Max Levchin on why Affirm wants to be your smarter older sister

If I couldn't write code anymore, I would feel like I'm missing a, a finger.

Like it, it, it's that core to sort of how I think of who I am.

As an engineering first CEO, I know exactly what it'll take.

I know what I would do.

I know what prompts I would write.

I know which agent I would use.

I know which set of techniques would apply here.

It's exciting for me, but it's also I think more compelling as you tell people, "Hey, like, we're gonna go take this hill, and it'll be fun, it'll be faster than you've ever seen, it will be 10X more productive." And they get to believe me, because they know I actually know how to do this.

I, I, I'm not just sort of reading it in the newspaper.

Today, on The CEO Signal, we're talking to Max Levchin, the founder and CEO of Affirm, a company built to challenge the way traditional consumer credit works.

Affirm began with a simple idea, but a pretty radical one, lenders should not make more money when borrowers fall behind.

That idea took Affirm from a checkout option to a public company.

The challenge is how he turns this disruptive model into a lasting business at scale.

From Semaphore, this is The CEO Signal.

If I couldn't write code anymore, I would feel like I'm missing a, a finger.

Like it, it, it's that core to sort of how I think of who I am.

As an engineering first CEO, I know exactly what it'll take.

I know what I would do.

I know what prompts I would write.

I know which agent I would use.

I know which set of techniques would apply here.

It's exciting for me, but it's also I think more compelling as you tell people, "Hey, like, we're gonna go take this hill, and it'll be fun, it'll be faster than you've ever seen, it will be 10X more productive." And they get to believe me, because they know I actually know how to do this.

I, I, I'm not just sort of reading it in the newspaper.

Today, on The CEO Signal, we're talking to Max Levchin, the founder and CEO of Affirm, a company built to challenge the way traditional consumer credit works.

Affirm began with a simple idea, but a pretty radical one, lenders should not make more money when borrowers fall behind.

That idea took Affirm from a checkout option to a public company.

The challenge is how he turns this disruptive model into a lasting business at scale.

From Semaphore, this is The CEO Signal.