Matthew Hui

10 months ago

Like my experience with WiseBanyan so far. Early users of the platform get tax loss harvesting for free so that's a good incentive to signup early. I'm gonna slowly start to move more of my money from Betterment to WiseBanyan. I'm a little worried that they might not be able to make money (since they don't charge a fee) and sustain their service but we'll see what happens.

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notajith

10 months ago

WiseBanyan is legit so far. Like a lot of startups and tech companies they don't quite have a solid revenue model yet. They report that they plan to sell a la carte products and features. I can't find it now, but I recall reading that they plan to charge 15bps for tax loss harvesting.

The brokerage is FolioInvesting, a 15 yr old company that deployed all the robo advisor features one could want(fractional shares, smart rebalancing, tax efficient withdrawals, basket trading), but is damn ugly. WiseBanyan presently is probably just leaning on that for all the operational stuff, so they didn't need a huge technology investment like say Betterment probably did to build everything from scratch and operate as a broker and an advisor.

In is advisory capacity WiseBanyan offers its model portfolios, and risk assessment just like the other robo advisors. The only notable divergence from a pretty typical model is that they choose to slice and dice the bond allocation. I haven't studied their rationale for that yet. Also they seem light on emerging markets compared to the others. The funds are all vanguard ETFs.

The brokerage is a third party, folio. If WiseBanyan fails, you still own your shares at the brokerage. If you like WiseBanyan's asset allocation, there is no more economical or convenient way to invest.

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AdrenolineLove

10 months ago

I have been with Wisebanyan for nearly a year now. About 5% returns and no fees from what I can see. Unless they are dipping into the investment returns and not telling me but. Nothing that I can see. It is easy to use, set up auto deposit of $70 a week and move on with your life. Check it once a week, month whatever helps you sleep at night.

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aekeys

10 months ago

It's been great. Been using it over a year for a personal investment account and jumped in with a Roth IRA a couple of months ago because I liked it so much. I'm currently up 6% and 3% respectively (aggressive portfolios) which is pretty good considering the market conditions over the past year. I have weekly auto deposits set up, which can easily be modified at any time. It's super easy investing which is great for set it and forget it style.

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mitchikade

9 months ago

I really, really enjoy using Wisebanyan and recommend it all the time. Their customer service is REALLY easy to deal with, too, if you ever need to call them. I've had my account since December 2014 and I've added money and pulled money out and as of the writing of this post I'm at 5.33% return with a 'risk score' of 8.2 (which is 75% stocks, 25% bonds and REIT for those curious).

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SnowdensOfYesteryear

6 months ago

WiseBanyan is free and make money off services like TLH which they charge for. Almost a no-brainer to use them. They're much newer though.
But seriously, if you have a small amount of money just pick anyone. Fees don't really matter that much, you're more likely to blow more money eating out.

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