Scared to trade stocks? Titan algorithmically invests for you

Titan could put an end to stock market FOMO. The app chooses the best 20 stocks by scraping top hedge fund data, adds some shorts based on your personal risk profile and puts your money to work. No worrying about market fluctuations or constantly rebalancing your portfolio. You don’t have to do anything, but can get smarter about stocks thanks to its in-app explanations and research reports. Titan wants to be the easiest way to invest in stocks for a mobile generation that wants an affordable coach to guide them through the market themselves.

“Our goal is to take things that aren’t accessible [in wealth management] and make them accessible, starting with hedge funds,” says Titan co-founder Joe Percoco. That potential to democratize one of the keys to financial mobility has won Titan a $2.5 million seed round from Y Combinator’s co-founder Paul Graham, president Sam Altman and partners including Gmail creator Paul Bucheit. The rest of the capital comes from Maverick Ventures, BoxGroup and Liquid2 Ventures.

“Titan is where investing meets virality,” says Graham. “Those are two very powerful forces.” Since TechCrunch broke the news of Titan’s launch in August, it’s doubled its assets under management to $20 million and hired its first non-founder engineer.

Now it’s launching in-app educational videos so stock market dummies can get up to speed if they want to understand where their money’s going amidst a swirling see of financial news. “There are so many different headlines telling so many different narratives,” Percoco tells me. “Everyone is searching for explanations in a voice they trust. An ‘ETF’ can’t talk back. Sometimes a human face is better than writing. A video can really help people make choices.” Here’s its two-minute video about Facebook’s Q2 earnings a few months ago, explaining why the share price crashed 25 percent:

Percoco and Clayton Gardner met on their first day of Wharton business school, while their third co-founder was earning a hedge fund patent and studying computer science at Stanford. They went on to work at hedge funds and private equity firms like Goldman Sachs, but got fed up just growing the fortunes of the already rich.

So they started Titan to invent a modern, mobile version of BlackRock, the investment giant founded in the 1980s. Titan uses the public disclosures of hedge funds to find consensus around the 20 best performing stocks. With as little as $1,000, users can let Titan robo-manage their investments for a 1 percent fee on assets. Users provide some info on how big they want to gamble, and Titan personalizes their portfolio with more or less conservative shorts to hedge their bets.

Titan’s simplicity combined with the sense of participation could help it grow quickly. It sits between do-it-yourself options like Robinhood or E*Trade, where you’re basically left to fend for yourself, and totally passive options like Wealthfront and Betterment, where you’re so divorced from your portfolio that you’re not learning. Managed hedge funds and fellow active investment vehicles like BlackRock with a human advisor can require a $100,000 minimum investment that’s too steep for millennials.

“Even the best hedge fund in the world is only going to send you a PDF every 90 days,” Percoco explains. But Titan doesn’t want you nervously checking your portfolio non-stop. “Our median user checks the app once per day.” That seems like a healthy balance between awareness and sanity. It thinks its education and informative push notifications make it worth a higher required investment and fees than Wealthfront charges.

Essentially, Titan is a stock trading auto-pilot merged with a flight simulator so you improve your finance skills without having to fear a crash. Percoco tells me the sense of accomplishment that engenders is why clients say they’re telling friends about Titan. “When I invest, I look for companies that are growing quickly and making a huge positive impact on the world. Titan is one of those companies,” investor Altman says. “I think they could improve the financial well-being of an entire generation.”

Can you use the Tor Browser without Tor connection?

Tor Browser is a web browser specifically designed for privacy and anonymity. The web browser is a modified version of Firefox ESR that includes privacy tweaks and even some extensions to improve privacy and security on the Internet. What makes it special is that all connections go through several severs of the Tor network before they connect to the destination. Connections to Tor improve privacy when you are online but could you, in theory, run Tor Browser without Tor? Tor Browser without Tor would still provide better out-of-the-box privacy than Firefox ESR or Firefox Stable -- and other browsers. It is arguably the browser with the best default privacy configuration which might make it attractive to some users. Dropping Tor reduces privacy while online but that can be compensated, e.g. by connecting to a VPN or even chaining VPN services and it would speed things up significantly. Tor is the better choice when it comes to critical tasks, e.g. leaking documents or communication...

12 Striking Dark Wallpaper Sites That Are Perfect for Your Desktop

The computer desktop is a personal space, and so you get to do it up with your choice of wallpapers. Desktop wallpapers reveal something about our natures. The kind of mood you are in. Science says that the choice of colors affect how we think and feel. Maybe also light or the absence of it. So how do you feel about dark desktop wallpapers? The obvious benefit of using dark backgrounds on your desktop is that all your icons and folders stand out in contrast. They make text easier to read. For instance, a dark motivational wallpaper spotlights the inspiring message scribbled on it. So let’s look at a few high-quality free dark-themed wallpapers for your desktop. 1. Wallpapers Craft The better wallpaper sites allow you to choose a wallpaper according to your screen resolution. They also have multiple categories for you to choose from. Wallpapers Craft could be on the shortlist. The catalog of dark wallpapers gives you 1000+ wallpapers to choose from. Sort them by the number of downl...

10 Essential Red Dead Redemption 2 Tips

Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of the most epic open world games ever made. There’s a lot to do in the game, from story missions to sidequests, from hunting animals to robbing banks. And that means Red Dead Redemption 2 can, at times, feel overwhelming. There are some fundamental things you need to learn in order to enjoy Red Dead Redemption 2. And they should help you succeed at playing the game without dying too often. So, here are some essential Red Dead Redemption 2 tips all players should know… 1. Take Note of Your Surroundings This may seem obvious to some, but it’s worth mentioning. Don’t just focus on your destination or waypoint. Instead, scan the horizon for places worth exploring and people worth meeting. Smoke rising into the air means someone has a campfire. A white circle denotes a stranger mission is close by. You’ll also see or hear animals close by that may be worth hunting. 2. Always Set Destinations on Your Map The map in Red Dead Redemption 2 is vast. So vast...

BardTech

Search This Blog