Vice President, Stablecoin and Blockchain Partnerships & Strategy

American Express Digital Labs catalyzes digital innovation across the enterprise by originating, incubating, and scaling emerging products and platforms that are integral to our customers’ digital lives. We combine creativity, customer centricity, and technical excellence to reimagine how Card Members experience payments and membership in an increasingly digital world.

As a fast-moving, entrepreneurial team, we leverage emerging technologies to build differentiated digital payment solutions and engaging membership experiences. We work in close collaboration with leading technology companies and strategic partners to bring innovative products to market and extend the reach of the Amex ecosystem.

Amex Digital Labs is seeking a VP, Stablecoin & Blockchain Partnerships & Strategy to define and operationalize how American Express participates in the next generation of programmable money, stablecoin-enabled payments,  and blockchain-based financial infrastructure. 

This leader will be responsible for working with internal teams and external partners to shape partnership strategy, product direction, concept to launch execution, and ecosystem engagement across stablecoin issuers, blockchain networks, tokenization platforms, and emerging commerce ecosystems. This role is critical in helping influence American Express’s roadmap decisions, platform capabilities, and long-term strategic positioning. 

The successful candidate will work closely with Labs Product, Network, and Enterprise partners to identify opportunities where stablecoins, tokenization, digital identity, and blockchain technologies can enhance customer experiences, unlock new business models, and position American Express for the future of commerce. They will also be deeply tapped into the external environment, track progress and launches by market leaders and competitors and develop deep relationships with key American Express partners in this space, while educating internal stakeholders and translating complex blockchain concepts into decision-ready business, technical, and risk recommendations.

• Define the long-term ecosystem and stablecoin strategy for how American Express engages with stablecoin issuers, tokenization providers, wallets, blockchain networks, and next-generation payment rails, including priority use cases, partner selection, and strategic areas for collaboration. 
• Work with the Labs Product organization to identify and prioritize opportunities across stablecoin payments, tokenized settlement, digital identity, programmable commerce, and blockchain-enabled financial infrastructure.  
• Drive pilots from concept through launch, including business case development, partner diligence, controls, partner onboarding, operating model, launch readiness, and post-launch scaling. 
• Partner with Product and Engineering teams to evaluate future platform requirements, APIs, tokenization approaches, interoperability standards, settlement and reconciliation capabilities, and integration into American Express network technology  
• Lead relationships with partners including stablecoin issuers, blockchain infrastructure providers, wallet platforms, financial institutions, and fintechs.   
• Influence partner roadmaps and strategic product decisioning to inform American Express' blockchain, digital asset strategy, and structure partnerships that support Amex’s product, risk, and commercial objectives.  
• Partner with Go-To-Market team and key partners on risk and control framework across Compliance, Fraud, Legal, Tax, and Controllership.  
• Monitor emerging regulatory, technology, and market developments and translate insights into actionable recommendations.  
• Lead and develop a high-performing team responsible for ecosystem strategy, partnerships, ongoing partner management and pilot execution 

 

• 10+ years in partnerships, technology, product, payments, fintech, or strategy roles.  
• Strong understanding of payments, stablecoins, blockchain infrastructure, tokenization, wallets, and emerging commerce platforms.  
• Ability to influence product strategy and technical roadmaps and translate blockchain capabilities into enterprise platform integrations  
• Experience operating at the intersection of Product, Engineering, and external partners, ideally launching regulated payments, fintech, digital asset, or settlement products from concept to production. 
• Proven experience developing and executing partnership strategies in complex technology or financial services environments.  
• Demonstrated ability to navigate highly matrixed, regulated financial institutions and build coalitions across product, technology, legal, compliance, risk, operations, and commercial teams 
• Experience working in or with large payment networks, banks, processors, PSPs, or scaled financial services platforms; familiarity with American Express processes, governance, or operating model preferred. 
• Strong risk and controls orientation, with experience partnering with legal, compliance, financial crimes, fraud, tax, controllership, and operational teams in regulated environments. 
• Prior leadership experience hiring, coaching, and leading teams to deliver business outcomes.  
• Strong executive communication, negotiation, and stakeholder management skills.  

Employment eligibility to work with American Express in the U.S is required as the company will not pursue visa sponsorship for these positions.