🧭 RUMBO — ISSUE #003

Saludos! Happy Tuesday and welcome to Rumbo, edition 003.

Beatríz Acevedo knows what it means to break every rule in the book.

The three-time Emmy winner who built mitú into a digital media empire is now tackling something even bigger: closing the Latino wealth gap. At 50, when most entrepreneurs scale back, she scaled up, launching SUMA Wealth to rewrite how young Latinos think about money.

So grab your cafecito and dive in. If you enjoy today's edition, please forward it to your gente or share it online. ☕

In Tijuana, when Beatríz Acevedo's mother went into labor in San Diego, her father did something unexpected: he rushed the family across the border. Not away from opportunity, toward identity. He wanted his daughter to be born in Mexico so she could one day run for President.

"That's where I get my confidence," Beatríz says, laughing. "Before I was born, he was already positioning me to be president."

Instead, she became something else: an eight-year-old radio DJ, a three-time Emmy winner, the co-founder of mitú (the leading digital media brand for young Latinos), and now, at 50, the CEO of SUMA Wealth, a fintech company on a mission to close the Latino wealth gap.

But this latest chapter? It almost didn't happen.

"I'm a 'border girl,'" Beatríz explains. "I was born in Tijuana, Mexico. My dad was a super proud Mexicano and he really wanted me to be born in Mexico so I could one day be president of my country, which is never going to happen."

Growing up with one foot in Mexico and another in the United States gave her a hybrid cultural identity she's deeply proud of. "If you think about my work, from my media days to now, when I'm running a fintech company that leans very hard into culture, you can see that," she says.

At eight years old, Beatríz had a plan. "I had a crush on Ricky Martin when he was a kid in this group called Menudo. I thought if I get a show at the radio station when Menudo comes to town I can interview them, we'll fall in love and marry each other."

She brought her demo tape of McDonald's and Toys 'R' Us commercials she'd done voiceover work for, and she made her pitch to the station owner. Her moxie worked. She became the station's young sidekick, learning the ropes every day after school.

By her teens, she was crossing the border daily, school in San Diego during the day, radio from 5-8 pm in Tijuana, TV from 10-11 pm, then back across the border past midnight. She was making money, going to school, and doing what she loved.

At 17, she was given the chance to fly to Chile with Amnesty International to interview the mothers of the disappeared. She won her first Emmy for that work. Two more followed.

In her 20s, filmmaker Robert Rodriguez gave her career-changing advice: sell your car, shoot some pilots, bring your Emmys to a media convention, and "I guarantee you can do anything you want."

She did exactly that. In Las Vegas, overwhelmed at a massive convention, she set up a table with her VHS tapes and three Emmy statues. A gentleman from Discovery stopped by, looking to create travel content for kids. That conversation launched her production company.

By 2012, Beatríz, her husband Doug Greiff, and Roy Burstin launched mitú Network—now the largest Latino digital media company on YouTube with 100 million combined subscribers and 800 million monthly views.

mitú filled a content gap: "On U.S. television, we are represented often in a very stereotypical way, while Spanish-language TV is focused on soap operas, variety shows, and news."

She raised over $50 million and built mitú into a cultural force. In 2020, it was acquired, and Beatríz stepped away.

At 50, she was supposed to be scaling back "the hustle of the startup life."

Then the pandemic hit.

After seeing the pandemic's disproportionate impact on lower-income minorities, Beatríz felt compelled to return to the startup world.

She knew the problem intimately: "My parents were both college-educated, but we never talked about money. At our dinner table, there was never a conversation on money; they did not trust the financial system in Mexico because they had lost everything in one devaluation."

The wealth gap for Latinos sits at about 20 cents to the dollar. And Beatríz realized: financial institutions hadn't figured out how to serve young, U.S.-born Latinos who are English-dominant but culturally Latino.

"Although our community, our youth, prefer to consume content in English digitally, they still want the Latino cultural aspect of it," she explains. "Using that same insight, whether you are in media, fintech, food, or any other industry, and making sure that they feel they belong is key."

Her co-founder, Javier Gutierrez, came up with the idea for SUMA Wealth. But Beatríz faced a challenge: "I'm not a financial person, or at least I wasn't before. I'm a marketing girl."

She enrolled in intensive certification programs at Harvard, Berkeley, and Wharton; courses on everything from fintech to blockchain and cryptocurrencies. "I would read a term and then Google it, read an article, watch a video and then order a book. It was really exhausting the first year."

But she did it. And in 2021, SUMA Wealth launched.

SUMA Wealth is a breakthrough fintech platform that combines culturally intelligent AI with real-world financial tools to serve young U.S. Latinos.

Rather than building a product and hoping to attract users, started by building a brand that conveys it is "by Latinos for Latinos."

For example, the chupacabra, a mythical beast in Latino folklore, is reprised on SUMA as the money-sucking "chupalana," which accompanies instructional content on topics like lowering debt, budgeting, taxes, and investing.

"My mother will tell you she has no money to save and invest, but if it was for someone in her family, she'd give all the money in the world," Beatríz explains. "We're taking those nuances into account."

SUMA gives users an entire wealth-building ecosystem, starting with a free financial "limpia"—not with sage, but data science. Users can see where they stand financially. "You can't improve what you can't measure," Beatríz says.

The company also made history: SUMA boasts the first all-Latina female C-suite in fintech in the U.S.

SUMA raised $7 million, with every funder being female and most being Latina. The round was led by Chingona Ventures.

"I didn't have to explain to any of them why SUMA was important for our community," Beatríz says. "All of them come from that same background: where we grow up not talking about money, not talking about investment, being very confused."

Today, SUMA has close to 600,000 users, crushing their original goal of 150,000.

"Our slogan is 'building wealth juntos.' With everything we do, we ask ourselves, does this help our community build wealth? Is this contributing to closing the wealth gap? If the answer is yes, then amazing. If the answer is no, then we'll pass."

For Beatríz, the work is personal: "As I get older, I think about the contributions that I'm going to leave behind. If I died tomorrow, would I feel I made a difference in the world?"

She wants to know she opened doors for Latinos and Latinas, led them toward success, and helped close the wealth gap so they can start building generational wealth.

"No job is perfect, and no day is perfect. But when you are passionate about what you do, when you love what you do, a problem here or there is very easy to let go. You know that feeling when you think 'I can't believe I get paid to do this?' I've had that feeling so many times in my life."

At the helm of SUMA Wealth, Beatríz harnesses a $182 billion potential market. The platform melds financial tools and cultural education with a community-centric approach that's unparalleled.

She continues to lead The Acevedo Foundation, originally founded by her father in Mexico, now focused on education, wealth creation, and capital access for emerging entrepreneurs and leaders across the U.S.

Her ultimate goal? Happiness. "Being happy is my ultimate goal," she says. "I wake up every day and I am excited to go to work."

The girl whose father wanted her to be President of Mexico became something perhaps more impactful: a bridge-builder between culture and capital, empowering an entire generation to build wealth on their own terms.

Explore SUMA Wealth:
🌐 sumawealth.com
📱 Download the app: iOS | Android
💼 LinkedIn - Beatríz Acevedo
📸 Instagram: @wearesuma

Since this week's story is about financial literacy, this week's tool is SUMA Wealth itself, the app Beatríz built.

What it is:
A fintech platform designed specifically for young U.S. Latinos to build wealth through culturally relevant financial education and tools.

What you get:

Best for:
Young Latinos (18-35) who want to learn about money, build wealth, and understand finances in a way that respects their cultural background.

Why it matters:
The Latino wealth gap is real (20 cents to the dollar). SUMA addresses it by teaching financial literacy in a culturally competent way—using our folklore, understanding our family dynamics, and speaking our language.

→ Download: sumawealth.com

This is Issue #3 of Rumbo.

Beatríz's story is a masterclass in reinvention. At an age when most would coast, she dove into something completely new, teaching herself finance, raising millions, and building a company that addresses one of the most critical challenges facing our community.

Her lesson? "It's never too late to learn and reinvent yourself."

How you can help:

1. Know someone we should feature? We're looking for Latino founders, artists, doctors, creators, professionals—anyone making an impact and building something meaningful. Reply to this email with their name and what they do. We'd love to tell their story.

2. Check out SUMA Wealth. If you're young and Latino or know someone who is, this app could change how they think about money.

3. Found this valuable? Forward it to someone building something or thinking about money differently.

Next week: Another founder, another story, another reason to believe.

Adelante,
Robert Alexander Acosta Seda
Founder, Rumbo

Did you enjoy today's Rumbo newsletter? Please share it with family, friends, and other Hispanic-Latino business owners by forwarding this email or using the link below.

→ rumbo.beehiiv.com

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