I started using the InvestEngine platform last quarter, and having used about 9 brokerage, investment and robo-advisor platforms to date, I can honestly say it’s by far my favourite. Simple, clear, with low fees, and no-nonsense. To me it feels like it has found great product market fit. The financial figures seem to back that up. Client numbers and AUM grew by 3.8x and 5.3x for the year, which feels decent.
I can’t see fees going up on their existing products, as their business strategy is “simple, low-cost”. They will have worked out at what scale they can become profitable with the existing fee structure, and this will be a conservative estimate of where they think they can get.
Absolutely! And I’m sure there are further premium services in the pipeline. New features will also improve the platform and therefore help growth.
If I were a shareholder I’d be cautiously optimistic. As long as the growth continues, with stable customer acquisition costs, I would expect IE to get several further rounds of funding relatively easily before hitting profitability. And if not, it would be more likely to be sold than fold. They would likely get bought up by a retail bank, as there is a lot of synergy, or by a competitor, for economies of scale.