Celebrating CUSOs Series: Female Fintech Founders You Need to Know
Just 2.3% of global venture capital went to female-only founding teams in 2024, and if you attended any fintech conferences this year, you know the gender gap is obvious.
“Fintech has some of the lowest investment rates into women-founded companies despite being the sector with the highest capacity for outsized economic and systemic impact.”
Quote from the December 5, 2025 Fintech is Femme issue.
Turns out, the industry best positioned to close this gap is the one that's always put people over profit: credit unions are already proving it can be done differently.
Credit Unions Lead on Women in Leadership
According to a Credit Union National Association (now America’s Credit Unions) study, 51% of credit union CEOs are women - nearly 15 times higher than banks, where just 3% of CEOs are female.
This isn't accidental. Credit unions were built on a "people helping people" mission, and that ethos extends to who we hire, who we promote, and increasingly, who we invest in.
At One Washington Financial, we believe our investment strategy should reflect the same values that define credit union leadership. That's why we're intentional about funding diverse founding teams - including female-led fintechs solving real problems for financial institutions and their members.
OWF by the Numbers
31% of OWF's early-stage investments have gone to female founders - that’s 9x the 3.4% that female-led fintech companies received industry-wide.
This isn't charity. This isn’t the result of an initiative focused on female founders or making an impact… our decision to invest in female founders is simply smart investing.
Research consistently shows that female-founded companies generate 78 cents of revenue for every dollar raised, compared to just 31 cents for male-founded startups. They also consistently burn 15% less capital. The performance is there. The bottleneck isn't pipeline or performance; it's allocation.
Meet the Female Founders in Our Portfolio
We're proud to back female founders who are building essential infrastructure for credit unions and their members. Learn more about these powerful fintech leaders paving the way for credit union innovation:
Crissi Cole | Penny Finance
Crissi is a former Goldman Sachs wealth manager who spent a decade watching talented women struggle with basic financial planning because they couldn't meet the $100k minimums required for traditional advisors.
Penny is an online financial planning platform designed specifically for pre-wealth Americans - helping credit unions attract and retain the digital generation with tailored education and personalized guidance.
Gwyneth Borden | Remynt
Gwyneth brings over 20 years of public policy experience spanning Capitol Hill, IBM, and civic leadership roles. She founded Remynt in 2022 after experiencing firsthand how broken the debt collection system is.
Remynt is transforming debt collection from fear-and-shame tactics into credit recovery. Their digital-first platform helps credit unions recover delinquent debt while empowering members to rebuild their credit.
Rhian Horgan | Silvur
Rhian spent 17 years at JP Morgan as a Managing Director, where she led alternative investment strategies and advised families on wealth planning. She founded Silvur after watching her own parents struggle to navigate retirement decisions.
Silvur is an award-winning retirement platform helping Americans over 50 retire with confidence. Silvur partners with credit unions to deliver holistic retirement planning, turning their biggest borrowers into their biggest depositors.
Cara Oppenheimer | Goodbuy
Cara spent 17 years as a Creative Director at major agencies, leading campaigns for brands like Intel, Samsung, and McDonald's. She co-founded Goodbuy in 2021 to redirect the shopping habits she spent her career shaping - away from mega-retailers and toward small, values-aligned businesses.
Goodbuy is a conscious shopping platform that helps consumers easily find and support small, diverse, and values-aligned businesses.
Cary Telander Fortin | Goodbuy
Cary is a serial entrepreneur, best-selling author, and consumer psychology expert whose work has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Oprah Magazine.
Goodbuy includes a browser extension that redirects shoppers from big-box retailers to alternatives that are woman-owned, Black-owned, LGBTQ+-owned, veteran-owned, and more - putting purchasing power behind the values consumers care about.
Alison Alvarez | BlastPoint
Alison spent over a decade building big data tools for media, automotive, and banking companies before co-founding BlastPoint in 2016. A first-generation college graduate with two master's degrees from Carnegie Mellon, she was named Inc.'s 2025 Female Founders 500 and Pittsburgh's 2023 Founder of the Year.
BlastPoint uses AI-powered customer intelligence to help credit unions understand member behavior and predict needs.
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