There is a specific financial risk that sits in the gap between what a fintech's commercial metrics show and what the underlying economics of the business actually are, and it has a shape I want to describe because the CFOs who can see it clearly are the ones who are governing most completely.
Activation rate is not retention. Retention is not engagement. Engagement is not revenue. Revenue is not profit. In a growth-stage fintech, each of those terms gets used in ways that borrow confidence from the ones above in the chain. Activation rates presented with the confidence of retention. Engagement metrics cited as commercial proof. Revenue that includes cohorts with unit economics that have not been modelled through to their full commercial lifecycle.
The further down that chain your current reporting is living, the further it is from genuine commercial intelligence. The governance gap in between is financial risk, running quietly, until it is not.
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