Robo-Advisor

A black box. A smart robot. A computer that purports to advise you as to how to best manage your money, better than an analogous human...for a fraction of the cost.

Sound too good to be true? Hmm...well, given that human advice-givers are usually awful, and that money managers destroy more value than they add, this little trickster might actually be good. The future. The way things go. The "fire your advisor and hire this robot thingie"...thing.

You have probably heard of SoFi. They're a robo-advisor. It's all they do. Unclear how they make money, but it's awfully nice to have a computer do all the client-dealing for almost no marginal cost versus those high-maintenance people in expensive clothing.

In theory, a robo advisor "knows" more about the market than a human, is unbiased, and simply does what's best for clients as driven by statistical data. The tough question: is the data good, bad, or ugly? Or all three? Yeah. We don't know yet. The jury is still out on this one. Google the term and you'll be hounded relentlessly with ads from the many vendors out there all fighting for your business.