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Robinhood S-1 IPO

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Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#51

Risk factors are lovely: We have been subject to regulatory investigations, actions and settlements and we expect to continue to be subject to such proceedings in the future, which could cause us to incur substantial costs or require us to change our business practices in a manner materially adverse to our business. We are involved in numerous litigation matters that are expensive and time-consuming, and, if resolved…

I am 100% sure most companies can and do have those exact same risk factors, they don't really mean that much. Any company that operates in a highly regulated area (finance/health/gambling/etc) are going to have regulatory on their risk factors. Any Company whose business is run on an app or a website is going to have the tech failure one.

I'm skeptical that this claim is true. Even a cursory look at news articles related to Robin Hood shows that these concerns are way more than boilerplate legalese.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#52

Risk factors are lovely: We have been subject to regulatory investigations, actions and settlements and we expect to continue to be subject to such proceedings in the future, which could cause us to incur substantial costs or require us to change our business practices in a manner materially adverse to our business. We are involved in numerous litigation matters that are expensive and time-consuming, and, if resolved…

The illegal shit they do is just a "cost of doing business" for them. It is just hard to calculate how much of a kickback the FINRA and SEC would like to have.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not the most sophisticated trader but I appreciate their UX and simplicity, which I think is true of most of their user base

I think the question is whether RH is sticky, they have good traction in growth, and I think it will be sticky. If enough people are doing fractional shares trading it's really hard to transfer out fractional shares to different brokers. Might actually not be possible.

I did an ACATS from RH. They just sell the fractional shares at market price and send the cash.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#54
post #48

I understand that many give Robinhood crap because it is not "sophisticated enough" or because of the Gamestop fiasco. Although many startups like to claim that they are "democratizing [x]", I honestly believe they did it. I have many friends that never traded before, and after they got their Robinhood account they feel comfortable enough to do it often. Even myself, who used to only trade a couple of times a year, s…

If they removed all of the dark patterns from their UI, I think they could be a real social good.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

~70% was transactions and ~20% was interest. For comparison about 60% of Etrade's revenue is interest and 30% is fees + commissions. Either Robinhood has found a smarter business model re: selling order flow or they are making a killing on crypto fees. The commission business model is dead for good I think. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/net-interest-revenue-will-fo...

>or they are making a killing on crypto fees. They don't charge commissions to trade crypto. Not sure where they're skimming the money but the terrible order fills you get there gives me an idea.

Front-running?

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#56

I remember seeing their first public demo at LA Hacks in 2014. Seemed like a couple of kids right out of college. They had the iPhone's screen hooked up to the projector and one of their friends kept sending them silly text messages the whole time that they had to dismiss. This was before the Do Not Disturb feature came out. I remember wondering how it took so long for someone to make a half decent stock trading app…

iOS development sucks. It had a huge amount of churn this decade due to the transition into Swift. Documentation wasn't just out of date, it was in a different dimension. Every SO answer was a mix of incompatible versions and - what answers existed were best guesses from people who also had no concrete documentation to go off of.

Your best bet was to cozy up to Apple teams or preferred Apple partners like Facebook and Uber, and see if the inside scoop could save you a few months of maddening frustration.

You can see this evidenced in engineering blog posts from companies like Uber and Twitter, they had to hire soooo many people to build out their mobile app.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#57

I remember seeing their first public demo at LA Hacks in 2014. Seemed like a couple of kids right out of college. They had the iPhone's screen hooked up to the projector and one of their friends kept sending them silly text messages the whole time that they had to dismiss. This was before the Do Not Disturb feature came out. I remember wondering how it took so long for someone to make a half decent stock trading app…

I know better, and I still use Robinhood. I also use Fidelity, but their mobile and web apps suck beyond description, and used to use Scottrade, who also suck. Robinhood doesn't just look better (although that's important); it's easier to use and faster; bank transfers are WAY easier; you don't have to jump through hoops to enable options trading (which means a lot of people who shouldn't trade options now do, but it's still better for those who want to); you can trade on deposits instantly instead of waiting a week for the deposit to clear; margin is easy to use. There are plenty of foot-guns in everything I said, but there's also plenty of convenience and utility for people who are trading carefully.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#58
post #48

I understand that many give Robinhood crap because it is not "sophisticated enough" or because of the Gamestop fiasco. Although many startups like to claim that they are "democratizing [x]", I honestly believe they did it. I have many friends that never traded before, and after they got their Robinhood account they feel comfortable enough to do it often. Even myself, who used to only trade a couple of times a year, s…

If I went for this positive spin, I'd talk about democratising investing, not democratising trading.

Democratising trading is not inherently good, similar to democratising gambling.

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#59
post #32

That's what happens when you spend a decade printing a lot of money Value becomes diluted

this logic makes no sense. did you get this from peters schiff.com or something? Tech stocks surged in the 90s despite the fed raising rates and the treasury runing a budget surplus.

Monetary policy makes people viscerally upset for some reason

Re: Robinhood S-1 IPO

#60
post #54
post #48

I understand that many give Robinhood crap because it is not "sophisticated enough" or because of the Gamestop fiasco. Although many startups like to claim that they are "democratizing [x]", I honestly believe they did it. I have many friends that never traded before, and after they got their Robinhood account they feel comfortable enough to do it often. Even myself, who used to only trade a couple of times a year, s…

If they removed all of the dark patterns from their UI, I think they could be a real social good.

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