I don't think the number includes tax deferrals from loss harvesting. For example in 2014 I "lost" (harvested) about $40k -- note that my account ended in the black in 2014 -- that I paired with a short-term capital gain (read: high-tax gain), deferring those taxes and letting them compound until the far future when I am hopefully in a lower tax bracket.
> What’s to keep me from investing $10,000 with you and then mimicking trades for my $250,000 portfolio at a discount broker?
> Nothing. But that kind of sounds like a pain in the neck when we only charge you an annual advisory fee of 0.25% (on assets over $10,000) to take care of all the trades in your account, as well as the periodic rebalancing and daily tax-loss harvesting. That being said, you are welcome to copy anything we do if you would rather do it yourself.
> Wealthfront is indeed a ripoff for the well-informed.
Do you feel that this is universally true or situation-dependent? I consider myself reasonably informed and Wealthfront appears to be a strong, if not the strongest, option for my financial situation (young, most of my net worth is in a taxable account, direct indexing, regular expected capital gains to pair with tax losses).
I don't think the number includes tax deferrals from loss harvesting. For example in 2014 I "lost" (harvested) about $40k -- note that my account ended in the black in 2014 -- that I paired with a short-term capital gain (read: high-tax gain), deferring those taxes and letting them compound until the far future when I am hopefully in a lower tax bracket.