The Financial Future: Why You'll Buy Advice, Not Be Sold It

Remember the "boiler room" scenes in The Wolf of Wall Street? High-pressure brokers pushing penny stocks on unsuspecting clients, fueled by fat commissions? That image, while exaggerated, reflects an old Wall St adage: "stocks are sold, not bought"[1]. Brokers – often on hefty commissions – weren't just order takers; they were promoters, actively pitching investments, and their relationship with you was often the core of the investment experience. In the pre-internet age, knowledge was power, and brokers held almost all of it.

Fast forward fifty years, and that adage sounds almost quaint. Today, stocks aren't really sold, and in many ways, not actively "bought" either. They are… chosen, allocated, or simply present in your portfolio, often with minimal human intervention.

The 'Mayday' Moment: When Discount Brokers Empowered Investors (and Then Came the Web)

If you wanted to mark the beginning of this shift, May 1st, 1975, “Mayday” as it was known on Wall Street, is a good place to start. This was the day fixed commissions on the New York Stock Exchange were abolished, collapsing the old, expensive brokerage model. Discount brokers rose, with Charles Schwab leading the charge. Schwab offered lower costs and, crucially, choice. Investors could now manage their stock selections themselves, executing their own orders, a far cry from being steered towards specific picks by a broker.

But the story didn't stop with Schwab. The late 1990s and early 2000s saw the next wave of disruption: the rise of online brokers like E*TRADE and TD Ameritrade. These firms took the discount brokerage model and turbocharged it with the internet. Suddenly, you didn't even need to call someone to place a trade; you could manage your portfolio entirely online, in your pajamas. E*TRADE's quirky commercials and TD Ameritrade's robust trading platforms signaled a new era of accessibility and self-direction. The balance of power was shifting decisively towards the individual investor.

The Robinhood Effect: Commission-Free Trading Solidifies the Era of Investor Agency

Then came another seismic shift. In 2013, Robinhood, with its sleek mobile app and promise of "democratizing finance," launched commission-free trading. This wasn't just about deeper discounts; it was about zero cost transactions. By 2019, commission fees became extinct across the major brokerages. Schwab, TD Ameritrade, E*TRADE – all eventually dropped commissions to $0 to compete. The last vestiges of the old, sales-driven stock model evaporated. Stock trading became something undeniably accessible – or, perhaps more accurately, directly controlled – by retail investors, empowered (and occasionally over-enthusiastic) and armed with more information than ever before.

Financial Advice: Still a ‘Sold’, Not ‘Bought’ Service?

Yet, while the world of stock trading underwent this radical transformation, the financial advisory industry… largely stood still. The traditional Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) model, despite its fiduciary duty and often valuable services, often still operates on a model where services are sold rather than bought. Financial advisors still market their expertise, often emphasizing personal relationships, hand-holding, and customized strategies. Many RIAs, in a business model built around scale, then outsource the actual investment management, focusing their efforts on client acquisition, marketing, and relationship management – all while highlighting that seemingly standard 1% annual management fee.

It's a curious paradox: in a world of zero-commission stock trades and readily available investment information, millions still allocate a significant percentage of their assets annually for investment guidance that, in many cases, leads them to fairly conventional, easily replicable investment approaches. Financial advice, for many, remains something actively sold, often through persuasive campaigns and relationship building, rather than something proactively bought with the same critical evaluation that investors now apply to choosing stocks or ETFs.

Building the 'Bought' Future of Finance

But the landscape is shifting. We are on the cusp of a major transformation in financial advice, mirroring the disruption of the brokerage industry. Over the next two decades, an estimated $84 trillion is expected to pass from older generations to younger ones [2]. This is not just a generational wealth transfer; it’s a generational shift in mindset. This new generation, raised on the internet, expects transparency, on-demand access, and value for money. They are accustomed to selecting services directly, comparing options, and doing their own research. The era of passively accepting pre-packaged financial advice is waning.

Here at Double, we believe investors will increasingly adopt specific, targeted financial solutions and tools, directly, and on their own terms. This means advanced investment strategies, previously packaged as bespoke, high-cost advisory services for the wealthy, are now becoming direct-to-consumer products. Think of sophisticated strategies like Tax Loss Harvesting and Direct Indexing – tangible benefits that were once locked behind advisory fees are now obtainable with a 0% expense ratio from Double.

Financial planning, retirement projections, and complex scenario modeling, once opaque processes handled by advisors, are being democratized through flat-fee, transparent digital tools like Boldin, Mezzi and others. Even some RIAs like Elm Wealth (run by Victor Haghani of Long Term Capital Management fame) are getting in on the action by launching what were closed funds as ETFs that can be bought in any brokerage account.

The future of retail finance isn't about being sold a dream; it's about buying the tools, knowledge, and strategies to build your own financial future, with transparency, control, and value at the forefront. The era of "sold" financial products is fading; the age of "bought" finance is dawning. And for today's digitally savvy, value-conscious retail investor, armed with platforms like Double, that's a very powerful and empowering shift.

[1] Discussed on page 119 of the great book A Piece of the Action

[2] Merril Lynch