Welcome to pacs.002

I’m Carolina. I’ve spent the last eight years working in payments. First at a bank, then as a founder, and most recently working with startups in the space.

pacs.002 was born out of personal curiosity during one of those, “wait, how does that work?” moments.

After all this time, somehow this industry still manages to surprise me. Some things confuse me. Some things excite me. Occasionally, the same thing does both. That’s probably because payments are evolving fast, and also because payments are extremely complex.

That complexity can be hard to explain, there are too many reasons, but they all boil down to one: it’s all so fragmented. So many players. So many banks. So many networks. So many providers. And oh so many startups. The infrastructure stretches deep, wide, sideways, and occasionally into places you didn’t know existed.

That fragmentation doesn’t stop at the infrastructure. It shows up in the knowledge base too, where the pieces don’t always come together.

pacs.002 is meant to be that: a place where those scattered pieces can start to connect. A source of knowledge where innovation can sit at the same table as institutional knowledge, without presenting a subjective commentary about the future of payments.

Where payments will go next is uncertain, and everyone is welcome to have their own interpretation. My goal is to make those interpretations grounded in a deeper understanding of the fundamental principles behind a complex ecosystem that finds itself in seemingly constant motion.