Advice rewired: Do robo-advisers dream of actual profits?

Lost more than £100m

Tom Ellis
clock • 12 min read

After Investec recently took the decision to withdraw its robo-adviser Invest & Click from the market after the venture lost £32m, Professional Adviser's news editor Tom Ellis assesses how profitably the so-called 'robo-advice' sector as a whole is shaping up… 

Philip K. Dick's poignant 1968 sci-fi classic Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was famously the inspiration for the Blade Runner films. If he was writing today, however, might Dick instead be wondering if robo-advisers dream of ever turning a profit? A substantial rummage through the accounts of those inhabiting the UK robo-adviser space has revealed it is clearly a market still very much in its infancy - although that excuse may wear thin for investors and backers before long. While turnover and profit/loss figures are not available for all of the market's robo firms, the accounts that...

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