Bill Harris at The Dead Rabbit | Standing Table #8

**Guy** (0:00)
Elon Musk, what was your impression? Forget about what we know about him today.

**Bill Harris** (0:03)
He was the boldest thinker I had ever met.

**Dan** (0:07)
Well, he got fired from PayPal.

**Bill Harris** (0:09)
Everybody got fired from PayPal. I got fired, Peter got fired. Every morning, it was unclear who was going to be CEO that day.

**Dan** (0:17)
New York City, the finance capital of the world. It has more ambition than one tiny island can handle.

**Guy** (0:23)
And it's not a bad place to get a bite to eat either. For three decades, we've made it here on the markets, calling our shots and always speaking our minds. But the best conversations happen across the table.
So pull up a chair while we break bread with founders, CEOs and creators, all in the iconic spots that define the greatest city on earth. This is Standing Table.

**Dan** (0:52)
Presented by Apex Fintech Solutions.

**Guy** (0:59)
Welcome to Manhattan's Financial District. To us, it feels like home.
We're just a stone's throw away from Wall Street, grabbing a pint at the Dead Rabbit, a New York bar that embodies the grind and grit of the early Irish settlers who inspired its name.

**Dan** (1:15)
Since opening in 2013, it's become a New York institution, known for craft cocktails, classic Irish fare, and better yet, a perfect pint of Guinness.

**Guy** (1:24)
Today, we're sharing one with serial entrepreneur and operator Bill Harris, best known as an early CEO of PayPal. Bill is a veteran fintech executive who's also served as CEO of Intuit.

**Dan** (1:37)
He later founded Personal Capital, a digital wealth management firm that grew to manage billions in assets before being acquired. Andy is now founder and CEO of Evergreen, continuing to innovate in financial technology and investment management.

**Guy** (1:52)
Have you ever been to The Dead Rabbit before?

**Bill Harris** (1:54)
I have never been to The Dead Rabbit.

**Guy** (1:55)
Have you seen The Dead Rabbit? I heard you were a bit of a farmer back in the day.

**Bill Harris** (1:59)
Gentlemen farmer.

**Guy** (2:00)
Gentlemen farmer.

**Bill Harris** (2:00)
I have smacked my rabbits with a shovel. Yes, I have.

**Guy** (2:03)
Is that a metaphor? By the way, I think of Dead Rabbit and my mind goes to that movie with, if you remember, Michael Douglas and Glenn Close. I mean, that scene was ridiculous.

**Bill Harris** (2:13)
I'm sure they got that joke.

**Guy** (2:14)
Well, it's the first thing I thought of.

**Bill Harris** (2:16)
Plus, Marty Python.

**Guy** (2:17)
Yes, look at you old school.

**Bill Harris** (2:20)
Okay. Listen, if we're going to talk about who's old school. No, that would be me.

**Guy** (2:24)
Well, thanks for joining us here. We have a lot to talk about.

**Dan** (2:27)
Yeah, we do. I mean, the career in fintech before is called fintech, right?

**Bill Harris** (2:34)
Right. It was called financial software.

**Dan** (2:36)
That's right. It was fairly prolific. Back then, you guys were looking to disintermediate or disrupt a bunch of really stayed financial institutions. Does that make sense?

**Bill Harris** (2:46)
It does make sense. And by the way, they're not all that much farther along today.

**Dan** (2:50)
Is that right? So we're going to hit some of the stuff that you've been focused on. I mean, for Guy and me, you know, Guy, you've been doing vast money on CBC.

**Guy** (2:56)
Almost 20 years. Bill, you watch the show religiously, I'm sure.

**Bill Harris** (2:59)
Religiously.

**Dan** (3:00)
Except that, you know what?

**Guy** (3:01)
That's bullshit because you don't have a television set.

**Bill Harris** (3:04)
What? I catch the clips.

**Guy** (3:07)
No, you don't.

**Bill Harris** (3:07)
Yes, I do. On the YouTube.

**Dan** (3:11)
So Guy, actually, you started the show back in 06, 7 You know, it's interesting. I mean, the markets have changed a lot, right? The way market participants interact with information, news and trade, all that sort of stuff. Hugely.

**Bill Harris** (3:24)
By the way, the markets have changed, but the way consumers, the way investors interact with the market has changed dramatically.

**Dan** (3:30)
That's where I was going to go because it seems like there's a through line in your career. It's about financial literacy. Does that make sense in a way? This is something that Guy and I-

**Bill Harris** (3:39)
I would say also financial access.

**Dan** (3:41)
Yeah.
That's, I think, one of the biggest things you're getting to is the democratization of a lot of these tools. So for us, we struggle between- the show's called Fast Money, right? What happened today in the markets? What might happen tomorrow? But sometimes we don't have the time to actually break it down what people should be doing. So at some point, you probably got it in your head, like there's a really interesting opportunity, not just to disrupt through technology, but really do it through knowledge. Does that make some sense?