No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones • Hacker News Board

Post by bdangubic » Mon, Feb 03, 2025, 1:38 AM UTC

throwaway2037 wrote: post #450

lxm wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ETFs are a relatively recent phenomenon, the criticism I remember from 2008 era is having paycheck + employee stock purchase plan + 401k concentrated in a single stock - employer's.

Do 401k plans allow people to buy single stocks? I never saw it in my experience. I cannot believe that would be considered "prudent" by financial regulators. However, when you leave a company you can "roll-over" your 401k into an IRA, then you can go wild and buy anything that you want (IBRK allows it).

i401k’s which you have to manage yourself if you are a contractor allow you to purchase whatever you want depending on where your account is. I was with Vanguard and they do not allow it - I moved my account to etrade and now my 401k account is basically like my brokerage account, I can buy whatever I want.

Post by luckylion » Fri, Feb 07, 2025, 10:10 PM UTC

okanat wrote: post #89

luckylion wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you don't necessarily need a banking license, right? My understanding is that there's a handful of bank-as-a-service banks that have a license and will let you do your thing. I'm sure the aging population doesn't help, but to me the primary inertia comes from how difficult it is to switch. You can take your phone number with you while changing providers, you can't do that with your bank account. They have "servic…

To be honest, in Germany even the brick and mortar banks provide transfer services. They will detect and move your automatic payments. You usually fill a form, login to each bank and they send automatic requests to move stuff. Similarly my broker also supports moving accounts for me. Moreover, especially after the Wirecard scandal, I wouldn't trust any company that doesn't have a banking license. Without a banking li…

Yes, they do offer transfer services. But do you trust their services to be flawless?

Like I mentioned, I've dealt with their brokerage-arms, and it was a disaster. Numbers being wrong between two large banks, the transfer taking _months_, and nobody knowing anything and everybody shrugging their shoulders and going "maybe call the other guys again?"

They have no incentive to make that seamless (in fact, they have every incentive to not make it seamless), and it isn't.

The same isn't true with your phone number. Once you've moved, it just works. You never have to tell anyone you're switching providers. The old provider is out of the picture and you no longer need to rely on their good will after your business relationship ends.

No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones

Re: No one is disrupting banks – at least not the big ones