Annelise Osborne’s Blockchain, From Hoodies To Suits

Henry Ford said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have told me ‘faster horses.’”

Annelise Osborne uses that quote in her new book, “From Hoodies to Suits: Innovating Digital Assets for Traditional Finance.”

The Westport writer and fintech executive refers not to Model Ts, but to blockchain.

But a century later, the concept is the same: Most people have no idea how to innovate, or what new ideas mean for their lives.

They better pay attention. If they don’t, they’ll get run over — by a car, or a concept they don’t understand.

Osborne has taken a circuitous route to her blockchain book, which was published last week by Wiley. She grew up on the Marshall Islands (where her father did missile work). After William & Mary and Columbia Business School, she began her career in New York.

She’s worked in financial services (including as senior vice president at Moody’s, where she managed the commercial mortgage backed securities conduit surveillance team, responsible for monitoring ratings on $400 billion of bonds), and served on numerous boards.

Since April Osborne has been chief business officer at Kadena, a blockchain firm.

After COVID, she moved to Westport. Like the Marshall Islands, it’s on the water. It’s got great schools for her 3 teenage boys (and, she says happily, a public golf course).

She’s involved with Homes with Hope, rescue dogs — and Startup Westport. The town’s public/private tech entrepreneur group is a perfect fit.

Osborne has gotten to know many of Westport’s most creative minds (a number of whom are women). They, in turn, are interested in what she knows about blockchain.

One way to visualize blockchain. Annelise Osborne offers another way, with words.

Explaining how and why finance is chaining is the goal of her new book. Blockchain, she says, is a $2.6 trillion market “created by (people in) hoodies. But (people in) suits need to understand how and why it’s important.”

Blockchain can save investment companies like Templeton, JP Morgan and KKR enormous sums, says Osborne, through operating efficiencies. In fact, they already have.

And with baby boomers passing down trillions of dollars in assets to (primarily) Gen Z — many of whom get investment information from “finfluencers,” who understand blockchain technology, and seek non-traditional types of companies to invest in — it behooves the suits to understand what the hoodies are doing and thinking.

Osborne notes that the lines between the two groups is blurring. When Mark Zuckerberg testified before Congress recently, he ditched his trademark look for a more traditional one.

Osborne calls her book “a Michael Lewis-type read.” It’s filled with stories that blockchain-challenged people can understand.

Annelise Osborne (holding book), with (from left) Doug Bross, Zac Mathias and Marion Jones, at this month’s launch party at Mexicue.

This being Westport — a town with plenty of suits, and a growing number of hoodies — Osborne thanks several locals in her book. They include Keith Styrcula, founder and CEO of Glasstower Digital; investment manager Ilka Gregory; Gregg Bell, senior vice president of The HBAR Foundation, and Patrick O’Kain, a partner at RW3 Ventures.

The book has created a bit of buzz. She sold 75 in 10 minutes at an Austin crypto conference. It sold out on Amazon , and topped the charts in a couple of new release categories.

Osborne now heads out on a book tour, to financial capitals around the world.

What’s ahead? She’s keeping her eye on even more efficiencies in finance, including “programmable money.” Bonds can pay themselves interest; look out for automated margin calls.

You heard it here first, from Annelise Osborne — a Westport financial whiz wearing neither a hoodie nor a suit.