EFEX is a banking platform designed to meet the needs of businesses in Latin America engaged in cross-border trade with the United States.
By focusing on partnering with fintechs and marketplaces that serve SMBs, EFEX addresses a significant gap in the financial infrastructure of Latin America, where companies face barriers in accessing the U.S. market due to the complexities of international banking.
EFEX provides services that enable these businesses to open bank accounts in multiple countries, hold funds in U.S. dollars, and move those funds into their local currencies with instant or forward payments.
Our goal is to help companies in Latin America access the largest economy in the world— the U.S. Mexico, being the closest neighbor and the main trade partner of the U.S. for the past two years, is a natural starting point for us. But the need to facilitate cross-border payments exists across all of Latin America." - Dimitri Zaninovich ( CEO EFEX)
EFEX: The Founders' Vision
EFEX was co-founded by Dimitri Zaninovich and Santiago Bustamante who met as students at Stanford University. Dimitri, who brought extensive experience from his time as Colombia's Vice Minister of Finance and CEO of the National Infrastructure Agency, oversaw projects exceeding $20 billion USD and managed a team of over 2,000 people. Santiago, a seasoned entrepreneur, scaled an EdTech company to more than seven countries, reaching over 1,500 customers. During this journey, Santiago encountered significant challenges with high international payment fees, which consumed nearly 4% of his company’s revenue. This frustration motivated him to develop a solution for entrepreneurs and business operators in Latin America. Sharing their past experiences they identified a significant market gap for cross-border payment solutions specifically designed for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the region.
We saw that businesses in Latin America faced many barriers when trying to trade with the U.S. Complicated, outdated banking systems limited them," Dimitri explains. It was clear to us that if multinational corporations could access sophisticated banking services through big institutions like JP Morgan or Citibank, smaller businesses should have similar tools.
Founders
Dimitri Zaninovich & Santiago Bustamante
EFEX’s Differentiator
One of the main advantages EFEX offers is the ability to simplify the cumbersome process of sending and receiving cross-border payments through their platform.
Latin American businesses typically face a multi-step, manual process that involves multiple communication channels like emails, calls, WhatsApp, banking platforms, and ERPs (Enterprise Resource Planning systems) to track payments and negotiate exchange rates.
This often results in inefficiencies and high transaction costs, with fees that can reach up to $50 per transaction.
"Sending and receiving money is a painful process for businesses. They have to deal with different channels, negotiate exchange rates, and often can’t track when their payments actually arrive. EFEX changes that by providing an intuitive platform and frictionless process that saves 30% of the time spent on cross-border payments. Plus, we don’t charge the usual commissions," says Dimitri.
Further, EFEX’s invoicing feature allows customers to request payments from abroad with ease, enabling the payee to make a domestic transaction instead of navigating the complexity of an international transfer.
This not only saves time but also removes many of the financial hurdles that smaller businesses face.
"A key differentiator is our invoicing feature, which makes it easier for customers to track and collect payments. We essentially erase the borders for our customers' businesses," Dimitri adds.
