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Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

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Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#231

Post by ac29 »

taway789aaa6 wrote: post #41
jjmaxwell4 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We charge $1/month. Longer term, we think there are additional revenue streams we can enable that are similar to existing broker-dealers like Robinhood, Fidelity and Schwab. That means things like cash float, margin lending, stock lending and payment for order flow. Currently we are not a broker-dealer.

Ah yes, the old "we'll buy stocks for you and then turn around and lend them out to short sellers that actively want you to lose money. Promise we care about you!" I do not trust any institution that makes money off of lending MY shares out to predatory short-sellers who's sole purpose is to decrease the value of MY shares.

> lending MY shares out to predatory short-sellers who's sole purpose is to decrease the value of MY shares.

Sure, that is their goal. But, shorting equities is a tough game, because most years the market goes up. An investor who is broadly short the market would therefore lose money more often than not, and has to pay borrow fees on top of that.

If you hold shares that you think are going to go up, you absolutely should be willing to lend out your shares because it will enhance your return.

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#232

Post by TuringNYC »

jjmaxwell4 wrote: post #216
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #16

I saw the "Your Money is Secure" section, but after things like the Synapse fiasco, I would like to get confirmation from you. It says my money would be SIPC insured, which means if anything goes missing (obviously not through loss of equity value, but through missing funds or a ledger bug), I get my money back, up to the SIPC limit, right? I just want to ensure this isn't the same situation with fintechs that say yo…

If Double goes out of business, your assets are safe and held in your name at Apex Clearing. They have processes in place for these scenarios to help you access and transfer those assets. SIPC protection covers against a brokerage firm failing, which in our case is Apex Clearing. We are not currently a brokerage so SIPC would not apply if Double goes bankrupt.

>> If Double goes out of business, your assets are safe and held in your name at Apex Clearing. They have processes in place for these scenarios to help you access and transfer those assets. >> SIPC protection covers against a brokerage firm failing, which in our case is Apex Clearing. We are not currently a brokerage so SIPC would not apply if Double goes bankrupt.

Dear @jjmaxwell4 -- I'm not really worried about your service given you're a layer atop Apex, however, this is a very common conversation happening right now on many forums -- could you clarify a bit more, how one would "get comfortable" with a new product?

I'm assuming the list is something like this, but that is an non-expert guess:

- Is the institution i'm interacting with regulated (in your case, Yes, Double is regulated by The SEC)

- Who holds my funds, and are they regulated (in your case, the funds are held by Apex Clearing, and if I understand correctly, Apex is a broker dealer regulated by The SEC)

- Are the funds held in my name or pooled in with other money? (in your case, I think the funds are held by Apex only in my name)

I think one of the problems with the Yotta/Synapse/Evolve collapse is -- its unclear how one even evaluates their level of risk.

It is also unclear how one validates SIPC coverage, like could I go to SIPC and enter an account number and validate the funds are actually covered somewhere across the layers?

Would be great for someone who knows this area to comment.

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#233

Post by koolba »

kccqzy wrote: post #201
koolba wrote: post #67

How do you intend to make enough money to stay a going concern? Charging $1/mo adds up to peanuts and peanuts will not paying the salaries needed for running a highly regulated industry like this. What are some examples for real world tax loss harvesting of this versus just rotating between things like VTI, SCHB, and ITOT? I can’t imagine it’s going to be meaningfully more tax savings versus the monumental pain in th…

Retail brokerages earn most of their money from uninvested cash from their customers. An easy strategy is to force customers to keep a few percent of AUM as cash.

And savvy investors avoid those platforms or manually move their cash holdings into money market funds.

Requiring people hold some minimum cash amount is just charging a fee with more steps involved.

And even the larger offenders of that approach are in the crosshairs: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/securities-law/wall-street-gia...

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#234

Post by arcticbull »

stavros wrote: post #143
don_neufeld wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. Zero interest until there is a very clear answer here.

Zero interest, just like my bank account.

I get like 4% at my bank. Sounds like you need a new bank! I'd suggest starting with Nerdwallet. [1]

[1] https://www.nerdwallet.com/h/category/banking

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#235

Post by TuringNYC »

shmatt wrote: post #90
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #16

I saw the "Your Money is Secure" section, but after things like the Synapse fiasco, I would like to get confirmation from you. It says my money would be SIPC insured, which means if anything goes missing (obviously not through loss of equity value, but through missing funds or a ledger bug), I get my money back, up to the SIPC limit, right? I just want to ensure this isn't the same situation with fintechs that say yo…

This would explain only $10M in AUM within 3 months. Id guess just the commenters on this thread hold 10x that in etfs and funds If a big bank launched this it would have $1B in AUM within less than an hour

>> If a big bank launched this it would have $1B in AUM within less than an hour

I love the M1 product (and while I am not a Double customer, I love the value proposition). Note that ShareBuilder (eventually Capital One), FolioFN have tried and didnt get traction.

Fidelity has "Fidelity Basket Portfolios" and I'm assuming they have no traction -- the product is broken 3 of 5 days of the week, and almost nothing works. I could file a dozen Jira SEV-1 bug tickets "Fidelity Basket Portfolios" is so bad.

Chase has a basket product but it is barely surfaced on their OneVest menus.

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#236

Post by ac29 »

xur17 wrote: post #146

One thing I've always wondered about products like this: how is the portability between platforms? For example, if double.finance shuts down, are there other platforms that I can transfer my assets to inkind that will maintain the index fund tracking for me moving forward? I realize I can use ACATS to transfer the assets, but I want index tracking as well.

There are a number of companies offering direct indexing, but you'd need to research them individually to see how they supported transferring in assets in kind.

Ideally any direct indexing would be done in tax advantaged account so if you needed to liquidate your positions and start over from cash there are no tax implications. Otherwise, be prepared to eventually deal with hundreds of individual positions each composed of numerous tax lots.

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#237

Post by htrp »

mritchie712 wrote: post #108
ddgddg wrote: post #97

much hate here; but mostly it is transparent jealousy arising from frustration about the great global money game being unfair and many educated and deserving ppl having no hope of ever making it off the bottom rung. But jjmaxwell4 don't let any of that distract you 1. This problem (solid, simple, inexpensive) direct indexing is totally real 2. Congrats on identifying this and getting going on it 3. All your best cust…

same here, $1 makes me wonder how you'll stay alive. I don't want to wonder.

growth at a loss and ever increasing vc funding....

think it'll be difficult for them to be around 3 years from now (in their current form)

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#238

Post by TuringNYC »

soared wrote: post #124
sumanyusharma wrote: post #76

I'm actually pretty interested in what you're building. Sure, Vanguard and Fidelity are well-established giants, but they've barely moved beyond standard ETFs for decades. Having the option to tweak weightings at a more granular level and do daily tax-loss harvesting at scale seems like a genuine step forward. I also like that you're transparent about how you might eventually introduce additional revenue streams like…

Fidelity has innovated a ton and they have this exact product, though I don’t know the fees. Fidelity is very much into new fintech ideas and products.. they were mining crypto very early on.

>> Fidelity has innovated a ton and they have this exact product, though I don’t know the fees. >> Fidelity is very much into new fintech ideas and products..

Fidelity has a competitive product called Basket Portfolios and it is so buggy as to be almost unusable. The bugginess has existed for many months and they do not even seem to care.

Re: Launch HN: Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios

#240

Post by AznHisoka »

TuringNYC wrote: post #232
jjmaxwell4 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Double goes out of business, your assets are safe and held in your name at Apex Clearing. They have processes in place for these scenarios to help you access and transfer those assets. SIPC protection covers against a brokerage firm failing, which in our case is Apex Clearing. We are not currently a brokerage so SIPC would not apply if Double goes bankrupt.

>> If Double goes out of business, your assets are safe and held in your name at Apex Clearing. They have processes in place for these scenarios to help you access and transfer those assets. >> SIPC protection covers against a brokerage firm failing, which in our case is Apex Clearing. We are not currently a brokerage so SIPC would not apply if Double goes bankrupt. Dear @jjmaxwell4 -- I'm not really worried about yo…

Ditto. I would really love to know if theres a site where you could enter the ID of a company and tell me if SPIC really backs them up..
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