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- [00:00]
Optum Narrator
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- [00:36]
Interviewer (Katie)
News let's talk a bit more about those Trump accounts because Robinhood shares closing higher the company involved in the rollout of this program. I'm pleased to say that CEO Vlad Tenev joins us now from the White House. Vlad, great to have you with us. So the Trump accounts app, of course, it was built in partnership with the bank of New York and with Robinhood. The actual app has been available for download since about late May or so ahead of that July 4th launch. Talk to us about, you know, the uptake you've seen in terms of interests and downloads, etc. Heading into the launch and now a few days post.
- [01:13]
Vlad Tenev
Yeah, thank you for having me, Katie. And I mean the uptake has been tremendous. The aspiration from the beginning was to make this the best product, product that the government has ever been associated with. And we had 6 million kids sign up pre launch and express interest. Millions of accounts have already been invested and the app has basically been living at or near the top of the App store chart. So it's, it's continuing to accelerate. More and more people are downloading it, setting up accounts for their families. This weekend the first investments started rolling in and the money started flowing in and every newborn born after January 1, 2025 gets an initial thousand dollars for free ceded from the U.S. treasury. So this is a no brainer for new parents, but also amazing for anyone under the age of 18. And there's 70 million individuals that we believe this could be the best mechanism for them to get ownership from a young age in the US Equity markets, which as you guys know, have been the greatest engine of wealth creation in human history. So we're proud to serve as initial broker and trustee in partnership with DNY as the financial agent powering this great transformative program.
- [02:36]
Interviewer (Katie)
And last week we heard from the treasury announcing the funds that will be involved. Estate street etf, the Ticker Spy M is going to be the default fund. But in announcing the fund fund line of treasury said in A statement that in the coming months, treasury expects to make available functionality that will allow parents or guardians to choose how to allocate funds across the additional investment options. But until that functionality is available, all of those contributions will remain invested in the default fund, which, again, is spy. I was wondering if you could shed light on what functionality means in this context. What, you know, sort of the, the wiring and the back end of setting this all up has looked like.
- [03:18]
Vlad Tenev
Yeah, I mean, the balance that we have to reach is between enabling personal choice and individual choice and balancing that with the need to make sure that these children benefit from the power of compound interest, which Albert Einstein described as the eighth wonder of the world. So, so compound interest is incredibly powerful. If you take that initial thousand dollars and add $100 a month to the account, assuming a fairly conservative 7% annual rate of return, that turns into millions of dollars by retirement age. And so it actually makes a huge difference the earlier you start. So starting at age zero is like much, much better than starting even at age 18 or most people, you know, in their 30s. So we want to make sure that, that the children benefit from the compounding as early as possible.
- [04:18]
Interviewer Follow-up
I am curious, Vlad. So then I am curious just about how long term this potentially benefits Robinhood. Obviously, for a lot of kids, their first sort of contact with, you know, the investment world to a certain extent is going to be through Robinhood, or at least their parents, and then eventually the kids themselves. Is the idea here not so much just, okay, whatever the compounding effect of the thousand, but also an educational component about how to manage money and invest in other ways as they grow and get to adulthood and can do so
- [04:49]
Vlad Tenev
on their own, well, remain so. Robinhood has always been about ownership. We want to make everyone an owner. We believe that a future that's owned by the few is inherently fragile and, and so broad ownership is essential to have a stable and prosperous and free society. And Right now, the US sits at about 62% of individuals own equities. With Trump accounts, we think that can get up to 95%. And I think we spend a lot of time talking about the benefits to the individuals. You know, they could make more money, they could, they could secure their own financial future. But I think what's under reported is the societal benefits. So if you own something and you're not just a consumer or renter, you care about it, you become a staunch defender. And I think we've seen our free market system come under increasing attack in recent years. And I think the best antidote to that is to make everyone an owner and everyone have skin in the game in the most powerful and impactful companies that are, that are local to this country.
- [05:59]
Interviewer Follow-up
When we start to talk about sort of the, I guess the partnership that you have, particularly with regards to the National Design Studio, how much of that tech stack that was used to create the app was that, did some of that come from Robinhood or was that just sort of independent and then you guys just kind of paired up later?
- [06:19]
Vlad Tenev
Yeah, so it's really a partnership between, between us and BNY Mellon, which serves as the financial agent for the accounts. We're doing the brokerage services and the mobile development. We work with National Design Studio on the designs and to make sure this product has a consistent look and feel. And you know, the craftsmanship that we've all been enjoying from, from, from other government websites and properties that, that Joe Jebb over there has been, has been really refining. And of course US treasury and the administration, you know, we think this is a great example of the private and public sectors working together and leveraging our respective strengths to deliver an amazing product to the American people. I think this might be remembered as one of the best things that, that we've done in a very long time and it's just an honor to be associated with it as Robinhood.
- [07:20]
Interviewer (Katie)
Well, Vlad, while we have you, I do want to ask you about perpetual futures, because Robinhood, you just rolled out perpetual futures which have no expiry date on commodities, ETFs, currencies in Europe, then bringing it back to the U.S. i mean, when do you think that we might see something similar beyond Bitcoin perps come to the U.S. yeah, I mean,
- [07:44]
Vlad Tenev
certainly the technology to do this exists. We have it live in Europe, both to retail consumers and institutional through our bitstamp exchange offering. I think in the US it's coming to the administration has signaled a willingness to innovate. And you know, these products, these perpetual futures products have benefits like they are a very capital efficient way to get leveraged exposure to commodities, crypto, to all kinds of different assets without worrying about the complexities of managing exploration or rolling. So I think it's going to happen and you should expect that. You know, we make all of our global products available in the US and in all other jurisdictions where, where they're permissible.
- [08:41]
Interviewer Follow-up
All right, Vlad, we really appreciate you taking time for us there. A Vlad, 10 of there right outside on the lawn at the White House. The CEO of Robinhood, of course, with the big rollout that we saw over the July 4th weekend of those new accounts.
- [08:54]
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