Founder of FiDi-Based Financial Tech Company Pleads Guilty to Securities Fraud
A Lower Manhattan resident, who until recently presided over a highly regarded tech startup based in the Financial District, has pleaded guilty to federal charges of securities fraud. Gökçe Güven, a Turkish national, came to America in 2018 to study computer science at the University of California at Berkeley. She moved to New York in 2022, renting at apartment at 70 Pine Street and founding Kalder, a fin-tech marketing platform. Based at 25 Broadway, Kalder promised to help consumer companies monetize their loyalty programs by creating, she predicted, “a world where rewards work like currency—not coupons. Where they move freely between brands, ecosystems, and categories. Where rewards are liquid, measurable, and valuable—a new kind of asset class.” The value proposition, according to statements Ms. Güven made shortly after opening the company, was that client firms could, “embed cash-back and rewards programs directly into their websites, thereby increasing customer engagement and spending.”
To launch this plan, Ms. Güven persuaded the first round of investors to give her $3 million, and also began courting publicity, making the cover of Forbes Magazine. By 2024, she had convinced venture capitalists to hand over $7 million for an equity stake in Kalder on the strength of assurances that 26 large companies had signed on as clients, generating cash flow of $1.2 million per year. This boosted the notional value of the firm to $35 million, and the value of the shares Ms. Güven held personally to approximately $18 million.
“Loyalty is the new currency,” she enthused on social media, adding, “you don’t need a 100-slide deck to start. Just one frustration you can’t shake—and the conviction to build the market no one else sees yet.”
All of these claims now appear to have been a series of fabrications. According to an indictment handed up in January by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of New York, Ms. Güven “concealed the true financial condition of the company from multiple investors by maintaining two sets of books—one internal set containing Kalder’s accurate monthly and annual financial information that was prepared by Kalder’s outside accounting firm, and a second set with false and inflated numbers that was transmitted to investors and prospective investors.” The actual ledgers showed that Kalder was earning approximately one-tenth the revenue Ms. Güven claimed in presentations to investors.
A second form of legal jeopardy arose when Ms. Güven’s student visa expired in 2025. She directed Kalder to sponsor her for an O-14 visa, which is reserved for people with “extraordinary ability in the sciences, education, business, or athletics.” This application contained the same impressive claims she had used to woo investors, but was nonetheless denied. Ms. Güven then had Kalder appeal this decision on her behalf, and bolstered her case with effusive testimonials from two corporate executives.
In fact, according to the federal indictment, Ms. Güven forged both letters, using an elaborate scheme that involved creating fake email addresses, writing the testimonials herself in the name of the purported authors, and then generating DocuSign electronic signatures for them. Last fall, federal officials, persuaded by the amended application for an “extraordinary ability” visa, granted her permission to remain in the United States.
The reprieve was short-lived. At 10:30pm on the night before Thanksgiving, FBI agents knocked on the door of Ms. Güven’s home at 70 Pine Street. She was arrested, and charged with securities fraud, wire fraud, and visa fraud. Last Friday, she pleaded guilty to a single count of securities fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison, and agreed to forfeit $7 million in proceeds from the Kalder scheme. She is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
