Michael Tannenbaum

Chief executive of Figure

Michael Tannenbaum is chief executive officer of Figure Technology Solutions. Figure announced on April 23, 2024 that he had become CEO and joined its board, succeeding co-founder Mike Cagney, who became executive chairman. Cagney described the company as being in a pivotal period of growth. At the time Tannenbaum was Brex's chief operating officer and remained on the Brex board.^[1][2]

Figure describes its business in three parts: lending, which includes home equity lines of credit, cash-out refinancing, debt-service-coverage-ratio loans and crypto-backed loans; markets, which includes the Onchain Public Equity Network, Democratized Prime and the YLDS product; and partnerships with lenders, brokers, banks, credit unions and others. Cagney founded the company in 2018 to build online lending on a blockchain, starting with a digitally processed home equity loan that Figure said could cut approval time to five minutes.^[1][2]

Earlier career: banking, private equity and SoFi

In a 2023 interview Tannenbaum said he moved into startups from banking and private equity, and that he came to see additional years in finance-oriented roles as having diminishing value for startup work. Figure's announcement describes him as having been chief revenue officer at SoFi before Brex, while a Brex profile page describes his earlier SoFi job as vice president of finance, so published accounts of his title there differ.^[2][3][4]

He said that he was promoted six times at SoFi and that the experience shaped his belief in promoting from within, which he sees as a way to build loyalty and effort. He also noted that managers who promote internally take a personal risk, since they stake their reputation on someone growing into a role the person has not yet held.^[3]

Seven years at Brex

Tannenbaum joined Brex as its first employee and spent seven years there, according to the Figure announcement, helping take the company from a three-person startup to a global business with about 1,200 employees and a multibillion-dollar valuation. Brex describes itself as a spend-management platform for finance teams and founders. The Fintech Leaders interview put its valuation at 12 billion dollars as of January 2022.^[2][3]

His Brex profile says he helped launch the company in its earliest days by setting up the first office, establishing bank relationships and managing capital markets work, and that he led the June 2018 marketing launch and the San Francisco campaign the company became known for. He said that co-founders Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi were younger than he was but had already started and sold a payments company, and that he deferred to their expertise in technology and company building.^[3][4]

In March 2023, when Silicon Valley Bank collapsed, he coordinated Brex's work across fraud, credit, capital markets, partnerships and internal risk, according to his Brex profile. In the interview he explained that Brex chose not to bid for the whole bank because of the regulatory burden, and was instead interested in taking over the bank's card customers.^[3][4]

How he describes his approach

In the advice posted on his Brex profile, Tannenbaum recommends shipping an early version quickly and using feedback to improve it, reasoning from first principles by breaking a problem into written analysis, building one team rather than siloed sub-teams, and hiring people who can eventually take over your work. These are his stated principles rather than assessments by outside reviewers.^[4]

The 2025 IPO

Figure priced its initial public offering at 25 dollars a share on September 10, 2025, selling 31.5 million Class A shares to raise 787.5 million dollars at a valuation of about 5.29 billion dollars, above its revised range of 20 to 22 dollars. Shares began trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker FIGR the next day. Goldman Sachs, Jefferies and BofA Securities were joint lead bookrunners, and HousingWire reported a 50 million dollar cornerstone order from Duquesne, the family office of Stanley Druckenmiller.^[5]

At the IPO, Figure said it could fund home equity loans in 10 days against an industry average of 42, and reported more than 17 billion dollars in originations, over 200,000 borrowers and 170 partners. Its chief capital officer said the company planned to expand beyond mortgages into other digital lending products.^[5]

2026: record volume and the Kiavi acquisition

For the first quarter of 2026 Figure reported Consumer Loan Marketplace volume of 2.9 billion dollars, up 113 percent, net revenue of 167 million dollars, up 98 percent, net income of 45 million dollars and adjusted EBITDA of 83 million dollars. It added a record 80 partners to reach 387 active partners, and Tannenbaum called the results exceptional.^[6]

On June 10, 2026 Figure announced it would acquire Kiavi, a residential transition loan lender, for 717 million dollars, and HousingWire reported the deal completed on September 1, 2026. Kiavi operates as a Figure subsidiary and its residential transition and DSCR loan products are offered through Figure Connect, Figure's blockchain-based credit marketplace. Figure expects the deal to add more than 7 billion dollars a year in first-lien volume to Figure Connect, and says it and its partners have originated over 30 billion dollars of loans on the platform. Tannenbaum said the deal accelerates the company's roadmap by expanding its marketplace.^[7]

Why he matters

Tannenbaum is an operator who moved from running the business side of a high-growth fintech to leading a newly public company that is trying to move lending and capital markets onto a blockchain. His tenure at Figure so far has combined a public listing, a sharp rise in marketplace volume and its largest acquisition, which makes the company an important test of whether on-chain credit can operate at the scale of traditional mortgage platforms.^[5][6][7]

On The Executive List

Michael Tannenbaum is ranked No. 9 on The Executive List (October 2026) in the Chief Financial Officers discipline. The Executive List edition records him under his Brex role; he has since become chief executive of Figure Technology Solutions and remains a Brex board member. The ranking reflects The Executive Review's own editorial Trending Score; it is not an outside award, and placement on the list is never sold. View the October 2026 edition.