A former lawyer at
Feli Oikonomopoulou, who spent four years as legal counsel for Bank of America in its financial markets department in London, noticed anecdotally in her financial services roles that senior female colleagues did not invest their money to the same degree that men did.
Oikonomopoulou, who is originally from Greece, later moved to the U.S. to pursue her MBA degree at Yale University. WealthMeUp, her app that tries to address
The concept is promising, as traditional
"I'm not surprised this founder is European because in Europe, banking and investing sit so much closer to each other compared with the U.S.," said Pirker.
The challenge will be hooking an audience through financial education and
Scott Smith, director of advice relationships at Cerulli Associates, a market intelligence firm for financial services, conducted a brief test drive of the app.
"It appears to be pursuing a solid goal but will be challenged with longer-term engagement," he said via email. "I've seen several apps and online tools with similar goals, but they struggle to attract and retain users."
Oikonomopoulou's observations from her experience working in banking are supported by other data about gender gaps in investing. Cerulli Associates found in a 2020 report on gender parity in retail investing that 41% of its female respondents indicated interest in being actively involved in their portfolio decisions, compared with 57% of males.
A "recurrent theme of a tendency for females to have a degree of discomfort with the intricacies of financial advice emerges. Females express lower interest levels in taking an active role in their portfolios but are also more reluctant to pay for advice to guide them through these topics," reads the report.
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In its initial version, WealthMeUp, which has a core team of three including founder and CEO Oikonomopoulou, focuses on financial education for Generation Z and millennial women through gamification. Users complete courses and earn points that they can put toward rewards from fitness, wellness and lifestyle companies aimed at or frequented by women, including fitness studio Orangetheory and financial coaching service FemFinancial.
There are more than 140 modules covering stocks, bonds and other investment options; debt; home-buying; and more. For instance, one module may walk users through the basics of saving versus investing, while the next may build on that lesson with a tutorial on compounding. Oikonomopoulou interviewed both men and women about the app in its early stages to weigh what appealed to women. As one example, women expressed a significant preference for goal-setting and progress-tracking features compared with men. They also preferred rewards that were practical in daily life or that aligned with their values, rather than monetary rewards.
Oikonomopoulou cross-checked course content with advisors at universities and fintech companies. The launch folds in a weekly newsletter, free webinars and access to one-on-one sessions with financial coaches and certified financial planners, subject to a fee.
"The concept is making investing part of one's lifestyle," she said. "Everything starts with education."
Smith says that learning about these topics could be appealing to this market at the start, but "keeping them coming back for more is hard to do," he said. "Paced learning of in-depth topics rarely goes viral."
To incentivize progress in the app, users earn 100 points per module, up to 100 points for a daily challenge, or 1,500 to 1,900 points per completed course. They can redeem these points for rewards. For instance, 3,000 points gets two one-hour sessions at Orangetheory and some merchandise.
The idea is, "younger users associate learning about investing with getting rewarded," said Oikonomopoulou.
Smith says this structure may help, "but it is tough to get [rewards] large enough to drive behavior."
The next phase, which Oikonomopoulou plans to pilot this summer, is to link a user's personal cash-back card to WealthMeUp so the cash-back users earn can be automatically invested in exchange-traded funds or fractional shares. She expects to use Plaid or a similar provider to link credit cards with WealthMeUp's investment account, and notes that individual partnerships with banks and credit card issuers may be necessary.
This idea was inspired by her interviews as well.
"Men often asked about investment opportunities shortly after completing some educational modules, regardless of their actual readiness," said Oikonomopoulou. "Women, however, expressed the desire for a safe space to continue learning about investing, often preferring to use a simulator before engaging with real funds." The cash-back idea felt like a suitable step forward because it could feel to some like "free money."
Dylan Lerner, senior analyst in digital banking at Javelin Strategy & Research, agrees that cash-back can feel less like "money out of your own pocket" and assuage some anxieties about throwing money into investments.
But generally, "although we see value in the 'set it and forget it' nature of automated functionality, we find that savings features that engage consumers and make them actively conscious investors and savers have more potential to form better financial habits and influence long-term financial behavior," he said via email.
WealthMeUp has received funding via several awards from Yale Business School startup competitions as well as grants and accelerator programs. Oikonomopoulou wants WealthMeUp to remain free for users. She plans for the company to earn money via its rewards partners, who will pay to be on WealthMeUp's platform in order to reach potential new customers, and is ironing out her monetization strategy for the investment side.
