Gainy, a San-Franciso based SEC-registered retail trading platform focused on Millenial and Gen Z investors, has announced a new partnership with a fintech investment company and fractional investing pioneer DriveWealth, to offer its customer base access to trading on autopilot. The new tool, dubbed Thematic Trading Fractionals (TTFs), is based on DriveWealth's API and will allow the optimization of the thematic model portfolios.
Gainy Offers Autopilot Investing
According to a press release shared with Finance Magnates, this collaboration is a response to the investment preferences of the younger generation, as 90% of Gen Z investors prioritize saving and investing over spending. With a combined disposable income of around $360 billion, these investors recognize the importance of businesses addressing environmental and social issues. Consequently, they lean towards investing in diversified products like ETFs instead of individual stocks.
Gainy's TTFs platform allows active investors to maintain flexibility and control without spending time and effort on in-depth stock research and portfolio optimization. The platform offers over 70 model portfolios based on industries, investment styles, and market conditions, making use of Gainy's recommendation tools and financial data. TTFs typically comprise 10-20 stocks, striking a balance between diversification and investment focus that exchange -traded funds (ETFs) cannot provide.
"Many retail investors want to take a hands-on approach to managing their portfolio, but focusing on single stocks requires time and in-depth research," said Mikhail Stukalo, the CFA and Chief Investment Officer at Gainy. "Our goal is to make the investment process easier and allow investors to focus on long-term portfolio management and themes rather than just a few specific company names."
Gainy users can now access personalized investment advice through the Gainy Score, which aligns investors with stocks and portfolios that match their interests and investment goals. Gainy will create and optimize TTFs for clients, ensuring their portfolios stay current with the most pertinent companies and performance.
Boris Dus, Gainy's CEO, highlights that the new generation of clients are investors rather than traders, and they often think in terms of investment topics rather than single-stock picking. He believes that the partnership with DriveWealth will help cut through the market noise and simplify investing.
Hard Year for Retail Traders and Their Brokers
In 2022, retail investors lost a total of $350bn, with the average portfolio losing 30%, according to data by Vanda Research. Declines in the shares of major tech giants such as Tesla and Apple, which are hugely popular with Main Street, resulted in a contraction of earnings and a decrease in risk appetite.
In addition, a report prepared by Finance Magnates Intelligence showed that the decline in the stock market's value has proved detrimental to the popularity of the contracts for difference (CFDs) market. This can be seen both in the results of popular search engines and the performance of brokers and trading firms.
"The decline in Big Tech stock prices in 2022 was indeed directly related to a loss of user interest in Equity CFD trading. A keyword analysis on Google Trends shows that interest in stock CFDs has dropped in a very similar way," Filippo Ucchino, the Founder and CEO at InvestinGoal, commented.
The latest financial report by XTB for 2022 showed that in Q4, equity CFDs turnover reached PLN 1.1 million, marking a decline of over 90% compared to the PLN 11.5 million which was recorded during the previous year's corresponding period. This demonstrates that trading activity hit a low point alongside the market.
However, after the storm, the sun usually comes out. The same is true of the stock market, which has rebounded significantly from last year's lows, and retailers are again looking for opportunities in the market. The TTFs offered by Gainly could be a viable alternative for well-established instruments.
TTFs Instead of ETFs
Since the outbreak of the 2020 pandemic, the retail investment market has grown enormously. Investors were given the opportunity to trade commission-free, and then investing in fractional shares became commonplace. Now Gainy is unveiling its proposal for TTFs, which are designed to be an alternative to ETFs.
The tool is in private beta for early users and internal testing. According to a Gainy representative, TTFs have an advantage over ETFs because they focus on fewer companies and are more risk-optimized. This allows the investor to generate higher returns than traditional ETFs.
Forget ETFs and index funds!
ā Michael Rumiantsau (@MicRum) June 9, 2022
Here is why TTFs are the future of retail investing š pic.twitter.com/9Pl5T7Emgc
"The themes for TTFs can be as simple as industry classifications (e.g. Green Energy TTF), a certain investment approach (Dividend TTF), or some social cause (Diversity Leaders TTF). Furthermore, we strive to create a large range of TTFs to reflect a wide variety of topics, and we keep our eyes wide open for new themes and topics that are getting some traction among retail investors," Gainly explained on its website.
Users can choose the sectors they are interested in themselves, or, for an additional fee, use the autopilot function. TTFs, according to Gainly, will be tailored to the trader's needs.
