I’m Tony Molina, C.P.A. and Senior Product Specialist at Wealthfront. Ask me anything about Wealthfront, investing, and personal finance.

How am I supposed to trust Path if I can't see how accurate its past predictions have been? My impression is that every time I log in I might see a different set of numbers ("you'll have $x when you want to retire") but I'd never know unless I manually took notes. I get that this type of prediction is not easy and updating the prediction based on current best information is important. But at the same time not being able to evaluate the correctness (what did Path predict 2 years ago about how much money I'd have today?) makes it hard to trust.

We've actually received this request quite a bit so we'd like to expand Path predictions both forward and backward-looking at some point. It's not our highest priority currently but certainly something we hope to add. We'll make sure to share the feedback with the team.

I read the tax loss harvesting white paper which listed the average amounts saved by TLH by age of user. The argument was that users saved more than the fee, on average. However, the fee goes up with the account size, and the benefits of TLH do not past a $3k deduction per year, unless you are liquidating/tax gain harvesting. Does wealthfront automate tax gain harvesting?

For example, take a hypothetical portfolio of 500k.

Wealthfront's fee: 500k * .0025 = $1250

Max annual tax loss harvesting deduction: 3k

Max annual tax savings from TLH at 35% marginal tax bracket: 3k * .35 = $1050

In this case, Wealthfront's fee of $1.25k will almost always be greater than the maximum annual benefit of tax loss harvesting, as long as you are not realizing capital gains.

Hey it looks like u/bartoncls responded but I'll add onto their response. You can use losses generated by Wealthfront to offset capital gains with no limit. The 3k reference only applies to using losses to offset ordinary income per year. However, you can apply your harvested losses to all capital gains. If you don't have any capital gains to offset, you can carryforward those losses for future years. The argument that most clients save more with TLH when compared to fees certainly applies no matter what the account size.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/tax-loss-harvesting-101/

https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/209348646-What-kinds-of-income-can-I-offset-with-my-harvested-losses-

Got it, so if I don't have capital gains to offset, then I effectively am left with the 3k income offset each year. If I never have more than 40k in realized gains per year after I retire, and no ordinary income, then I effectively get 0 benefit from my accumulated tax loss harvesting.

edit: although it can still offset 3k in 401k withdrawals in retirement, so I suppose that continues.

If you have no capital gains to offset, correct you can only use 3k losses to offset ordinary income. However, the overwhelming majority of people do have capital gains to offset at some point in their wealth-building years.

What should a completely inexperienced investor do with $1000?

You should always make sure you have enough emergency savings set aside in a high-yield bank account. This is typically ~6 months worth of expenses. Then, if you have any high-interest debt, considering paying that down with your 1k. If you have any funds left over that are meant for long-term purposes, you might consider a robo-advisor like Wealthfront. We take the hassle of researching out of the equation for you and let software build your wealth.

Here's more guidance:

https://blog.wealthfront.com/should-you-pay-off-debt-or-invest-heres-the-real-answer/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/financial-health/

I visited the site and I'm having a hard time understanding what Wealthfront is. Is it an app?

Sorry to hear that! Yes, it's an app for investing, banking, and financial planning. You may want to visit our full website at wealthfront.com as well.

With inflation...low interest rates....shaky economy...where to put your money?

Great question. We'd consider making sure you have enough cash to get you through an emergency (6months of expenses) but also consider not holding too much cash. With rates as low as they are, you may end up losing buying power against inflation. Therefore, a diversified portfolio of low-cost ETFs has always been a great strategy for times of inflation AND no inflation.

Check out this blog I wrote recently: https://blog.wealthfront.com/the-right-and-wrong-ways-to-protect-yourself-from-inflation/

Any plans to include an HSA?

We really don't have any plans for HSAs. These types of accounts require a significant amount of manual maintenance due to regulations. We prioritize products and features we can automate to offer super low-cost investing, banking and financial planning. Sorry about that!

Thanks for the reply. For reference I mentioned this because you trade blows with Fidelity on your offerings (cash account and robo advisor) but that is one thing they have that keeps me stuck with them.

Totally understand that. We’ll never say never but it’s likely not something for a while we’d consider.

There’s a great guitarist named Tony Molina. Do you also play guitar?

No, but that's not the first time I've heard that!

Is the stock market a safe investment in the 10yr horizon?

I would never consider the stock market a "safe" investment but I would say that, the longer time frame you have for investing in the stock market, the less likelihood of loss you'll see. All you need to do is go back and look at any 10 year time frame for the overall global equity market and you'll see that you're almost always going to see a return in that time. However, you need to be willing to withstand temporary loss as the market does not always produce returns in the short-term.

Here's a great blog explaining this: https://blog.wealthfront.com/think-long-term-investing/

Is it true that the longer I have assets in wealthfront the less likely I will get value out of TLH since the probability that my portfolio will be below cost basis (loss to harvest?) is lower and lower?

That's only true if you add a lump sum and no longer add funds to invest regularly after. We all hope and have seen that the market goes up over time so, if you don't regularly add funds for us to invest, at some point your cost basis will go so low that the market hopefully won't drop below it again. In these cases, TLH is tough to do down the road.

However, the majority of our clients are in the growth phase of wealth building and set up recurring deposits. In these cases where we're constantly buying new securities, we'll likely always find TLH opportunities to save you money on taxes.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/tax-loss-harvesting-101/

What's your opinion on the short selling and synthetic shares in the market? Specifically the Gme manipulation

There is just an overwhelming amount of data that has shown, time and time again, day trading or engaging in risky strategies like the GME saga is a losing strategy. You may come out ahead in the short-term but most investors who get involved with this will likely not win out. We view it the same way as we view gambling.

Instead, we think most investors would be better off building lont-term wealth through software-based tools that have been proven to work over the long-term.

Here's more context:https://blog.wealthfront.com/unsure-about-investing-because-of-gamestop/https://blog.wealthfront.com/the-day-trading-pandemic/

The question was about shorts/synthetic shares, not whether to invest in GME. I'm interested in a specific answer as well.

Got it, my response is actually the same for shorts/synthetic shares as it is for GME. It's an extremely risky strategy that not many have proven over the long-term to succeed at. We don't have anything to add if you're looking for more specifics on the actual strategy as we simply don't recommend it for the average investor.

Currently IRAs don't rebalance based on your age. Is this something you're looking into?

For that reason I have moved my IRAs to Schwab where I'll be buying a target date fund.

Sure, we've certainly heard from our clients that they'd like to see us do this. However, the majority of our clients are still in the growth phase of their wealth-building years. This strategy would not add much value to them right now so we prioritize other products instead. Keep in mind you can adjust your allocations if you're nearing retirement using our Custom Portfolios features recently added. However, if you're looking for automation to do this, we may be a few years away from adding this strategy.

Wouldn't reducing risk tolerance when nearing retirement age be "better" than manually changing allocations?

You could do that as well, yes. However, we've found many clients like adjusting their allocations in addition to the risk score.

I’m a young guy trying to get into investing, and I know more or less next to nothing about the stock market. I have a mutual fund, specifically an s&p 500. My main question is: is it worth getting more into the stock market, or should I just stick to pumping money into the mutual fund? If I should get more into it, what’s the best place to start?

First off, you should feel good about already getting started investing at a young age. Your biggest asset is time and you've already started taking advantage of it. If you have a good emergency savings set aside (6months of expenses) and you don't have any high-interest debt, you may want to consider investing more in a more diversified investment. Investing in the S&P500 is a great start but that means you're only exposed to about 50% of the overall global stock market.

If you like doing it yourself, you could consider an ETF that offers exposure to the entire global market and not just the US. If you don't want to do the research and you like letting software make the decisions for you, you may want to consider using Wealthfront.

Here's some helpful guidance:

https://blog.wealthfront.com/why-you-shouldnt-just-invest-in-the-s-p-500/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/advice-for-new-investors/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/financial-health/

Is the 60/40 portfolio dead?

The boomers loved it but millenials on down don't like the constraint this presents. We want flexibility, customization and a bit more control to invest in what we care about. A 60/40 portfolio is also likely too conservative for those building wealth long-term.

It might not be dead but it's just not nearly as popular as it was 30 years ago.

Do you see Decentralized Finance (DeFi) as a legitimate threat to traditional finance?

I don't see it as a "threat" but I do see it as much a part of our future global economy as the current system. It's here to stay IMO.

What are your thoughts on active trading vs passive index investing?

Indexing vs mutual funds?

Thanks!

Passive index investing has been proven time and time again to provide better net-of-fee returns than active investing. There are certainly some active investors that can out-perform an index, but the likelihood they can continue to do it over time significantly diminishes. If there's a time-tested strategy that data shows wins, why not choose that?

As for indexing or using ETFs vs mutual funds, you just want to watch out for the fees. Many mutual funds come with a high fee as well and there are so many super low-cost ETFs that do the same job as mutual funds try to do. I don't think all mutual funds are bad but it just makes most sense in a majority of circumstances to use an ETF over mutual fund.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/advice-for-new-investors/

Thanks for the reply!

I agree with you 100%, however, since this is a well-known fact, why is it that wall street continues to create funds and have all these different managers who are smart but the reality is nobody knows which way the market is going?

Because they’re great salespeople and average investors love the idea of out-performing. No matter how much data we have to show that passive beats active, we’ll likely always see people willing to pay higher fees on a false promise.

Any plans to go after a banking charter like Varo so you cut out Green Dot and offer more banking products like a credit card?

We don't have plans to go after a banking charter at the present time. However, it's worth noting that we do not consider this necessary or required to continue improving and expanding our banking offerings, which is something very much on our longer-term radar. Our goal, with or without a bank charter, will be the same; build a system that benefits you over institutions.

I am currently in community college trying to become an accountant. I hear many people saying its a bad decision because it will become obsolete soon becuase of AI. Do you think so?

No, I don't think it's fair to say that at all. I think humans will always serve a valid purpose in accounting so I encourage you to go that route, get your CPA and open as many career opportunities as possible. Good luck!

I'm now being promoted to "update" my portfolio because of some algorithms that you changed, I guess. What's happening there? I thought you didn't do active investing, but shifting weights around in response to market conditions seems like just that.

I believe I manually edited my portfolio after setting my risk tolerance; is Wealthfront taking those edits into account when recommending its new weights?

Hi this was a long-term change based on our periodic review for the recommended portfolios. It actually has nothing to do with recent market conditions. The end goal is to recommend the portfolio that offers the highest after-tax, risk-adjusted returns for our clients over the long-term.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/updating-asset-allocation-for-recommended-portfolios/

What should someone who has inherited a massive amount of wealth do first?

Hi you may want to read this: https://blog.wealthfront.com/equity-ipo-guide/managing-windfall/

What the best way for a married couple making $200k a year to reduce their tax burden?

The best way when it comes to investing is to max out each of your pre-tax 401k contributions. This helps you save for the long term while reducing your adjusted gross income and potential tax bracket.

If i have an account under 100k, am I out of the market for 31 days when you TLH or do you replace it with a different ETF that's different enough to avoid a wash sale?

We replace your ETF with a different ETF right when we sell the other ETF so you're not out of the market at all. This is what makes our automated, daily tax-loss harvesting so dang good. When an investment declines in value, you can sell it, harvest the loss, and replace the original investment with a similar one so as to maintain the risk and return characteristics of your portfolio.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/tax-loss-harvesting-101/

Is there any word on when we might see the Wealthfront Cash account become available for joint accounts?

We're hoping by the end of the year but feel free to reach out to our support team for more exact ETA later this year!

We're hoping by the end of the year but feel free to reach out to our support team for more exact ETA later this year!

Are you planning on building a "fixed income" feature for those who are retired and need regular withdrawals from their taxable accounts?

As it stands now, we're getting double taxed: once on the dividends (that later get unnecessarily reinvested) and again on the capital gains, when the dividends could just be left aside for us to pull out on a regular cadence.

It's not something we're prioritizing now but I'm sure we'll build tools built for those nearing retirement at some point in the future. We're focused on bring value to those building wealth and not necessarily those nearing or in retirement. That doesn't mean our products don't benefit those in retirement though - it just means our value-add is truly to those that tend be younger, prefer automation through software, and don't need the income from their investments just yet.

As for dividends, reinvesting those are overwhelmingly at your benefit as we're able to rebalance and harvest losses without having to incur gains on your behalf. This is key to diversified portfolios that optimize for automated rebalancing and tax-loss harvesting.

Is this a good time to buy a house?

If it makes sense for you and your long-term financial goals, then yes it likely does. It's nearly impossible to know what the housing market will do in the future and the only real answer assumes we know that. Instead, view home buying the same way as you might with investing in the stock market; time in the market is more important than market timing.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/best-time-to-buy-a-home/

Are there CPAs that cater and give different advice to or serve millionaires vs lower and middle class income folks?

Yes, there are certainly CPAs that specialize in all wealth brackets and those who would serve all instead. If you're looking for a CPA, I'd suggest finding one that puts your interests before theirs.

If I have an amount saved up near the total amount left on my student loans, should I just pay off my student loans and be debt-free?

Great question - we actually have a blog that will help you through this important decision. In general, if the emotional burden of having student loans is holding you down, you may want to consider just paying it off to be done with it. Otherwise, you may want to also look at the interest rate you're paying on the student loan versus what you might make from investing that money.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/should-you-pay-off-debt-or-invest-heres-the-real-answer/

How do I start investing? What are the best apps to trade stocks?

You'll first want to consider how much control you'll want over investing. If you'd prefer to buy and sell your own stocks/ETFs, there are plenty of apps that support this. However, if you're just getting started investing, it's important to understand just how important diversification, fees, and taxes really are. Look for a service that offers the best diversification, lowest fees and offers the most tax savings. We wouldn't suggest trading stocks as a significant part of your long-term savings.

Here's more guidance:

https://blog.wealthfront.com/what-are-robo-advisors-and-how-do-they-differ/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/advice-for-new-investors/

[removed]

So invest early and often. Don’t look at (or more importantly worry about) the day to day fluctuations of your account.

At your age, the greatest assets you have are time and your future contributions.

This is great advice u/jimbo_hawkins

Take advantage of your biggest asset...TIME. If you're in your 20s, you have a huge advantage in that you have so much more time than the average 34 yr old (like me), to build long-term wealth. So take advantage of this by getting started now on saving enough cash in an emergency fund (6months of expenses), pay off any high-interest debt, take advantage of any company match in your 401k, consider maxing out your Roth IRA if you're eligible and then save any additional funds in a tool that offers low-cost, diversified investing.

Many young people find this hard to do if they're saddled with student debt and aren't making the income they expected. If this is the case, it's ok to start small. Chip away at that debt and don't get down on yourself if you feel behind. The earlier you start the better!

I'd suggest checking this out: https://blog.wealthfront.com/financial-health/

Hi Tony,

How do you see Wealthfront’s recent expansion into broader ETF selection and portfolio customization fit into the company’s overall philosophy of “hands off investing”? When adding new features do you consider how this might cause people to stray from that core philosophy and how do you balance choice with simplicity?

It's a valid question that we've discussed a lot when building these products. The reality is that nothing has changed to our fully hands-off model of passive investing - there's no need or requirement to change your portfolio if you love the pre-set allocations based on your risk tolerance. However, we quite simply have seen an overwhelming amount of requests to have more control, customization over portfolios while also taking on an even higher risk tolerance. We found a way to give our clients this ability but also allow for the same Wealthfront tailored allocations you've always had.

The limit we put on crypto of 10% is a perfect example of letting clients take on more risk but not too much in the sense they would be over-exposed to a volatile asset class like crypto.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/cryptocurrency-exposure-at-wealthfront/

All through 2020, and especially during the GME craze, Wealthfront sent me emails encouraging me to stay the course with broad market ETFs and not get swept up in hype. You've been so pro-passive investing in the past: 1 2 3. I'm a little confused what's changed from your analysis that you'd like us to have BTC, ARK funds, etc now. It looks on the outside like it's just customer demand. Is there more to it?

We're still pro-passive investing but we've just seen a big desire from our clients to have more customization and take on more risk. You can still do those two things while maintaining a properly diversified portfolio built for the long-term. Also, we'll still implement our automated rebalancing and tax-loss harvesting to save you money on taxes while we're at it.

How do you test the algorithm that determines when to sell and buy inorder to perform tlh? It makes me scared that one day a small software bug might end up making a decision that will have considerable impact on my financial well being.

We reached out to one of our most senior engineers to provide this response:

To start, we follow best practices around test-driven development with unit tests, integration tests, and functional tests. One key part of the functional tests is a large test suite of trading in various scenarios that we can use to compare what the current code does to what we actually did in the past. Of course, if we're intentionally changing something, those tests need to be updated, but we're able to confirm that the changes are those we expected.

For example, when we modified rebalancing in 2019, we knew that those changes would reduce the amount of rebalancing, and as long as that's what we saw in the test suite it was working as intended, but if we had seen that new deposits were invested differently, or if TLH changed, that would mean we broke something. This all happens before code gets deployed to production.

Have you ever had any bad experiences with the stock market?

Yes, before I understood investing as I do now, I bought a few different Schwab ETFs and sold them a few months later for a small gain because I thought I had to protect that gain. If I would have simply held onto those ETFs, I would've doubled my money a few years later. This wasn't fun at the time but it helped me understand why "long-term" is such a key part of investing.

You might like this blog: https://blog.wealthfront.com/feels-right-actually-wrong/

aren't REITs purely real estate?

Yes, it's a type of asset class that offers exposure to trusts that own commercial properties, apartment complexes and retail space. The trusts pay out rent as dividends to investors. REITs can be a part of a diversified portfolio as they provide income and inflation protection.

Why is the risk parity fund weighted so highly? It is 20% in my portfolio. I've read the white paper and still don't understand why it is needed.

It may be a great fund, but there's just not enough information available to evaluate whether it's worth 20% of my portfolio.

We've actually updated our recommend portfolios and no longer include Risk Parity as 20% of your allocation. I'd suggest you check out this blog: https://blog.wealthfront.com/updating-asset-allocation-for-recommended-portfolios/

As for the details behind Risk Parity, it's meant to provide you higher returns with less volatility than the standard diversified portfolio of ETFs. It uses leverage to provide the exposure and returns of the global equity market while reducing volatility through exposure to bonds. This link might help: https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000117963-How-does-Risk-Parity-work-

I just checked my allocation and risk parity is still targeted for 20%. US stock allocation and the others were changed when I accepted the new allocation but risk parity didn't change.

Ah got it - the RP change was just for new clients. For current clients, we instead give them the ability to choose their allocations going forward.

https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/360059631751-Customizing-your-portfolio

I'm trusting wealthfront to tell me what the optimal allocation is for my risk level, but you're saying the optimal allocation is different for new and current clients?

We’ll always tell you the proper allocation for your desired risk tolerance. However, we’ve found that most new clients don’t choose to include risk parity as an asset class in their portfolios. For this reason, we give new clients the option to add it or not. This does not mean your portfolio with risk parity is not optimal.

If you’d like to discuss further, send our team an email at [email protected].

What’s the advantage of Wealthfront over a direct indexing strategy with TLH?

Wealthfront actually offers Direct Indexing with TLH for taxable brokerage accounts over 100k in size. US Direct Indexing, formerly known as Stock-level Tax-Loss Harvesting, is an enhanced form of Tax-Loss Harvesting that looks for movements in individual stocks to harvest more tax losses and lower your tax bill even more. It's a great reason to use our service considering the long-term tax advantages.

If your account is under 100k, you still get access to daily tax-loss harvesting using ETFs instead of individual stocks. Either way, the tax savings typically will far outweigh the costs in fees for most clients.

https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/211005023-Wealthfront-s-US-Direct-Indexing-

Does wealthfront have any plans to add support for additional account types in the future? In particular would love to see Inherited IRAs added (never fun to discuss, but I’m aware that I will have to deal with a few in the future…)

Yes, as our company grows we will likely look to support more account types. The reality right now is that, those other types of accounts like Inherited IRAs, HSAs, etc. just require so much manual intervention and maintenance. We're focused on supporting products and features only if they can be automated - this is how we save our clients money. Hope that helps!

User since March 2020 here! (Yes, that was just about when the economy hit its bottom…hopefully).

What are some things Wealthfront considered when deciding to offer crypto exposure?

There’s a lot of info and mis-info out there and I’d be curious to know what was on your teams pros and cons list.

Thanks!

Edit- grammar

Thanks for using our services! We really wanted to give our clients the ability to take on more risk but not too much in the sense that they would be exposed to too much volatility that we've seen over the last few years with crypto. We've known for a while that our clients want exposure to crypto but not everyone is sure where to start.

With this in mind, we found it best to start by offering up to 10% as part of a diversified portfolio to limit the risk but also allow more flexibility. We hope to offer a wider variety of crypto options as well in the future so stay tuned!

Here’s our blog discussing this latest launch: https://blog.wealthfront.com/cryptocurrency-exposure-at-wealthfront/

What's your take and stance on PFoF?

With 'reportable' short interest of stocks like Gamestop being actively gamed by market makers, what would your approach to investing detail to clients about the inherent disadvantage most retail customers face?

Does Wealthfront have plans or advice on the record-breaking RRP and what the potential for high inflation will do to devalue personal investments?

PFOF is the "dirty little secret" of trading that we believe is wrong. Instead of charging our clients PFOF, we don't engage in it whatsoever and instead pass those savings back to our clients. I would avoid it all costs considering how much these fees can add up over time.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/silent-assassin-fees/

Regarding retail investors and shorting stocking like GME, we view day trading in the same way we do casinos; you may win big in the short-term but the odds are just so against you over time. There's clear data to show us that, the chances that you even beat out the S&P 500 day trading is less than 1% over the long-term. We just don't suggest anyone take part in it but we do understand the draw of it.

Regarding inflation concerns, that's certainly relevant but there's just no proven way to actually protect yourself from this. We view it the same way as market timing - no one can do it successfully so we instead suggest you focus on long-term, time-tested strategies proven to win out over the long-term. In times of inflation, continuing to invest in a diversified portfolio of low-cost ETFs is a great strategy to maintain. Don't change your long-term strategy for short-term headline-grabbing issues.

Here's my suggestion in detail: https://blog.wealthfront.com/the-right-and-wrong-ways-to-protect-yourself-from-inflation/

Are there any plans for Wealthfront to lower the borrow interest rate to be more competitive with the likes of M1 Finance and Interactive Brokers?

I previously kept all of my money in Wealthfront, but have recently been moving it out to these other platforms in order to incorporate a Lifecycle Investing strategy.

We've received this question quite a bit over the last year so I can tell you that we absolutely want to do everything we can to offer the most competitive rates when it comes to borrowing. With that said, our rates are tied to the effective fed funds rate and those are pretty much bottomed out currently. If we can find better ways to offer more lending product offerings at lower rates, we'll do it.

I've been a happy customer for almost 3 years now. The TLH benefits were a huge selling point for me, but I'm wondering how to best take advantage of these benefits? Also, does wealthfront ever plan to offer tax prep services?

Thanks for using our services! You don't need to worry too much as our software checks your portfolio every day for tax-loss harvesting opportunities. Whenever it sees the opportunity to save you money on future taxes, it will work for you. However, you can enhance the opportunities by continuing to add funds - this allows our software to consistently buy new securities, which can be super valuable during volatile times as we're seeing now. This doesn't mean you should leave funds ready to invest aside out of the market. Instead, we just want you to consider continuing to add more to your account to supplement this feature.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/tax-loss-harvesting-101/

We don't have any near-term plans to offer tax services but it's certainly something to consider down the road.

Thoughts on GME?

We're not here to tell you shouldn't do something as we understand everyone wants the freedom to choose how to invest. However, there is just an overwhelming amount of data that has shown, time and time again, day trading or engaging in risky strategies like the GME saga is a losing strategy. You may come out ahead in the short-term but most investors who get involved with this will likely not win out.

We view it the same way as we view gambling. Here's more context:

https://blog.wealthfront.com/unsure-about-investing-because-of-gamestop/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/the-day-trading-pandemic/

When does it make sense to get a human financial advisor?

If you would rather pay more fees to have a human you can call and meet with regularly to build a relationship with, you may prefer using a human advisor over a software-based service. No humans have proven to give better returns consistently so you should not choose a human advisor if you think that's going to happen. However, certainly many people would rather have a human to make these decisions for them as opposed to software.

You may find this helpful: https://blog.wealthfront.com/what-are-robo-advisors-and-how-do-they-differ/

What assistance do you provide for estate planning, education funding, retirement fund optimization, etc?

We actually do all of this through Path, our software-based planning tool. I'd suggest checking this out here: https://www.wealthfront.com/planning

Why shouldn't I remortgage and put my net worth into $AMC?

We'd never suggest putting a significant part of your net worth into one stock, no matter what that stock is. Instead, think about the long-term and how to put yourself in best position for that.

https://blog.wealthfront.com/think-long-term-investing/

https://blog.wealthfront.com/why-you-shouldnt-just-invest-in-the-s-p-500/

How do u find investment opportunity groups...like the ones who buy apartments or MRI centers or McDonald's?

That's a great question to look into different investment opportunities but we don't offer any type of advice on real estate investment groups like that. You may find this blog relevant though: https://blog.wealthfront.com/why-rental-properties-are-not-good-investments/

Hi Tony, I have a few questions.

1. What are some future products that are in the pipeline that you're really excited about?
2. What percentage of customers did you see adjust their portfolio to include new offerings outside of Wealthfront's recommended portfolio's?
3. What's one thing that customers request a lot of that Wealthfront will not include as a product? (individual stocks?, margin?, etc.)

Thanks for the great product!

Thanks for the questions!

1) We have a ton of great products in the pipeline but I'm most excited about giving our clients more options when it comes to Socially Responsible Investing. We're looking into some really great ways to give more guidance in choosing SRI funds while also still staying properly diversified for long-term investing. Stay tuned on this one.

2) ~15% of clients or so

3) Honestly, there isn't anything that clients request a lot we aren't going to consider at some point. We genuinely listen to our clients on this one - if we're getting a lot of requests for something that adds value to our product offerings, you're likely going to see it on our product roadmap at some point. This is what makes Wealthfront different than most other fintech apps.

How should I think about and decide if it’s worth liquidating a taxable account and taking capital gains tax hit to move the cash into a wealthfront taxable account? The transfer tool preview indicated I’d need to liquidate all.

Please send an email to our Product Support team at [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) if you feel the transfer tool needs a bit more explaining.

This really depends on your overall tax situation and that's not advice I can give so I would consider what you're giving up to gain long-term. If our tool is telling you to liquidate, I take that as you hold all mutual funds? If so, most mutual funds carry a high fee and can't even track the benchmark they're built to beat. Maybe you'd consider yourself better off paying a bit of taxes now to reduce your fees and also get better diversification long-term.

https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/115003949806-Transferring-securities-from-another-firm

https://support.wealthfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/209348166-Which-investments-can-I-transfer-to-Wealthfront-

Can you talk a little about the recent rebalancing of Wealthfront’s recommended portfolios, and what triggered the decision to make that change? How often does Wealthfront reevaluate their recommendations and what are some considerations you make when deciding to roll those out?

Sure, we review our recommend portfolios periodically with the goal of recommending the portfolio that offers the highest expected after-tax, risk-adjusted returns for our clients. Over time, as we look at the expected returns of each asset class, if we find that the allocations no longer offer this probability, we adjust accordingly. In our most recent update, we found that the US Stocks asset class deserved a higher allocation in most risk scores due to its expected return. With that, emerging markets deserved a lower allocation for most risk scores.

If you want to dig into how we actually come up with these portfolios, it's all based on the Modern Portfolio theory. Details here: https://blog.wealthfront.com/updating-asset-allocation-for-recommended-portfolios/

Are there any updates about a possible wealthfront mortgage offering?

No updates yet but we certainly want to expand our lending offerings in the future. The mortgage business is overly antiquated and ripe for change - I can tell you we see it as a great opportunity to simply through software that we've already built. We don't have an ETA but feel free to reach out to our team at [email protected]!