S4 Ep5 | The One Where Robo-Advisors Haven’t Saved the World Yet

Because Money Podcast

You might remember from our episode on robo-advisors in Season Three that Sandi and John have spent abnormal amounts of time thinking about robo-advisors, to the point where they built a calculator to compare all of the ones available in Canada. Well, they’ve sold the calculator (to our Season 2 host, Kyle and his partner in crime Justin), and in this episode we talk about what the robos have done right in the last three years and what they can still improve on. Time Stamps: 5:28 - What are robo advisors doing wrong 9:10 - Why ‘time on device’ is not a great metric 13:19 - Is it a robo advisor’s job to educate their users? 20:03 - A rant against being ‘better than nothing' 23: 53 - Do robo advisor’s really provide advice? 28:58 - How do we want to see robos grow in the future? 32:31 - Debunking the idea of ‘transparent fees’ with robo advisors 39:53 - The responsibilities of an industry that bills themselves as a disruptor 47:55 - Portfolio complexity leads to fee complexity