular contributor to industry advisory groups around best practice across areas including financial crime, regulatory compliance, Data Protection and European Directives.
Stephen Flynn
Chief Technology Officer
Stephen has 20 years experience designing & directing technology within fintech.
He has extensive experience in bringing new technology platforms to market that cross both traditional payment (swift) and digital (crypto) rails.
His previous fin tech experience was at Aspire Group and Finseta where he led the tech build for their payment platforms..
Vincent von Backstrom
Head of Sales
Having worked in FX, Trade Execution and Payments for over a decade, Vinnie leads the sales team at Universe Money. He helps clients to directly integrate fiat and crypto on/off-ramp solutions and optimise settlement flows.
His expertise in local payment methods, stablecoin settlement and cross-border payout rails benefits corporates, particularly those in high-growth regions such as LATAM, MENA or South East Asia.