FintekNews is pleased to offer our weekly feature column 3 Questions. Each week, we feature a thought leader within a unique sector of fintech and ask them to answer just 3 questions for our audience in their vernacular. This week, we’d like to introduce you to Stan Smith, CEO of SaveDaily, an ultra low cost, private label platform which enables banks, brokerages, and non-traditional financial service providers to profitably offer high-end financial services to anyone, regardless of income, account size, or activity levels.
NAME: Stan Smith
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CEOCOMPANY:
SaveDailyWEB ADDRESS:
SaveDaily.comWhat does your firm do/offer within the fintech sector?
SaveDaily is all about the small saver. We try to make investing easy and repeatable with a wizzard assessment and with 3 easy steps (1: Select a goal; 2. Calculate how much you want to save; 3. Find a suitable investment vehicle). By catering to the mass affluent or the small saver (<$10K), SaveDaily believes each investor should have access to the greatest investment tools, great 3rd party research, access to Institutional mutual funds at a low price point.
Millennials are changing jobs every 2-5 years (3.2 years on average according to balance.com) which means you could have over 8+ different 401k accounts at 8+ different providers by the age of 65. Making sure you have the right IRA rollover solution is critical so that you can aggregate your accounts in the most cost effective way. SaveDaily can support that business with a $5.95 per month with no account minimums, unlimited mutual fund trades, and access to a managed account solution.
What area/s of fintech do you believe will grow the most in the coming 5 years?
Life is becoming more and complex with everyday needs. I believe that having a single hub to access all of your accounts and see them holistically is the future. A great example is Yodlee which aggregates all of your accounts. However, I think the Yodlee concept needs to be portable via an iWatch or some other similar mint.com app. This single hub would reflect your savings rate, how you can save during the week or month based on your budget trends, credit cards rates, investments, student loans, mortgage, and provide small tax tips. It would then tier them based on your priorities and pro-actively pin you with easy tips on how to save and cut expenses (i.e. Have you thought of doing this today, or what are your thoughts of cutting back on this this week?).
Secondly, a fintech provider should not be one country specific but rather should be multi lingual, multi country, and global solution. I don’t believe one country should have better tools or access vs. another. That is what SaveDaily is trying to do and be a global fintech company. Moreover, fintech as a whole will need to think about when is the right time for people to begin saving, investing; for example, does it start when you get your first summer job, an internship and build as a lifelong relationship from the ground up. I believe fintech companies can reach the 99% of this world!
What do you believe the next major innovation in financial technology will be and why?
I believe the next major financial innovation would be some type of “Amazon Alexa” like solution. This Alexa will have all your personal info, remind you of what you should be buying/not buying, discount locations and more. Alexa will be your virtual daily personal financial adviser, reminder and educator…very similar to a weather person. An Amazon-like company already has some of your personal info. By accepting, this assistant would ask you for a more in-depth questionnaire. Based on your responses it would create a profile and prioritize your daily needs in a voice reply method…For example, what is my net worth? what were my biggest weekly expenses? when do I have to pay my taxes? how are my stocks doing?. With that said, Alexa would also proactively give you some friendly reminders; did you know if you brought your lunch today to work you could save?
Stan L. Smith most recently served as Vice President of Senior Relationships Manager at Fidelity Investments. Prior to Stan’s tenure at Fidelity Investments, he worked as a Junior Partner managing over $100 million in high net-worth clients, hedge funds and endowments at UBS Paine Webber, Inc. and Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc. Stan holds the FINRA Series 7, 63, 9, and 10 licenses, an Accredited Investment Fiduciary designation (AIF), and a Certified 401(k) Professional, C(K)P.