Jenny Just & Matt Hulsizer at Apex’s Ascend Innovation Summit | Standing Table

**Matt Hulsizer** (0:00)
People ask all the time, they always ask Jenny, they're like, how can you work with your husband? No one ever asked me how I work with my wife.

**Jenny Just** (0:08)
We know nobody does it alone. We are in it together. I think one of the reasons why our trading firm has made money for so long is because of the collective. So everybody's eyes are on the same basket.

**Guy** (0:20)
New York City, the finance capital of the world. It has more ambition than one tiny island can handle.

**SPEAKER_4** (0:27)
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.

**Guy** (0:56)
Presented by Apex Fintech Solutions.

**SPEAKER_4** (0:59)
For today's episode, we look back at our conversation with Jenny Just and Matt Hulsizer at Apex Ascend Innovation Summit.

**Guy** (1:07)
Jenny and Matt are co-founders of PEAK6 Investments and have been building successful businesses together since the 90s. In 2012, they bought the company that became Apex Fintech Solutions and helped shape it into the company we know today.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:19)
Oh, and get this. Jenny and Matt aren't just partners in business, they're also partners in life, married since 2003

**Guy** (1:28)
They've made their mark as traders and business operators, and over the years, they've instilled a shared vision that technology can make financial markets more accessible, more efficient, and more inclusive.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:39)
Today, we're sitting down with Jenny and Matt to talk about their journey from building businesses together to building a life together and ultimately building Apex.

**Guy** (1:49)
Well, Guy and I were honored to be here at the Ascend Innovation Conference first annual. Hopefully, we'll get asked back.

**SPEAKER_4** (1:57)
We just got to... At this point?

**Guy** (1:59)
Yeah. We'll see. But we got to spend some time with these two. They couldn't have been more hospitable, so we thought we'd kind of lay it out here, and we'll do it in front of all these guys. Guy, what are we doing here?

**SPEAKER_4** (2:09)
Well, we're going to have a conversation, and we're going to have a conversation about their background, how they wound up together, the amazing companies that they've built, because I think getting to know the back story is always the most interesting thing. So Jenny, I'll start with you. Being a woman in, back then, a male-dominated field, now not so much as anymore, but back then it was, how did you vibe? How did you get going?

**Jenny Just** (2:32)
Well, first, we will introduce ourselves, because we are the owners of Apex. So if that is helpful, we'll give you a little background.

**Matt Hulsizer** (2:39)
Wait, I just want to say, he starts out with back then. I just wonder how old he thinks you are. No, no, I said, I'm just saying. We had a whole conversation.

**Jenny Just** (2:46)
She said when I got out of college.

**SPEAKER_4** (2:47)
I said it was like 2015

**Jenny Just** (2:49)
It feels like the trading floor again. Yeah, I know what it's like. It's okay. As I said earlier, I can take them. Yeah, I started on the Chicago Board of Options Exchange. Matt started on the Apex. We both started with an amazing firm who was very infamous in options trading, O'Connor and Associates. And for me, it was no different than how I grew up. So I grew up with four brothers and down on the trading floor, it was just like roll my eyes, here they go again type of thing. And I was there to do a job. I didn't know anything about options trading. I actually didn't even know I was going to the trading floor. I didn't interview on the trading floor, I interviewed in an office. I was good at math, I answered the questions quickly and I was token female for sure.

**Guy** (3:31)
So Matt, how did you find the one woman on the trading floor? I mean, it seems like, I mean, what was your deal? Were you like, you were a hot shot back then, huh?

**Matt Hulsizer** (3:41)
You know, I came to Chicago actually, to actually meet Jenny.

**Guy** (3:44)
You say that now.

**Matt Hulsizer** (3:45)
Yeah.
I mean, I was, clearly, I was a good investor back then too. We had met because way back then, banks, trading used to be separated. They couldn't really do it. There was this thing called Glass-Steagall. Okay, we got bought. Our trading business got bought by a bank and we're going to go out and create solutions for customers. And so who did decide that they're going to entrust this new business to? But Jenny and myself and another gentleman who was from Goldman Sachs, a more senior, wisened person, which is a terrible mistake. And so we really cut our teeth together, trying to build a business from scratch at Swiss Bank.