Superb Forbes cover story about the trajectory of MoneyLion and its CEO founder, Dee Choubey, on its path to offer a complete, private bank for the $50,000 American household. Over time, the company has become a "product factory" that offers seven financial products, including paycheck advance and brokerage services.
Diwakar (Dee) Choubey was supposed to be an engineer, not an investment banker. Born in Ranchi, India, he came to the U.S. at 4 when his father was finishing a graduate degree in engineering at Syracuse University. The family ended up in New Jersey. Choubey’s mom taught autistic children, while his dad worked as an engineer at Cisco—and plotted his son’s future. When Choubey started at the University of Chicago in 1999, he signed up for a bunch of computer science classes picked by his dad. But after earning a couple of B-minuses, “I cried uncle,” Choubey says. He became an economics major, strengthening his grades and job prospects by taking corporate finance and accounting courses at the business school. After graduating with honors, he went into investment banking, where he remained for the next decade.