RiskReversal Pod Not All Millennials Are FOMOing Into Markets with Wealthfront CEO David Fortunato
Mar 19, 2026
David Fortunato, CEO of Wealthfront and longtime product leader in automated investing. He talks about building systematic tax-loss harvesting and direct indexing. He explains why younger investors prefer delegation and ease of use. He describes portfolio lending, home-finance expansion, and how AI powers planning tools like Path.
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Clients Prefer Delegated Automated Portfolios
- Wealthfront found clients prefer delegation and automated, low-cost investing over tactical tinkering.
- A hackathon-built ETF portfolio with automated rebalancing and tax efficiency became the core product that drove initial growth.
Tax Loss Harvesting Is Real Alpha
- Systematic tax-loss harvesting produces meaningful after-tax alpha unlike most tactical allocation managers.
- Wealthfront automated tax-loss harvesting and later direct indexing to harvest more losses via fractional shares and security-level trading.
Make Ease Of Use The Core Product
- Prioritize ease of use and availability over flashy performance claims to retain younger clients.
- Wealthfront grows mainly via referrals because clients value peace of mind and mobile-first access to their finances.