Chief Compliance Officer, Payoneer Global
Search every verified Micheal Sheehy interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Micheal Sheehy, Chief Compliance Officer at Payoneer Global, stated in a 2022 testimonial for ThetaRay that the company operates as a regulated financial services institution in multiple jurisdictions. He said that Payoneer has over 220 banking partners and operates in a non-face-to-face environment, which he described as challenging for mitigating risks. Sheehy noted that the company has adapted its compliance program to address new typologies, including spikes in COVID-related scams, PPE scams, and loan scams, as well as further exposure to financial crime from the war in Ukraine. Sheehy said that Payoneer selected ThetaRay's Sonar product after a proof of concept in which the company sent manipulated customer data to test detection capabilities. He described machine learning as an important element in the vendor assessment process and stated that the technology allows the company to move away from static, threshold-based rules toward analyzing whether transactions fit a customer's risk profile. Sheehy added that ThetaRay set itself apart through a collaborative partnership approach rather than a vendor relationship, and that the system enables Payoneer to adapt quickly to business and product team needs.
“2022 is a whole different world. Human trafficking, counterfeit goods, drug smuggling, you know, general money laundering. Recently we've seen spikes in, as an industry, related to COVID scams, PPE scams, loan scams where people are defrauding finance institutions to get COVID loans, or selling PPE equipment that doesn...”
“We are a regulated financial services institution, regulated in multiple jurisdictions all over the world. So, we've really had to adapt our compliance program to look at those new typologies.”
“Coming with COVID and the war in the Ukraine, we see further exposure to financial crime. We operate in what we call a non-face-to-face environment. It's a lot more challenging to mitigate those risks associated with those products.”
“We have over 220 banking partners. So, we have to have a top-class compliance program.”
“One of the key factors around our decision making process was how quickly can we make changes to the system. The key was around flexibility. We still operate like a startup. My compliance program needs to be agile and quick to respond to whatever the business or the product teams are coming up with.”
“Historically, we just have this static book of rules that you would just have in your transaction monitoring system and the incorporation of the added layer of machine learning and AI will enable us to adapt and respond to our models and risks a lot faster.”
“Machine learning was a very important element for us in this space that we operate in and it was one of the capabilities that we assessed a lot of vendors on. We'd looked a lot at everyone's machine learning and how it works, but we were super impressed when we went through our proof of concept with Thetaray's Sonar pr...”
“One of the biggest shifts with machine learning is that you move away from treating every customer, every use-case exactly the same, just threshold-based, to really analyzing, does this fit the profile of your risk, what your customer's doing, and you can really segment and analyze that data, and then adjust your model...”
“What Thetaray set apart for us was the collaboration on the relationship. They very much wanted to be a partner with us and not a vendor. We're able to maneuver their system in a very efficient and speedy manner to meet our needs effectively so that we can really focus on the things that we really need to focus on.”
ThetaRay: Payoneer's testimonial video – with Micheal Sheehy, Chief Compliance Officer.
Payoneer's Chief Compliance Officer Micheal Sheehy knows that when you work in over 190 countries and territories, serving ...
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