Thread by @patio11

I ran into motif.com earlier today, which is pretty clearly attempting to RobinHood-style sew up millennials who have money but don’t connect to either mutual funds or the finance industry.

Not sure how I feel about this, honestly.

A younger coworker told me something striking last year: if it weren’t for RobinHood, nobody in his social circle would be investing, at all, due to financial crisis overhang and distrust of the industry.

That strikes me as highly suboptimal, but RobinHood is trying to sell...

...that financially unsophisticated customers should daytrade options spreads on their phones. This, this is going to work out very poorly for most of them.

It appears that Motif is trying to sell “You pick a theme you like, like e.g. SaaS, and we’ll math out a portfolio.”

And if the opportunity to invest in e.g. “Just give me video games” gets people to actually save $1k a month and underperform an index by probably 50bps over the long run... maybe that isn’t *entirely* against their interest? 25 year olds become 35 year olds and learn.

Better to learn and then do the more optimal thing like a Vanguard retirement fund or roboadvisor with the portfolio that has underperformed but exists because you socked away money because it was fun than wake up at age 37 with no investments.