Joel Hodroff is an international authority on the use of noncash financial instruments for commercial and economic development applications.  In 2005, he was selected an Innovator of the Year by Minnesota’s Finance and Commerce newspaper.  Joel is also the Founder of Minnesota-based DualCurrency Systems (DCS).
DCS designs programs and systems at the intersection of loyalty marketing, credit card services and payment systems.  In 1997, the company was awarded two U.S. Patents for its novel DualCurrency Pricing, Accounting and Transaction Settlement system.  The system manages transactions in a combination of U.S. dollars and noncash financial instruments, such as loyalty rewards, barter dollars or business scrip. 

DCS developed Universal Reward SolutionsSM for the incentives industry to optimize redemption while enhancing customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. The same DualCurrency payment system and Virtual Community Warehouse also manages innovative incentive programs, including wellness incentives that lower employer and employee health care costs and volunteer rewards that promote healthy communities. 

The genesis of DualCurrency Commerce occurred during Joel’s years as a commercial barter broker.  There he began to design a method of blending B2B barter with C2C (individual to individual) barter into a system of large-scale B2C barter.  He eventually integrated corporate scrip — frequent flyer miles, hotel scrip and other business currencies — into the DualCurrency approach, creating a highly versatile new financial instrument and a next generation payments platform. 

Joel gained his early entrepreneurial experience as the Founder and President of Solar Consultants, Inc. in Albuquerque, NM.  An informative and entertaining speaker, his groundbreaking work in DualCurrency Commerce is documented in The Future of Money by Bernard Lietaer, The New Alchemists by David Boyle, and the Japanese Public Television Documentary Ende’s Warning to the Future.

Joel has been invited to present DualCurrency solutions to executives at: VISA, US Bank, Wells Fargo, MoneyGram, United Airlines, Chase Bank, Thrivent Financial, United Healthcare, Digital River, and elsewhere.