Harald Plewka joins FoxPay as Chief Legal Officer

Payment infrastructure only becomes truly reliable when law, compliance, and technology converge. For FoxPay, this is not a late-stage add-on; it is a core part of building the platform. That is why we are pleased to welcome Harald Plewka as Chief Legal Officer (CLO) to the FoxPay leadership team.

Harald brings decades of legal and tax experience – and he leads HPL Plewka & Coll. LLP, an international advisory network that operates exactly where FoxPay is growing: at the intersection of regulatory requirements, complex business models, and international clients.

Legal and compliance as a growth driver

Payments are a regulated business. Merchant onboarding, contract structures, data protection, anti-money-laundering controls, licensing questions, and the handling of high-risk industries are not side issues – they are part of the product core. The faster FoxPay grows and the more countries, industries, and methods it adds, the more important a clear, forward-looking legal strategy becomes.

A CLO at FoxPay therefore means more than a traditional legal department. Harald works directly at the intersection of product, partnerships, and regulatory safeguarding. He helps design payment flows that remain legally sound, operationally scalable, and transparent for merchants.

Who Harald Plewka is

Harald Plewka is the founder of the international HPL network of lawyers, tax advisors, and business advisors. Professionally based in London, he advises national and international clients on structured finance, debt and equity capital markets, corporate finance, M&A, crypto law, and corporate law. He is admitted to the bar and licensed as a tax advisor in Frankfurt, registered as a European lawyer in London, Luxembourg, and Vienna, and licensed as a legal consultant in Dubai.

After studying law in Münster, he served as a senior officer in the German tax administration in Düsseldorf, then as a judge at the Düsseldorf State Tax Court and later at the Federal Fiscal Court in Munich. Since 1994 he has practised as a lawyer and tax advisor. Before founding HPL, he was an equity partner at leading international law firms including Haarmann Hemmelrath & Partner, Gleiss Lutz Hootz Hirsch, and Bird & Bird. He is a member of the German Banking Association and other professional bodies and publishes regularly on German and international tax law.

This combination of administration, judiciary, BigLaw, and his own network makes him a partner who can quickly classify complex matters and solve them pragmatically – exactly what a growing payment platform needs.

HPL as a strategic partner for FoxPay

HPL Plewka & Coll. LLP is an international consultancy boutique network with specialists in corporate law, real estate, structured finance, debt and equity capital markets, M&A, fund structuring, IP law, tax planning, corporate finance, and business development. The network links its own offices in London, Frankfurt, Dubai, Dhaka, Luxembourg, Vienna, and Santo Domingo with a global external expert network.

That matters for FoxPay because payments do not stop at the border. Merchants sell internationally, operate under different legal forms, and encounter questions in regulated industries that an isolated local perspective cannot answer. HPL provides exactly that international legal breadth – tailored, experienced, and at the highest level.

What this means for merchants and partners

More legal clarity during onboarding

Merchants benefit when contracts, terms, privacy documentation, and risk assessments are reviewed earlier and more thoroughly. This reduces back-and-forth and makes the path to live operations more predictable.

A stronger compliance foundation

Whether KYB, AML, regulatory reporting, or industry-specific requirements: with Harald as CLO, FoxPay gets a clear compliance line that is built into product and process from the start, not added afterwards.

International scaling

Anyone active in multiple markets needs more than a single local legal opinion. The HPL network enables FoxPay to classify international clients and complex structures correctly from day one.

Faster decisions in complex cases

Not every payment case fits a standard checklist. When it comes to regulatory edge cases, new methods, or unusual business models, an experienced legal network helps reach a reliable assessment more quickly.

A clear signal to the market

Appointing Harald Plewka as CLO shows how FoxPay is positioning itself: as a payment platform that takes demanding merchants seriously. Not through last-minute legal advice, but through a legal and compliance culture that becomes part of day-to-day operations.

For partners, investors, and merchants, this is a concrete signal: FoxPay is building not just fast, but sustainably. And it is doing so with a team that understands that good payment infrastructure is ultimately also good legal infrastructure.