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Addepar, the WealthTech powerhouse behind one of the most widely adopted investment data platforms, has announced a $230 million Series G funding round, propelling its valuation to $3.25 billion. Co-led by Vitruvian Partners and returning backer WestCap, with participation from 8VC, Valor Equity Partners, and new investor EDBI (via SG Growth Capital), this round signals more than just a capital injection, it marks a strategic turning point for Addepar and WealthTech at large.    A Private Credit-Focused Round    Unlike traditional equity raises, this round is designed primarily as a private credit-style tender offer, providing liquidity for long-standing employees and early investors. In simple terms, it allows stakeholders to realize gains from their contributions while keeping Addepar’s ownership concentrated among committed long-term investors. This is becoming an increasingly popular route for mature, high-growth FinTechs seeking to balance employee retention, investor returns, and capital efficiency without the immediate pressures of public markets.    From Financial Crisis Roots to WealthTech Titan    Founded in 2009 by Joe Lonsdale in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, Addepar was built to solve a core problem: the lack of reliable, transparent investment data for complex portfolios. What began as a data aggregation platform has since evolved into a comprehensive operating system for investment professionals, empowering RIAs, family offices, institutional investors, and banks to manage over $7 trillion in assets.    Addepar’s growth trajectory has been steady and strategic. Prior to this round, the firm raised $150 million in Series F funding in 2021 (at a $2 billion valuation) and $117 million in 2020. With over $700 million raised to date, Addepar has stayed focused on long-term innovation, investing over $100 million annually in R&D and positioning itself to achieve profitability in 2025.    Addepar’s Expanding Influence in WealthTech    What sets Addepar apart is its ability to scale while staying deeply attuned to its clients’ evolving needs. Adding $25 billion in new assets weekly, and serving over 1,200 client firms across 50+ countries, Addepar’s platform has become indispensable for wealth managers navigating volatile markets and increasingly complex client demands.    This funding round reinforces Addepar’s commitment to continuous innovation such as expanding product capabilities, enhancing client experiences, and broadening its global footprint. Recent partnerships, like the 2024 deal with Corient Private Wealth, showcase Addepar’s role as a critical enabler in the wealth management ecosystem.    The Bigger Picture   Addepar’s Series G comes at a time when WealthTech is maturing beyond its startup roots. The convergence of data transparency, personalization, and digital client engagement is reshaping how investment professionals operate. Private markets are playing an outsized role in this transformation, as firms like Addepar leverage private credit-style liquidity events to fuel growth without diluting strategic control.    This approach reflects a broader WealthTech trend: sustainable scaling over speculative growth. As RIAs consolidate, alternative investments go mainstream, and investor expectations rise, platforms like Addepar are positioning themselves as the foundational infrastructure for the next era of wealth management.    In Summary    Addepar’s $230 million Series G isn’t just a headline-grabbing funding round, it’s a signal of WealthTech’s evolution. By blending private credit mechanisms with a relentless focus on product innovation and client success, Addepar is charting a path that many others in the space are likely to follow. As WealthTech continues to mature, Addepar’s journey serves as a case study in balancing growth, liquidity, and long-term vision.

In a move that underscores the continued strength of strategic M&A across WealthTech, Germany’s Fincite and France’s Harvest have announced their merger, bringing together two of Europe’s leading B2B wealth management software providers. Backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Montagu, the merger sets the stage for a new European champion in digital wealth management infrastructure.    Operating under the Harvest banner, the combined business will serve financial institutions across Europe with a full-stack offering that spans onboarding, KYC/AML, digital advice, execution, and reporting. Their goal is to simplify fragmented tech stacks and deliver more integrated, modular solutions to banks, insurers, and asset managers as they navigate rapid digital transformation.    Both companies bring significant strengths: Harvest with its strong presence in France, and Fincite with a deep client base in the DACH region (Germany (D), Austria (A), and Switzerland (CH). Their shared vision is to accelerate growth through acquisition, enter new markets (Benelux, Italy, Northern Europe), and double revenue within four years.    This is more than just scale. It’s about synergy. As legacy systems strain to keep up with client expectations, wealth managers are consolidating their vendor relationships, looking for flexible platforms that can handle the full advisory lifecycle. This merger directly responds to that demand and reflects a broader WealthTech trend: strategic M&A as a tool not just for growth, but for delivering true platform unification.    Both brands will remain operational, with Fincite co-founder Ralf Heim joining the Harvest Group board to help lead this next chapter.    At a time when digital wealth infrastructure is more mission-critical than ever, this deal signals strong conviction in the future of WealthTech, not just as a collection of point solutions, but as a foundational layer of financial services across Europe.

WealthTech funding rose slightly in the US last quarter, rising 9% from the prior quarter. But that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that early-stage deals (under $100mm) were off 35% from the prior quarter and dropped a whopping 85% compared to 1Q2024, according to a report from FinTech Global Research . The overall gain seems to have come from investors piling into later stage deals (over $100mm).   There are several possible reasons for the preference for later-stage investments. We have seen some anecdotal evidence that venture capital funds, who have been having trouble raising money from their LPs, are preserving their capital to re-back the winners in their portfolios in later-stage deals. Additionally, with fewer new funds in the venture capital space, the existing funds are seeing their time horizons approaching, so they may look for later-stage deals where they can get their money back faster. Lastly, strategic investors who are active in the market tend to favor solutions with proven traction, in our experience.   This is a fairly distressing situation for early-stage founders (and their bankers), but it is what it is. Here are some thoughts as to navigating these waters:   The market is soft, but not dead . It’s going to be more work, take longer, and have more drama than before, but there is still a chance to raise funds. You will need to pull out all the stops on the capital raise and budget for a longer time to funding.   Revenue is the best financing . Try to bootstrap as best you can. You may have to accept a slower growth rate than you were hoping for, but if you can keep costs low and pipeline up, you may win the race to breakeven. Think strategic . You certainly will want to get in front of the venture capital community, but you should focus heavily on the strategic community. It’s a longer sales cycle, but they have capital and are generally looking for solutions to pull forward their roadmaps or fill a product feature gap. It’s a different pitch than a venture capital pitch, but even if you don’t get funding, you might get a client. Explore co-development opportunities . You are a nimble, tech-forward entrepreneur with a clean tech stack. There are many financial services firms that are excellent in many other ways, but not in those ways. Lining up a financial services firm to fund the development costs for the exact solution they need is a possible path forward. Just beware of negotiation traps. Don’t categorically rule out a sale . At the moment, strategics are the more aggressive source of capital. While they will make minority investments, they often prefer to acquire rather than invest. It’s just their nature. Three of our clients this year have flipped from a fundraising mentality to company sale mentality (out of 8). Keep in mind that you can structure transactions so that you still maintain some of that entrepreneurial upside.   Being a founder is never easy and the current funding environment certainly is not making it easier. The fundamentals of the WealthTech market are ever changing, but opportunity is still there, particularly if you have a solution that fits into one of the WealthTech Themes of the Decade . As usual, we are here to help in any way we can, even if you just want to chat about WealthTech for a while.

Zoe Financial, originally a referral network connecting individuals to fiduciary RIAs, has evolved into a full-scale digital infrastructure platform that plays a dual role in the advisor ecosystem. In 2023, it launched the Zoe Wealth Platform, offering RIAs tools like digital account opening, fractional trading, automated rebalancing, performance tracking, billing, and more recently, tax loss harvesting and direct indexing. These tools reflect Zoe's broader strategy, not just to deliver leads, but to become embedded in the advisor tech stack. Following the launch, Zoe’s “J-curve growth”, contributed a $29.6 million Series B funding round led by Sageview Capital with participation from several of Zoe's RIA clients: Creative Planning, Mariner Wealth Advisors, Captrust, Perigon Wealth Management, and Falcon Wealth Planning.  Zoe’s recent funding round underscores its alignment with a broader trend reshaping the industry: RIA Roll-ups. As the race for AUM continues, firms growing through M&A can't assume that acquired advisors will remain on their platform. Increasingly, these same firms are recognizing that sustainable scale depends just as much on advisor retention as it does on advisor acquisition. To retain top advisors, especially those brought in via M&A, firms need to offer a strong technological backbone: tools that streamline operations, enhance client service, simplify advisor workflows, and, most importantly, tools to bring in more clients with seamless onboarding.

Last week, New Jersey became the 50th state to adopt a best-interest annuity sales standard. Like nearly all other states, the New Jersey statute is based on the National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ (NAIC) Suitability in Annuity Transactions Model Regulation  which is designed to align with the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Regulation Best Interest  (Reg BI) requirements. While implementation varies slightly from state to state, with some like New York opting for stricter fiduciary-based rules, this national shift sends a clear message: annuity sales must be rooted in the client’s best interest.  And the timing couldn’t be more important. With Peak 65  underway, more Americans than ever are reaching retirement age: over 4 million people will turn 65 each year between 2024 and 2027. As retirees navigate longevity risk and search for reliable income, annuities can play a critical role in retirement income planning. Stronger standards ensure those decisions are made with greater transparency, care, and client-first intent.  Road to a Best-Interest Standard  While the NAIC’s original model regulation was introduced in 2003, it has undergone various updates over the years. The most recent revisions occurred in February 2020 and were relatively substantial. Among the 2020 revisions was the adoption of a best-interest standard requiring insurance producers and insurers to meet obligations related to care, disclosure, conflict of interest, and documentation. The update also mandated that insurance professionals clearly disclose their role in the transaction and details on compensation. While not barred from recommending products with a higher compensation structure, the model does require that insurance professionals be able to show that such a recommendation is in the consumer’s best interest.  In May 2020, Iowa became the first state to adopt the updated suitability model for annuity sales. Just five years later, all 50 states have followed suit. As more than 16 million Americans turn 65 between 2024 and 2027 the need for reliable retirement income solutions beyond Social Security has never been greater. It’s no surprise that states moved swiftly to implement stronger consumer protections.  Confidence in Standardization  Despite the widespread availability of annuities and the value that they can offer in the form of retirement income, very few Americans saving for retirement actually own any. According to an  October 2023 report  by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, only 4.8 percent of families reported having any type of annuity in 2022. This underutilization of annuities by retail investors is due, in part, to factors such as the complexity of many annuity products and their lack of availability in employer-sponsored plans, as well as the historic lack of standardized regulation.  According to Morningstar , “Historically, the inconsistency and inadequate enforcement of state law standards has resulted in the use of aggressive sales tactics and misleading information by insurance agents selling some annuities under the traditional suitability standard of the NAIC.” However, “all 50 states have now adopted a best interest standard for annuity sales—an important milestone for consumers,” said American Council of Life Insurers (ACLI) President and CEO, David Chavern, and National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (NAIFA) Trustee, Dennis Cuccinelli, in a joint statement  last week. “This ensures people will get professional financial guidance they can trust on products that provide a reliable lifetime stream of income in retirement. At a time when millions of workers are nearing retirement without a pension, this kind of certainty matters more than ever.”     The Retirement-Planning Toolbox  Annuities are a worthwhile consideration when planning for retirement. Arguably their most compelling selling point is that they can serve as a source of guaranteed income throughout retirement, mitigating longevity risk (the risk associated with outliving your retirement savings). Unlike a portfolio, which can run out if you overspend or make poor investment decisions, most annuities will pay you income for the rest of your life, much like Social Security. Having an additional guaranteed source of income in retirement may be especially valuable in managing longevity risk given the findings of a  2020 study  conducted by the Society of Actuaries: “51% of the U.S. population misestimated their life expectancy by at least five years—either too high or too low.”  Conclusion  For many retirees approaching age 65, the key question isn’t just how will I generate income in retirement,  but also how should I preserve and reposition the wealth I’ve already built?  Whether it’s liquidating a major asset like a business or a home or rolling over a 401(k), these transitions create opportunities and risks that require thoughtful planning. Annuities offer one potential solution for a portion of some people’s assets, helping convert those lump sums into predictable, long-term income.  With all 50 states adopting Best Interest standards, advisors must get up to speed and have a game plan to address client questions most appropriately about how annuities can play a role in modern, income-focused retirement strategies.

Altruist, a modern custodian for RIAs, has  announced  $152 million in Series F funding at a $1.9 billion valuation. The funding round—led by global institutional investor GIC, and including partners such as Salesforce Ventures, Geodesic Capital, Baillie Gifford, Carson Family Office, and ICONIQ Growth—follows a landmark year of growth for the firm.  In 2024, the custodian launched a suite of new products, including a high-yield cash account, automated and scalable tax management tools, and a fully digital native fixed-income trading experience. The average asset size of its clients increased by 43% from 2024 and it has tripled its assets under management for the past two years. The firm currently works with about 4,700 advisors, commanding a 6.25% market share (up from 2.85% in 2024) according to the 2025 T3/Inside Information Software Survey .  “We’ve found that we’ve got a formula that’s working pretty well, and so we want to just continue to put a lot more fuel into that,” said Mazi Bahadori, Chief Operating and Compliance Officer at Altruist. “And so, the focus really is just to continue to accelerate a lot of product development and innovation.”  Bahadori said the firm will announce new product developments in 2025, with some of them utilizing artificial intelligence in ways that will further Altruist’s goal of reducing friction for advisor activities such as account opening, funding, trading, and rebalancing, and offering more investment and trading options.   In addition, the firm is working to develop integrations with more existing technology platforms. “This year we're adding meaningful integrations with companies like Orion (including FIX trading for large, multi-custodial firms), Tamarac, Advyzon, and more,” said Jason Wenk, founder and CEO of Altruist.   This most recent round of funding follows a  $169 million Series E  round in May 2024 and the expansion of the firm’s leadership team with the appointments of Rich Rao  as Chief Business Officer and Sumanth Sukumar  as Chief Technology Officer earlier this year.

Investment giants Wellington Management and Vanguard are partnering with alternatives asset manager Blackstone to develop “simplified multi-asset investment solutions that seamlessly integrate public and private markets as well as active and index strategies,” according to a joint press release . Through this collaboration, the firms seek to address what they characterize as “one of the most important long-term challenges facing investors and the asset and wealth management industry – building fully diversified portfolios that incorporate private assets and pursue higher returns.” Wellington, Vanguard, and Blackstone now join other traditional asset managers and alternatives groups teaming up to facilitate greater accessibility to alternative investments, such as private markets, among individual investors and their advisors. Earlier this year, for instance, State Street and Apollo Global Management launched the SPDR SSGA Apollo IG Public & Private Credit ETF (PRIV)  which invests in private and public credit, among other instruments. BlackRock and Partners Group launched a retail private markets product  in September, enabling access to private equity, private credit, and real assets in a single portfolio. In October, Capital Group and KKR filed registration statements with the SEC for two public-private fixed income funds that will provide new ways for individual investors to incorporate private markets into their portfolios. Innovating is nothing new for these firms, particularly Vanguard, a firm with a long history of disrupting the investing industry by providing access to investors and driving down fees. This joint endeavor also tracks with Vanguard’s previously expressed desire to expand private equity accessibility; in 2021, then-CEO Tim Buckley stated in a press release  that “Over time we will expand access to [private equity], which has traditionally been reserved for the wealthiest investors, to the many qualified investors at Vanguard.” Details about the Wellington-Vanguard-Blackstone solutions are expected to be released in the coming months.   Takeaways The trend we’re seeing of companies seeking to democratize the market by expanding access to alternative investments is likely being driven by needs both among individual investors and investment alternative investment managers. For investors, the pool of available investments to choose from has dropped dramatically over the past 30 years. In 1996, there were more than 8,000 publicly listed companies  traded on U.S. exchanges. However, in 2023, that number had dropped by more than 50% to around 3,700—not because there are fewer companies than there were 30 years ago, but because companies have increasingly chosen to stay private as they’ve more recently had access to an abundance of private capital that enables greater long term control and flexibility. With available investment choices shrinking among public markets, alternative investments offer a potential new sector for individuals to invest in. However, alternative investments such as private markets have historically involved high levels of sophistication and required significant expertise to effectively invest in. Additionally, they tend to be less liquid than traditional investment assets and may be mired in SEC regulations, adding further complexity and barriers to entry for individual investors. That’s where investment vehicle “manufacturers” come in. This need for investment diversification among investors presents an opportunity for these manufacturers (i.e., Wellington, Vanguard, and Blackstone) to expand their market. By developing investment vehicles with built-in risk mitigation (i.e., packaging diversified, unrelated alternative investments), they can theoretically remove some of the complexity, risk, and high minimum required investments historically associated with these types of assets, enabling individual retail investors to access them and possibly achieve higher returns.

In 2026, the United States will hit a demographic milestone that’s been decades in the making: more people will turn 65 next year than in any other time in history.    This moment, often referred to as Peak 65, represents the apex of the Baby Boomer generation entering traditional retirement age. According to the Protected Retirement Income and Planning Study (PRIP), approximately 4.1 million Americans will turn 65 each year at the peak, a staggering figure with wide-ranging implications.    For the wealth management industry, Peak 65 is not just a population statistic. It's a signal, a tipping point, a market opportunity, and a challenge. Here’s what it means and how the industry is evolving to meet the needs of this grouping of Americans.     The Stakes: Why Peak 65 Matters     Unprecedented Demand for Retirement Income Solutions    The traditional approach to retirement, accumulating assets and slowly drawing them down, no longer meets the needs of many investors. A 2022 report from the Insured Retirement Institute found that only 26% of Baby Boomers are confident they have enough saved for retirement, underscoring the urgency for income-generating solutions.    WealthTech firms are responding by rethinking decumulation. Solutions that offer predictable, sustainable income, such as managed payout funds, dynamic withdrawal strategies, and personalized retirement planning tools, are growing rapidly. Providers are starting to blend behavioral finance and real-time analytics to help advisors optimize retirement outcomes.    The Rise of Annuities and Fiduciary-Friendly Income Tools    Annuities have long carried a mixed reputation, but that’s changing. In part due to updated fiduciary standards and product innovation, fee-based annuities and commission-free options are gaining ground. Firms have recently brought commission-free annuities into the RIA ecosystem, enabling advisors to offer guaranteed income options without conflicts of interest.    Annuities can also help tackle another retirement income challenges that is often, if not just about always, overlooked: longevity risk.    Tech-forward solutions are making annuities more accessible and transparent. Platforms are emerging that model lifetime income projections, assess product fit, and compare offerings across carriers. Expect this area to see accelerated growth as retirees prioritize income over growth in their portfolios.    A New Era for Fixed Income    The 2020s have ushered in a new rate environment. For the first time in over a decade, retirees can lock in relatively attractive yields from treasuries, muni-bonds, and other fixed income instruments. WealthTech platforms are racing to offer better access, education, and portfolio management capabilities in this domain.    Innovations like direct indexing for bonds, automated laddering strategies, and smart cash management, often paired with tax optimization tools, are bringing institutional-level fixed income strategies to the mass affluent market.    The Fight for 401(k) Rollovers and Liquidating Assets     While many firms like to focus on “The Great Wealth Transfer”, we also strongly encourage firms to focus on what Chip Roame calls “The Great Liquidation.” As people retire, they perhaps look to rollover their 401(k)s, sell the family business, downsize their house, etc. Making a play for those assets could very well be served with a cleaver retirement income proposal. It’s true that fewer people are retiring at 65 these days, but it is still a psychological milestone for many that likely gets them thinking.     With trillions of dollars sitting in workplace retirement plans, the post-retirement rollover market has become a battleground. According to Cerulli Associates, more than $500 billion is expected to roll over from 401(k) plans next year and it should increase after that. The firms that can best capture, retain, and manage these flows stand to gain enormous scale.    WealthTech platforms are positioning themselves at this intersection:    Digital advice platforms are using automation, personalized planning, and UX-driven design to attract rollover accounts.  Wealth management OS platforms are enhancing capabilities for complex wealth and estate planning as older investors transition assets.  Cash solutions are helping firms retain assets by offering insured, high-yield cash products that compete with money market funds.  Digital platforms that allow advisors to scale their advice over a 401k population, effectively becoming the “advisor of first resort”  Platforms that allow advisors to help bring a privately owned business into a unified financial plan, courting the small business owner    Strategic Implications for the Industry     Peak 65 is not a single-year phenomenon, it represents the beginning of a multi-decade shift in client needs and firm strategy. For advisors, banks, WealthTechs, and asset managers, the following areas demand focus:    Personalization at scale: Retirement income needs are deeply personal. WealthTech must integrate data (health, spending, goals) to generate more tailored advice.  Hybrid advice models: Combining human expertise with tech-driven planning will be key to scaling retirement readiness.  Regulatory clarity: As fiduciary standards evolve, firms that align early with best practices will gain trust—and market share.  Retirement as a platform: Expect to see end-to-end retirement platforms emerge with strategies that approach planning, income generation, benefits advice, and legacy solutions in unique ways.     WealthTech was born in the accumulation era. Now, it must come of age in the decumulation era.    For more information on the Peak65 theme, as well as the other WealthTech Themes of the Decade, feel free to read WealthTech Strategy Themes for the Rest of the Decade .  Sources:  Alliance Research   Insured Retirement Institute   Cerulli Associates - IRA Assets   Cerulli Associates - Regulatory Impacts   PR Newswire

Larry Fink, as Chairman of BlackRock, published his annual letter to shareholders containing some of his thoughts on the future. As always, it contains some interesting insights on where he thinks our industry is going, so long as you do a little digging. We would like to highlight his comments on the future of alternative investments in the retail wealth channel. Here is our skinny take: Alts will become more mainstream. He predicts that the traditional 60/40 portfolio is going to morph to a 50/30/20 portfolio, with the "20" being an allocation to alternatives. He says that Blackrock has traditionally seen itself as a traditional asset manager, but they now see themselves as an alts manager as of last year. It's their new mission to try and broaden the general investment of private capital. That is a difficult flag to retreat from once planted. Leading with private infrastructure? He feels a strong affinity for the opportunity in private infrastructure, which he describes as a $68 trillion demand opportunity. It's interesting that he spent most of the time talking about infrastructure as opposed to private equity, which is what most advisors think about when they think of alts. Blackrock did buy Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), a large public infrastructure company that owns Gatwick airport, a score or so of ports, and other assets. They plan to use it as a platform to help "bridge the gap" (pun perhaps intended) between the 60/40 portfolio and their new vision of a 50/30/20 portfolio. Data will be key. He mentioned their acquisition of Preqin along with the desire, necessity, and perhaps inevitability of transparent data sources in alternative markets. He points to Zillow in the housing market. He points to the usual and intuitive argument about increased transparency increasing conviction, understanding, and ultimately, adoption. However, we think his subsequent comments around indexing are really where he thinks the data fits and, in fact, where he thinks the whole thing is going. Data will lead to indexing, which will lead to massive adoption. We think the real argument around data that he is making is really at the very center of where he thinks alts are going in retail: indexing. It is our belief that Blackrock wants a series of alts index products that effectively becomes the "20" in Fink's 50/30/20 portfolio. Are there problems with this? Yes. Are there solutions? Probably. Will they find the solution? I certainly would not bet against it and I think we will find out relatively soon. These are just our opinions. Feel free to read the whole letter here . This fits solidly into our "Interest in Alternatives" WealthTech Theme of the Decade. To read more about this theme and the others, see our piece WealthTech Themes for the Rest of the Decade .

FNZ has announced that they have raised an additional $500 million from existing investors. The proceeds will be used to "support long-term sustainable growth," which sounds pretty snazzy even if a bit light on detail. As a reminder, the big investors are Motive Partners and CPP Partners, having lead their $1.4 billion round in 2022. Tamasek and Caisse de dépôt are also in there, but there were no details as to participation rates or which investors participated. There are quite a few small and employee equity holders as well. Last year it was reported that 200+ small equity holders were concerned about the level of dilution on the last financing. Knowing if there was significant participation and support for this financing from those investors would show that the issue has now been resolved. Regardless, the bottom line is that FNZ, and Motive in particular, are out to transform the wealth management landscape for the better and we support them in that quest. Link to the FNZ announcement: https://www.fnz.com/news/fnz-raises-ususd500-million-in-new-capital-from-existing-shareholders-to

smallcase, a direct-to-consumer WealthTech firm providing thematic pre-packaged portfolios to the retail investor in India, today announced a $50mm Series D funding round lead by elev8 Venture Partners, a new investor, with participation from State Street Global Advisors and Faering Capital. This is the latest in a series of fairly sizeable WealthTech funding rounds from India and shows the strength of WealthTech in that geography. The direct-to-consumer strength in the Indian market makes sense to us as the number of mass affluent/HNW investors is growing well in excess of any sort of mathematical prediction of the future supply of human financial advisors. Technology seems to be the only reasonable answer. In the case of smallcase, they develop consumable model portfolios professionally designed around various investment themes. If you are looking for a pre-made basket on themes like "Aging of America" or some particular slice of AI, they may have one you can invest in off-the-shelf. We had a similar company here in the US years ago called Motif. They were ultimately acquired by Schwab in 2020. smallcase purports to have 10mm users, which perhaps speaks to the power of the Indian retail investment market and why VCs seem to be taking an interest. Link to announcement: https://www.smallcase.com/blog/smallcase-raises-50m-in-series-d-funding/

Robinhood continues its march upmarket with launch of robo advice and private banking(ish) services Robinhood continues to execute on its strategy to move upmarket, increase average balances, and service the growing complexity in their clients' financial lives. This is reflective of two strong themes we are seeing in the market: (1) Self-Directed Trading as Lead Gen and (2) Family Office as-a-Service. For more information on these and the other themes we are tracking, please see WealthTech Themes for the Rest of the Decade . Self-Directed Trading as Lead Gen quick recap: as the former "day traders" mature and develop more complicated financial lives, they will increasingly seek advice on what is now "real money" instead of "play money." Given the size of the installed base, this could represent an excellent source of low-cost leads. How does this announcement fit with the theme? A potential first step towards advice for technology-minded investors is robo advice and having a captive audience is a big advantage. Perhaps it is not surprising that Robinhood is choosing to offer this product in its typical, disruptive way: the AUM fee capped at $250/yr for Gold Members (who pay just $5/mo). Family Office as-a-Service quick recap: as consumers demand more services beyond just retirement planning, technology will focus on scaling some of the high-touch, low-scale services typically found at a family office and bring it down market to the masses. How does this fit with the theme? Robinhood also announced that it would start rolling out services later this year "normally reserved for the ultra-wealthy." These will include things like estate planning and tax prep, but also some things like discounted helicopter flights. We should also note that Robinhood recently acquired TradePMR, which gives Robinhood a solid footing in the RIA space and vice-versa. Link to Themes detail: WealthTech Themes for the Rest of the Decade Link to article: https://www.reuters.com/markets/wealth/robinhood-bring-wealth-management-private-banking-retail-investors-2025-03-27/