🔒Serial entrepreneur Glyman launches fintech to help banks manage stablecoin payments

Instant payments are moving closer to mainstream banking. That’s the message Peter Glyman, founder and CEO of fintech startup Coinbax Inc., has for banks and financial services companies about the future of digital payments and money transfers — a pitch investors recently backed with a $4.2 million seed funding round. Based in Essex, Coinbax is developing technology to give banks and other businesses greater control over transactions that use stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency that, unlike bitcoin, is designed to hold a steady value. To achieve that stability, stablecoins are typically tied to traditional assets like the U.S. dollar and can be used to move money quickly over blockchain networks. Today, most electronic payments still move through traditional rails like the Automated Clearing House network, which can take days to settle. Newer options such as Real-Time Payments and the Federal Reserve’s FedNow Service offer faster transfers, but Glyman believes banks will increasingly need tools to manage the risks and controls tied to instant, blockchain-based payments. He says Coinbax’s systems are aimed at giving financial institutions more oversight of stablecoin transactions, helping make instant payments more secure and manageable.

Right place, right time

Glyman previously built and sold a fintech company. He co-founded Geezeo in 2006, a Tolland-based firm that developed personal finance management software for banks and credit unions. The company was acquired in 2019 for an undisclosed sum by Missouri-based Jack Henry & Associates. After the sale, Glyman joined Jack Henry as managing director of corporate strategy, a shift he described as a welcome change after more than a decade running a startup. The role gave him a deeper view into how financial institutions operate. At Geezeo, he said, the focus was on consumer budgeting and money management tools. At Jack Henry, his work touched lending, payments and core processing systems — the infrastructure that supports day-to-day banking. “I wouldn’t be able to do what I’m doing now if I didn’t do what I did at Jack Henry,” Glyman said. The job also allowed him to explore cryptocurrency more directly with banks and credit unions. That experience sharpened his view of how digital assets — particularly stablecoins — could fit into mainstream financial services. While adoption has grown globally, Glyman said U.S. banks and credit unions have faced “a lot of starts and stops” because regulations limited how they could participate. That began to shift in 2025, when Congress approved the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, known as the GENIUS Act, and the Digital Asset Market Structure Clarity Act.

Feds provide clarity

The GENIUS Act established nationwide guardrails for stablecoins, while the Clarity Act set more predictable rules for the broader digital asset market. “The GENIUS Act was critical; I wouldn’t be doing Coinbax if it wasn’t for the GENIUS Act,” Glyman said. “It really lit the wick, if you will, for the newfound enthusiasm from financial institutions of how do they get into this?” He said the laws eased concerns among banks and credit unions that regulators could block their involvement in crypto-related activity. Glyman also saw an opportunity in one of banking’s persistent pain points: moving large sums of money, particularly across borders, can be complex, costly and slow. Stablecoins, he said, offer a way to streamline that process. “I really think this is the future of money movement,” Glyman said. “One feature of stablecoin is faster payments … at the speed of email. We send you money, you get it. And we can send you a penny, or we could send you $100 million — it doesn’t matter. It goes wallet to wallet, nobody in the middle.”

Still, while instant digital payments sounds good at first, he admits that mistakes can happen. Payments can be sent to the wrong account, or to a scammer, “or maybe you just change your mind,” he said. “Instant settlement is great, until it’s not,” he added. Glyman believes blockchain technology can address that issue by building controls and safeguards directly into how transactions are processed. That concept became the foundation for Coinbax — a name meant to signal the ability to “get your coins back,” he said. He initially outlined the idea in a white paper focused on e-commerce, but quickly shifted toward business-to-business, cross-border and institutional payments after receiving strong industry feedback.

$4.2M raised

Glyman left Jack Henry in September to focus on Coinbax full-time. The startup now has five employees and in December raised $4.2 million in seed funding, including a $500,000 investment from Connecticut Innovations, the state’s quasi-public venture arm.

Douglas Roth, CI’s managing director of investments, said Glyman’s track record in fintech was a key factor that drove the investment. Glyman “is just a really impressive guy,” Roth said, adding that being a serial entrepreneur in a heavily regulated industry “is super important.” He also wasn’t concerned about the fact that Coinbax is a very young company. “At CI, we invest in very young companies,” Roth said. As the state’s venture capital arm, CI has two main goals — generate a return on investment that is commensurate with the risk being taken, and economic development benefits for the state. “Obviously, when it’s a super young company, it’s highly risky and therefore needs to generate a very high return on investment,” Roth said, adding that Coinbax has the potential to achieve both goals. He also noted that stablecoins, because their value is linked to an asset, are much more conservative than Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies. “I think stablecoin can play a predominant role deeper in the infrastructure of financial services and payments,” Roth said. “It can help to make more efficient, and fast and cheap, the processing of payments.” He added that Glyman’s industry relationships should help the company gain traction. Coinbax in January joined the Jack Henry Fintech Integration Network, which provides a framework for third-party fintech firms to integrate with Jack Henry’s core banking systems.

Digital wallets

Glyman said he expects Coinbax to grow to as many as 10 employees by the end of 2026, and 15 to 20 the following year. He said the seed funding supports that plan, noting the company relies heavily on artificial intelligence and Google Cloud tools to keep overhead low. “We have a small team, but we’re operating like we have 15 people” thanks to AI, he said. Chief Technology Officer Justin Seidl is leading development of Coinbax’s administrative platform and integrations across multiple blockchains, along with payment “templates” designed for different transaction types and stages. Glyman said the company is working toward a minimum viable product that can be piloted with customers. His goal is to sign about six clients by year-end and expand from there. Longer term, he wants Coinbax to become a go-to provider for banks and financial services firms seeking what he calls a compliant, programmable layer within their payment systems. Cross-border transactions are an early focus, he said, because international money movement remains costly and complex. He believes broader adoption of digital wallets is coming quickly. “I really believe that in the next three years, every bank account has a (digital) wallet associated with it,” he said. “So that’s coming.”