Mobility Capital Finance, a fintech company with a presence in both Newark (NJ) and Harlem (NYC), hosted a summit focused on the growing societal challenges of wealth inequality and the impact of sports and entertainment on community revitalization.
The summit, themed “And Finance for All”, was sponsored by Audible, Equifax, Facebook, Mastercard, Newark Venture Partners, and Prudential, featured conversations with Dr. Naomi Zewde, Columbia University research scientist; Oliver “Power” Grant, Co-Founder of Wu-Tang Productions and Founder of Wu Wear; Professor William “Bill” Easterly of NYU; Aisha Glover, President & CEO of the Newark Alliance; Eddie Bright, Jr., founder, Sports U/Team Izod; Sophia Chang, author and veteran talent executive; DuPre “Do It All” Kelly, entertainer and activist; and, Joanne Lin, Principal, Newark Venture Partners.
MoCaFi is a mobile-first platform that leverages technology and data to facilitate financial inclusion for historically marginalized communities. Wole Coaxum founded MoCaFi in 2016. Prior to starting MoCaFi, Wole served as Managing Director at JPMorgan where he held a series of leadership positions in Business Banking, Card Services, and Treasury & Securities Services. Wole designed MoCaFi as a tool to reimagine financial services for individuals and small businesses to ensure that all Americans have access to safe, affordable and credit-building financial products and services.
“Wealth inequality is one of this country’s most pressing issues. A Black family today has the same level of wealth that they had 25+ years ago, around $15,000 which is 10% of the average white family. The median wealth of a single Black woman is $200 compared to her single white male counterpart which is $28,900,” said Coaxum. “[Newark] is a city that has momentum and is undergoing a serious transition. We want to take advantage of this moment, in this place, to demonstrate how a community can close the wealth gap and provide a new path for people to improve their lives.”
The Summit, hosted by Coaxum, also presented MoCaFi with an opportunity to reveal its upcoming partnership with the iconic hip-hop brand, the Wu-Tang Clan. The initiative, under the name TRIUMPH, will be, an “economic mobility movement” that will provide mentorship and resources for aspiring entrepreneurs of color.
“40% of the venture capital in this country goes to graduates of Harvard and Stanford, despite the fact that there are 5,300 other colleges and universities in this country,” he added. “We know that one of the most significant barriers to the creation of business is access to knowledge and capital, so we are launching TRIUMPH as a startup school and seed fund for aspiring Black and Latinx entrepreneurs. Our goal is to teach founders how to validate a product, how to develop a business model, and how to raise money.”
TRIUMPH will launch a series of online courses via Facebook, workshops combined with concerts, and pitch competitions beginning in 2020. The inaugural events will kick off in Newark. For more information, go to getmocafi.com/wutang.
Miguel Gamino, Jr., Executive Vice President for Global Cities at Mastercard, spoke on behalf of Mastercard, which is also a partner to MoCaFi:
“We have to assemble rooms like this to try to do what we can collectively to ensure that the digital economy and the digital transformation that is happening in this world reaches everybody everywhere.”
Aisha Glover, President, and CEO, of the Newark Alliance, spoke on behalf of the efforts that are being done by the City of Newark to consider wealth inequality:
“We can’t program our way out of this. These barriers and challenges are systemic. They were done purposefully and intentionally, and we must approach the work that way, as well. The benefit of having an alliance in the City is having folks committed to moving the needle forward. The work has to be disruptive; it cannot be “feel-good”. We are really trying to create systemic change.”
Dr. Naomi Zewde, a Columbia Research scientist, wrote a paper on how universal baby bonds reduce Black/White inequality and could progressively raise the net worth of young adults. She explains the impact of this proposal:
“Today, if you’re looking at the net worth of young adult households, the median white household has 16 times the wealth of the median Black household. With baby bonds, this would be reduced to a factor of 1.4 and it would cost less than 10% of Social Security. The only way this gets done is to become politicized.”
Professor William “Bill” Easterly, NYU Economics Professor and author of, “The White Man’s Burden: How the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good”:
“I think it’s always entrepreneurs that come from the community itself that are the answer. The world found that it had pretty lousy world banking experts, but it had 7.1 billion other anti-poverty experts that were pretty good at reducing their own poverty.”
Oliver “Power” Grant, Co-Founder Wu-Tang Productions and Founder Wu-Wear:
“The Wu-Tang Clan story is based on the following values: knowledge, freedom, equality, justice and economic mobility. With MoCaFi, we are going to create a new paradigm to empower our communities. All great movements start from the bottom-up with the people. It is time for us to empower people so we can have more success stories like the Wu-Tang Clan. This partnership allows us to deliver on that promise.
Joanne Lin, Principal, Newark Venture Partners
“We think about community context, and communities that do not have access to economic activity and opportunities are more prone to widening the racial wealth gap. [Newark Venture Partners] want to provide access to opportunities to capital for early-stage tech entrepreneurs. We want to showcase everything that the city of Newark has to offer for tech entrepreneurs.”
