Written by Spencer Hulse

November 12, 2025 — Alex Tkachenko is a technology entrepreneur who has repeatedly built startups at the intersection of finance and technology. He founded Fira, an AI platform for investment firms (now backed by Y Combinator), and earlier created and successfully sold Hodler, a cryptocurrency portfolio-tracking app. Along the way, he also launched Hashscan, a blockchain analytics startup. Alex’s journey, from crypto enthusiast to AI visionary, has been shaped by both setbacks and bold pivots, and it reflects his ambition to elevate productivity in the financial industry by leveraging LLM technology.

Early Ambitions: From Computer Science to Cryptocurrency

Alex grew up fascinated by technology. He said he always loved building projects like mobile apps or making money in crypto. He studied computer science, but by his junior year, the standard curriculum had become boring. Seeking real-world experience, he took a gap year, interning in the United States and later spending a semester as an exchange student in Germany. These experiences broadened his technical skills and showed him new possibilities beyond the classroom.

With a bachelor’s degree, Alex faced two major career choices. One offer was to work part-time for a Silicon Valley startup; another was a final onsite interview with Google in Paris, but he decided to build his own projects, a decision that was fueled by a sense of being an outsider and a desire to succeed independently.

Not long after, Alex found the first big success of his career: Hodler, a mobile app to track cryptocurrency portfolios. Although details of Hodler’s early days are private, Alex noted the app was eventually created and sold to its users. The Hodler exit marked a milestone that validated his skills as a builder and gave him confidence in pursuing larger ideas.

Blockchain Analytics in the Crosswinds of War

In early 2022, Alex moved to London, while continuing work on his new project. By this time, he had already started building Hashscan, a blockchain analytics platform designed to make sense of cryptocurrency transaction data. He worked on Hashscan under challenging conditions: in his words, coding literally living in Airbnbs in different cities as he and his team found safe places to stay.

Despite the instability, Alex kept Hashscan moving forward. The London tech community became a temporary home, allowing him to focus on the startup. Hashscan’s aim was to bring transparency to the blockchain space by analyzing transactions and network activity, a fitting next step after Hodler’s focus on individual portfolios. While Hashscan was smaller in scale than Hodler or Fira, it demonstrated Alex’s ability to execute under pressure and to keep innovating even during a crisis.

Pivoting to AI: Founding Fira for Finance

By 2024, after Hashscan, Alex saw a new opportunity in financial technology that would form the basis of his next company. He had learned something important from his personal life: his partner works in finance, and he was struck by how many talented financial analysts were doing repetitive, manual work. “They hire the smartest, most active and ambitious people to work on repetitive tasks for at least 3–5 years,” he said. He noted that many bankers spend extra late hours creating reports or slides in PowerPoint and Excel, tasks he believes AI could easily automate.

Convinced that AI would soon permeate the finance industry, he turned his attention to building tools for that future. From a business perspective, there’s no way AI will not be everywhere in the financial industry in 3–5 years, he said, noting that AI can handle most existing data tasks if integrated properly. Seeing this trend, he decided to pivot from blockchain to artificial intelligence. But the move came with its own challenges. Alex found that fundraising in AI required traditional tech credentials, degrees, or experience at big tech firms, which he didn’t have. He wrote that transitioning from crypto to AI was a bit tough because crypto funding was merit-based and anonymous, whereas AI investors require credentials.

To overcome this gap, Alex planned a strategic move: get into Y Combinator (YC) to gain credibility. “Being a technical founder, I saw YC as my best chance to get the credibility needed to get into the financial industry,” he said. He applied and was accepted on purpose, using the program to validate the concept and gain investor attention.

The result of this effort was Fira, an early-stage startup building an AI-powered research and productivity platform for investment firms. Fira’s mission, as Alex puts it, is to build new AI products for investment firms, helping with research and productivity. He said that even though the company is too young for major traction or funding news, the core idea is clear: with Fira’s tools, people will have so much stuff automated. In other words, he wants analysts to spend their time on insight and strategy, not busywork.

Challenges and Resilience

Alex’s journey has not been a straight line. Beyond the obvious disruptions of war and visa issues, he has grappled with the typical trials of startup life. He describes feeling like an outsider after the Google rejections, a sentiment that motivated him to prove himself on an independent path. He also learned that great ideas require hard work and persistence: quoting Steve Jobs, he noted that you cannot convince someone to work hard if they don’t want to. For him, this underscores the importance of being surrounded by a dedicated team, and of being the kind of founder who genuinely drives projects forward.

One key lesson he shares is the importance of being a first mover. In the fast-changing AI cycle, he believed it’s better to first fact with a unique idea than to try copying others. This insight continues to shape how he approaches Fira: by focusing on novel solutions for finance, he aims to stay ahead of competitors.

Above all, Alex’s experiences have only reinforced his commitment to his goals. After each setback, whether war, interview rejection or visa denial, he doubled down on his vision. Today, as he leads Fira through Y Combinator’s program, he leverages those past challenges as fuel. His list of highlights underscores this resilience: a global relocation, a pivot from crypto to AI, and the successful bootstrap of multiple companies against the odds.

A Vision for the Future

Looking ahead, Alex Tkachenko’s ambitions remain as expansive as ever. He said his primary goal is to build a uniquely successful company, ideally one of a kind. Fira is the vehicle for that ambition, aimed squarely at an industry eager for innovation. By automating the tedious parts of financial research and workflow, he believes Fira can give analysts and portfolio managers more capacity for creative and strategic work. In his view, this mission transcends any single product: it’s about reshaping an industry.

Ultimately, what drives Alex is a conviction that technology, especially AI, can make finance more efficient and engaging. From his earliest days coding crypto apps to his latest codebases in London, his journey has been about one thing: spotting friction in the financial world and using tech to solve it. As he often points out, the smartest people in finance shouldn’t be stuck with mundane tasks for years. If Fira succeeds, those people will get those hours back.

With each venture, Alex Tkachenko has demonstrated a combination of technical skill and bold determination. His story, of bouncing back from rejection, building businesses in flight, and embracing cutting-edge technology, illustrates why he stands out as an entrepreneur. As he moves forward with Fira under Y Combinator’s wing, the future he’s building will test that vision. By all accounts, he is doing it one automated task at a time, driven by the goal of creating something truly unique.

This industry announcement article is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice.