Sharesies granted exemption to provide personal advice

Online investment platform, Sharesies, has been granted an exemption by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) to provide personalised digital advice to its customers. This is a significant step for Sharesies, enabling the company to develop its goal of making investing accessible to everyone.

Sharesies’ objective is to give someone with $5 the same investment opportunities as someone with $500,000. “We’ve got 40,000 people on our platform already, and we want our investors to have access to investing and advice. Robo-advice will let us do that,” says CEO and co-founder, Brooke Roberts.

Roberts points out, “there’s a large number of people prevented from getting appropriate investment advice because they don’t have big enough portfolios. In the past, personal advice has been restricted to people with substantial funds – often upwards of $500,000. We don’t think that’s fair, or equitable.”

“There are big developments ahead for Sharesies. The range of products we are going to be introducing in the coming months will give our investors more confidence in their investing decisions. Advice, and robo-advice in particular, will help provide that confidence at scale,” Roberts says.

Sharesies doesn’t consider robo-advice as a product by itself, rather a tool they can use to help its customers be confident investors. Having the exemption means Sharesies can start exploring how personalised digital advice can play a part on the platform.

“Having access to robo-advice means we can provide investment recommendations based on our customers individual goals, beliefs and behaviours that really resonate with how they want to build their portfolio. We’re excited about a future where advice is available to more and more Kiwis—allowing us to become the most financially empowered generation yet,” says Roberts.

Founded in 2017, Sharesies established itself as a challenger in the investment world. Through the platform Sharesies have made it possible for anyone to invest in shares, and to grow their financial knowledge.

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