Overview
- Headquarters
- Palo Alto, CA
- Total Firm Assets
- $42.9 billion
- Average High-Net-Worth Client Portfolio Size
- $1.3 million
- Minimum Account Size
- $500
Recent Rankings
Fee Structure
Primary Fee Schedule (WRAP BROCHURE OCTOBER 2025)
| Min | Max | Marginal Fee Rate |
|---|---|---|
| $0 | and above | 0.25% |
Illustrative Fee Rates
| Total Assets | Annual Fees | Average Fee Rate |
|---|---|---|
| $1 million | $2,500 | 0.25% |
| $5 million | $12,500 | 0.25% |
| $10 million | $25,000 | 0.25% |
| $50 million | $125,000 | 0.25% |
| $100 million | $250,000 | 0.25% |
Clients
- High-Net-Worth Share of Firm Assets
- 35.10%
- Number of High-Net-Worth Clients
- 11,604
- Total Client Accounts
- 642,888
- Discretionary Accounts
- 586,081
- Non-Discretionary Accounts
- 56,807
Services Offered
Services: Portfolio Management for Individuals, Portfolio Management for Institutional Clients
Regulatory Filings
- SEC CRD Number
- 148456
Additional Brochure: 529 PROGRAM BROCHURE OCT 2025 (2025-10-07)
View Document Text
261 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, California 94301
www.wealthfront.com
Wealthfront Advisers 529 College Savings Plan
Wrap Fee Program Brochure
October 6, 2025
Item 1 Cover Page
This Wealthfront Advisers 529 College Savings Plan Wrap Fee Program Brochure (“Brochure”)
provides information about the qualifications and business practices of Wealthfront Advisers LLC
(“Wealthfront Advisers” or “we” or “us”), an investment adviser registered with the United States
Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”), in respect of the Wealthfront Advisers 529
College Savings Plan (the “Plan”). Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training
but only indicates that Wealthfront Advisers has registered its business with state and federal
regulatory authorities, including the SEC (our SEC number is 801-69766). The information in this
Brochure has not been approved or verified by the SEC or by any state securities authority.
If you have any questions about the contents of this Brochure, please contact us at 844-995-8437
or support@wealthfront.com. Additional information about Wealthfront Advisers is also available
on the SEC’s website at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov and on Wealthfront Advisers’ website,
www.wealthfront.com.
Item 2 Material Changes
Since the last updating amendment to Wealthfront Advisers’ Form ADV Part 2 brochure on
October 29, 2024, there have been no updates to this 529 College Savings Plan Wrap Fee
Program Brochure.
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 1 Cover Page
Item 2 Material Changes
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 4 Services, Fees and Compensation
Item 5 Account Requirements and Types of Clients
Item 6 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk Considerations
Item 7 Client Information Provided to Portfolio Managers
Item 8 Client Contact with Portfolio Managers
Item 9 Additional Information
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Item 4 Services, Fees and Compensation
A. General Description of the Company
Wealthfront Advisers is an automated investment adviser registered with the SEC. Wealthfront
Advisers sponsors software-based investment advisory and portfolio management services for its
clients in respect of the Plan through the Wealthfront Advisers 529 Wrap Fee Program. This
program is made available via accounts that all clients open at Wealthfront Brokerage LLC
(“Wealthfront Brokerage”), a member of Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”).
Wealthfront Advisers became the successor investment adviser to Wealthfront Inc. effective
August 1, 2018. On the same date, Wealthfront Inc. changed its name to Wealthfront
Corporation. Software-based financial planning tools and services are provided by Wealthfront
Software LLC (“Wealthfront Software”). Wealthfront Advisers, Wealthfront Brokerage and
Wealthfront Software are wholly owned subsidiaries of Wealthfront Corporation, which is a
privately held company headquartered in Palo Alto, CA. Additional information about
Wealthfront Advisers’ products, structure and directors is provided on Part 1 and Part 2 of
Wealthfront Advisers’ Form ADV which is available online at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov. We
encourage visiting our website www.wealthfront.com/529 or our related mobile application (the
“Site” or the “App”) for additional information about the firm and the Plan.
B.
529 Plans
The Plan is a “529 plan,” i.e., a qualified tuition program sponsored by a state and established
under and operated in accordance with Section 529 of the Internal Revenue Code. 529 plans help
families save for future college costs. They enable individuals and certain trusts to accumulate
savings for qualifying higher education costs of beneficiaries by purchasing interests in a
state-created 529 plan trust, which interests are “municipal fund securities.” Proceeds from sales
of the state-created 529 plan trust interests are in turn invested in one or more investments. Any
earnings on these interests are tax deferred and may be withdrawn on a tax-free basis if used to
pay for a qualified higher education expense.
C.
Summary of Wealthfront Advisers’ 529 Investment Advisory Services
Wealthfront Advisers offers a unique automated investment advisory service based on Modern
Portfolio Theory (“MPT”) that makes it possible for anyone who enters into a Wealthfront
Advisers 529 College Plan Client Agreement (the “529 Client Agreement”), to access
state-of-the-art investment advisory and portfolio management services in the context of a 529
plan. As provided in the 529 Client Agreement, advisory clients (“Clients”) grant Wealthfront
Advisers discretionary authority to manage Client assets in accounts (“Client Accounts” or
“Accounts”) opened and maintained at Wealthfront Brokerage pursuant to the Wealthfront
Brokerage Customer Brokerage and Custody Agreement (the “Brokerage Agreement”), through
which Wealthfront Brokerage provides the necessary basic brokerage services to the Clients.
Clients are also required to enter into a Participation Agreement (“Participation Agreement”) with
the state 529 plan trust in order to establish the Client’s 529 account. Wealthfront Advisers’
investment objective is to seek maximum long-term, risk-adjusted, after-tax, net of fee returns.
D.
Tailored Services and Investment Restrictions
Wealthfront Advisers tailors its software-based 529 College Plan investment advisory services to
the individual needs of each of its Clients. Wealthfront Advisers uses its software, which is based
on academic behavioral economics research, to determine an investor’s risk tolerance.
Wealthfront Advisers asks each prospective Client a series of questions to evaluate both the
individual’s objective capacity to take risk and subjective willingness to take risk. We ask
subjective risk questions to determine both the level of risk an individual is willing to take and the
consistency among the answers. For example, if an individual is willing to take a lot of risk in one
case and very little in another, then the individual is deemed inconsistent and is therefore assigned
a lower risk tolerance score than the simple weighted average of their answers. We ask objective
questions to estimate with as few questions as possible whether the Client is likely to have enough
money saved at the time of matriculation by the Client’s beneficiary (“Beneficiary”), in order to
afford the Beneficiary’s likely spending needs. The greater the excess income, the more risk the
Client is able to take. Clients may not specify investments in which Client Account may not
invest.
Each individualized 529 portfolio is designed to be consistent with the Clients’ investment
objectives and risk tolerances. Wealthfront Advisers creates an investment plan and manage a
Client’s 529 portfolio by seeking to identify: 1) the optimal asset classes in which to invest, 2) the
most efficient exchange traded funds (“ETFs”) or other investments to represent each of those
asset classes, 3) the ideal mix of asset classes based on the Client’s specific risk tolerance, and 4)
the most appropriate time to rebalance the Client’s portfolio to maintain intended risk tolerance
and optimal return for the Client’s risk level.
Under the Plan, Wealthfront Advisers constructs a portfolio for its Client using up to nine
separate municipal fund securities, each of which contains a single underlying ETF representing
a separate asset class. Wealthfront Advisers designs the Client’s portfolio to provide a diversified
asset allocation based on the Client’s individual risk tolerance as reflected by the Client’s risk
score, which is determined by the Client’s responses to a risk questionnaire completed during the
application process. Using the risk score, Wealthfront Advisers assigns the Client’s portfolio to
one out of 20 “glide paths,” each of which determines how the Client’s portfolio’s allocations of
municipal fund securities will change over time. Each glide path gradually shifts the asset
allocations of the municipal fund securities in the Client’s portfolio to progressively decreasing
levels of expected risk as the expected matriculation date of the Beneficiary approaches. The
Client’s starting point along the specific glide path is determined by the Beneficiary’s expected
matriculation date. Thus, two Clients with identical risk scores and Beneficiaries of different ages
will transition along the same glide path but will start at different points on the glide path due to
the different investment time horizons.
E.
529 Wrap Fee Program
Under the Plan, Client assets are managed by Wealthfront Advisers as part of Wealthfront
Advisers’ 529 Wrap Fee Program. A wrap account is a professionally managed investment plan in
including brokerage commissions (if any), management fees, and
which all expenses,
administrative costs, are “wrapped” into a single charge. Wealthfront Advisers’ 529 Wrap Fee
Program provides Clients investment plans, portfolio management, and necessary basic brokerage
services for one comprehensive fee based on a percentage of individual account assets.
Wealthfront Advisers may buy or sell securities consistent with a Client’s investment plan
designed to seek an investment return suitable to the goals and risk profile of each distinct Client
Account. Wealthfront Advisers determines an appropriate course of action by performing a review
of each Client’s individual account and suitability parameters. This review may include type of
account, goals, overall financial condition, income, assets, risk tolerance and other factors unique
to the individual Client’s situation. Wealthfront Advisers manages each Client Account on an
individualized basis.
In order to implement Wealthfront Advisers’ continuous investment advice, Wealthfront Advisers
provides investment advisory and portfolio management services under the 529 Wrap Fee
Program only on a discretionary basis.
F.
529 Advisory Fees
Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its 529 advisory services by charging a fee based on the
net market value of a Client’s Account. Wealthfront Advisers reserves the right, in its sole
discretion, to reduce or waive the advisory fee for certain Client Accounts for any period of time
determined by Wealthfront Advisers. In addition, Wealthfront Advisers may reduce or waive its
fees for the Accounts of some Clients without notice to, or fee adjustment for, other Clients.
Wealthfront Advisers currently charges an annualized investment advisory fee of 0.25% on net
market value of a Client’s Account. Annual fees are charged on a monthly basis as explained
below.
Wealthfront Advisers’ investment advisory fees are not charged in advance and are calculated on
a continuous basis and deducted from Client Accounts each month as follows: Wealthfront
Advisers calculates a daily advisory fee, which is equal to the fee rate multiplied by the net
market value of the Client’s Account as of the close of trading on the New York Stock Exchange
(“NYSE”) (herein, “close of markets”) on such day, or as of the close of markets on the
immediately preceding trading day for any day when the NYSE is closed, and then divided by
365 (or 366 in any leap year). The advisory fee for a calendar month is equal to the total of the
daily fees calculated during that month and is deducted from Client Accounts no later than the
tenth business day of the following month. Wealthfront Advisers waives its investment advisory
fees on the first $25,000 it manages for Nevada residents who open a 529 Account, and this fee
waiver applies to the aggregate of all of the Nevada resident’s Wealthfront Advisers account
assets
Wealthfront Advisers may pay Wealthfront Brokerage amounts out of the proceeds of the
Wealthfront Advisers advisory fee pursuant to an agreement between Wealthfront Advisers and
Wealthfront Brokerage.
G. Other 529 Account Fees
In addition to advisory fees, Clients may also pay other fees or expenses to third-parties. The
issuer of some of the securities or products we purchase for Clients, such as Plan municipal fund
securities, ETFs or other similar financial products, may charge product fees that affect Clients.
Wealthfront Advisers does not charge these fees to Clients and does not benefit directly or
indirectly from any such fees. A Plan municipal fund security or an ETF typically includes
embedded expenses that may reduce the Plan municipal fund security’s or ETF's net asset values,
and therefore may directly affect the Plan municipal fund security’s or ETF's performances and
indirectly affect a Client’s portfolio performance or an index benchmark comparison. Expenses of
a municipal fund security may include an administrative/recordkeeping fee and a state fee, and
expenses of an ETF may include management fees, custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and
legal and accounting fees. Municipal fund security expenses may change from time to time at the
sole discretion of the 529 state trust, and ETF expenses may change from time to time at the sole
discretion of the ETF issuer. Wealthfront Advisers discloses each municipal fund security’s and
ETF’s current information, including expenses, on the Site.
Item 5 Account Requirements and Types of Clients
The minimum amount required to open and maintain a Plan Account is $500. Clients can be
individuals or certain trusts. Clients have real-time access to their Accounts through the Site.
Additional requirements for opening an Account with Wealthfront Advisers are described in Item
4, above.
At any time, a Client may terminate an Account, or withdraw all or part of an Account, or update
their investment risk profile (but may change their profile only up to two times per year or upon
an eligible change of Beneficiary), which may initiate an adjustment in the Accounts’ holdings. In
that case, unless otherwise directed by the Client, Wealthfront Advisers will redeem or sell the
securities in the Client Account (or portion of the Account, in the case of a partial withdrawal or
update) at market prices at the time of the termination, withdrawal or update.
Investors evaluating Wealthfront Advisers’ software based 529 investment advisory service
should be aware that Wealthfront Advisers’ relationship with Clients is likely to be different from
the “traditional” investment advisory relationship in several aspects:
A. Wealthfront Advisers is a software-based investment adviser, which means each Client must
acknowledge their ability and willingness to conduct their relationship with Wealthfront
Advisers on an electronic basis. Under the terms of the 529 Client Agreement and the
Brokerage Agreement, each Client agrees to receive all Account information and Account
documents (including this Brochure), and any updates or changes to same, through their
access to the Site and Wealthfront Advisers’ electronic communications. Unless noted
otherwise on the Site or within this Brochure, Wealthfront Advisers’ investment advisory
service, Wealthfront Brokerage’s brokerage services, the signatures for the 529 Client
Agreement, the Brokerage Agreement, the Participation Agreement, and all documentation
related to the advisory and brokerage services are managed electronically. Wealthfront
Advisers does make individual representatives available to discuss servicing matters with
Clients.
B. To provide its investment advisory services and tailor its investment decisions to each Client’s
specific needs, Wealthfront Advisers collects information from each Client, including specific
information about their investing profile such as financial situation, risk tolerance, and
investment objectives. Wealthfront Advisers maintains this information in strict confidence
subject to its Privacy Policy, which is provided on the Site. (The Plan’s recordkeeper and
custodian and the issuer of the Securities in which the Client will invest pursuant to the Plan
will have access to Client’s non-public personal and financial information that Client furnishes
to Wealthfront Advisers) When tailoring its investment solutions, Wealthfront Advisers relies
upon the information received from a Client. Although Wealthfront Advisers contacts its
Clients periodically as described further in Item 7 below, a Client must promptly notify
Wealthfront Advisers of any change in their financial situation or investment objectives that
might require a review or revision of their Account’s portfolio.
C. Clients may not place orders to purchase or sell securities on a self-directed basis.
Item 6 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk Considerations
For its software-based 529 investment advisory service, Wealthfront Advisers provides Clients
with investment advisory service that is based on MPT. MPT attempts to maximize a portfolio’s
expected return for a given amount of portfolio risk, or equivalently minimize risk for a given
level of expected return, by selecting the proportions of various asset classes rather than selecting
individual securities. Historically, rigorous MPT-based financial advice has only been available
through high-end financial advisors. Wealthfront Advisers’ goal is to enable anyone with at least
$500 to access the benefits of MPT.
Prior to the launch of the Wealthfront Advisers software-based investment advisory service, it was
not practical to offer rigorous and complete MPT to everyone because delivering a complete
solution was too complex. Specifically, the number of calculations required to identify an
optimized asset allocation, the ideal securities to represent each asset class, and an individual’s
true risk tolerance are beyond the scope of free, web-based tools. The job becomes even more
difficult when considering the importance of periodically rebalancing a portfolio to maintain a
desired risk level.
To employ MPT properly, one must start with an accurate determination of an individual’s
objective and subjective tolerance for risk. Achieving accuracy requires sophisticated software
applied to more detailed questions than are typically asked by advisers. Based on this risk
analysis, Wealthfront Advisers seeks to create an individualized investment plan using the optimal
asset classes in which to invest, the most efficient and inexpensive ETFs (to underlie the Plan’s
municipal fund securities) to represent each of those asset classes, and the ideal mix of asset
classes based on the Client’s specific risk tolerance. For the Plan, Wealthfront Advisers uses Mean
Variance Optimization to rigorously evaluate every possible combination of the following nine
asset classes: US equities, foreign developed markets equities, emerging markets equities,
dividend growth equities, real estate, treasury inflation protected securities (TIPS), corporate
bonds, emerging markets bonds and US government bonds. Mean Variance Optimization uses the
expected return and volatility for each asset class and the covariance among asset classes to find
the combination that delivers the highest possible expected return for any given standard
deviation of a portfolio’s returns. Wealthfront Advisers’ software-based 529 investment advisory
service generally includes preselected municipal fund securities (each with a single underlying
ETF) for each asset class within the plan recommended to a Client by Wealthfront Advisers.
Wealthfront Advisers does not allow Clients to select their own municipal fund securities because
each municipal fund security and asset class is considered to be part of the overall investment
plan. Investors with specific restrictions are not permitted to become Clients.
Wealthfront Advisers continuously monitors our Clients’ 529 portfolios and periodically
rebalances them back to the Clients’ target mix in an effort to optimize returns for the intended
level of risk as well as the applicable glide path. We may consider the volatility associated with
each of our chosen asset classes when deciding when and how to rebalance.
Wealthfront Advisers does not charge performance-based fees. Our advisory fees are only
charged as disclosed above in Item 4.F.
Risk Considerations
Wealthfront Advisers cannot guarantee any level of performance or that any Client will avoid a
loss of Account assets. Any investment in securities involves the possibility of financial loss
that Clients should be prepared to bear.
When evaluating risk, financial loss may be viewed differently by each Client and may depend on
many different risk items, each of which may affect the probability of adverse consequences and
the magnitude of any potential losses. The following risks may not be all inclusive but should be
considered carefully by a prospective Client before retaining Wealthfront Advisers’ services in
respect of the Plan. These risks should be considered as possibilities, with additional regard to
their actual probability of occurring and the effect on a Client if there is in fact an occurrence.
Market Risk – The price of any security or the value of an entire asset class can decline for a
variety of reasons outside of Wealthfront Advisers’ control, including, but not limited to, changes
in the macroeconomic environment, unpredictable market sentiment, forecasted or unforeseen
economic developments, interest rates, regulatory changes, and domestic or foreign political,
demographic, or social events. If a Client has a high allocation in a particular asset class, it may
negatively affect overall performance to the extent that the asset class underperforms relative to
other market assets. Conversely, a low allocation to a particular asset class that outperforms other
asset classes in a particular period will cause that Client Account to underperform relative to the
overall market.
investment advisory service. Wealthfront Advisers and
Advisory Risk – There is no guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers’ judgment or investment
decisions about particular securities or asset classes will necessarily produce the intended results.
It is possible that Clients or Wealthfront Advisers itself may experience computer equipment
failure, loss of internet access, viruses, or other events that may impair access to Wealthfront
Advisers’ software-based
its
representatives are not responsible to any Client for losses unless caused by Wealthfront Advisers’
breach of its fiduciary duty.
Software Risk – Wealthfront Advisers delivers its investment advisory services entirely through
software. Consequently, Wealthfront Advisers rigorously designs, develops and tests its software
extensively before putting such software into production with actual Client Accounts and assets
and periodically monitors the behaviors of such software after its deployment. Notwithstanding
this rigorous design, development, testing and monitoring, it is possible that such software may
not always perform exactly as intended or as disclosed on the Site, mobile app, blogs or other
Wealthfront Advisers disclosure documents, especially in certain combinations of unusual
circumstances. For example, there may be occasions where a number of Client Accounts may not
experience TLH (even if TLH had been activated for such accounts) or rebalancing back to the
Client’s target asset allocation for extended periods of time, due to certain errors in the
deployment of the software. Wealthfront Advisers continuously strives to monitor, detect and
correct any software that does not perform as expected or as disclosed.
Volatility and Correlation Risk – Wealthfront Advisers’ asset selection process is based in part
on a careful evaluation of past price performance and volatility in order to evaluate future
probabilities. It is possible that different or unrelated asset classes may exhibit similar price
changes in similar directions which may adversely affect a Client’s Account and may become
more acute in times of market upheaval or high volatility. Past performance is no guarantee of
future results, and any historical returns, expected returns, or probability projections may
not reflect actual future performance.
Valuation Risk – High volatility and/or the lack of deep and active liquid markets for some
securities (including the ETFs underlying the Plan municipal fund securities) that hold or trade
financial instruments may be adversely affected by liquidity issues as they manage their
portfolios, which may lead to valuation difficulties. While the Plan’s custodian and recordkeeper
value the municipal fund securities (and their underlying ETFs) held in Client Accounts based on
reasonably available exchange-traded security data, they may from time to time receive or use
inaccurate data, which could adversely affect security valuations, transaction size for purchases or
sales, and/or the resulting advisory fees paid by a Client to Wealthfront Advisers.
Legislative and Tax Risk - Performance may directly or indirectly be affected by government
legislation or regulation, which may include, but is not limited to: changes in investment adviser
or securities trading regulation; change in the US government’s guarantee of ultimate payment of
principal and interest on certain government securities; and changes in the tax code that could
affect interest income, income characterization and/or tax reporting obligations.
Foreign Investing and Emerging Markets Risk - Foreign investing involves risks not typically
associated with investments, and the risks may be exacerbated further in emerging market
countries. These risks may include, among others, adverse fluctuations in foreign currency values,
as well as adverse political, social and economic developments affecting one or more foreign
countries. In addition, foreign investing may involve less publicly available information and more
volatile or less liquid securities markets, particularly in markets that trade a small number of
securities, have unstable governments, or involve limited industry. Investments in foreign
countries could be affected by factors not present in the US, such as restrictions on receiving the
investment proceeds from a foreign country, foreign tax laws or tax withholding requirements,
unique trade clearance or settlement procedures, and potential difficulties in enforcing contractual
obligations or other legal rules that jeopardize shareholder protection. Foreign accounting may be
less transparent than US accounting practices and foreign regulation may be inadequate or
irregular.
Inflation, Currency, and Interest Rate Risks - Security prices and portfolio returns will likely
vary in response to changes in inflation and interest rates. Inflation causes the value of future
dollars to be worth less and may reduce the purchasing power of an investor’s future interest
payments and principal. Inflation also generally leads to higher interest rates, which in turn may
cause the value of many types of fixed income investments to decline. In addition, the relative
value of the
US dollar-denominated assets primarily managed by Wealthfront Advisers may be affected by the
risk that currency devaluations affect Client purchasing power.
No Guarantee of Principal Or Earnings; No Insurance - The value of a Client’s 529 Account
may increase or decrease over time based on the performance of the municipal fund securities that
constitute the Client’s portfolio. It is possible that, at any given time, the Client’s portfolio value
may be less than the total amount contributed. None of the Plan, the state trust, Wealthfront
Advisers or other Plan-related entities or individuals is an insurer of, makes any guarantee of, or
has any legal obligations to ensure, a particular level of investment return. The Client should be
aware that she could lose all or a portion of their investment, depending on market conditions.
An investment in the Plan is not a bank deposit. The Plan is not insured or guaranteed. None of
the Account, the principal the Client invests, nor any investment return is insured or guaranteed
by the Plan, the state trust, Wealthfront Advisers or other Plan-related entities or individuals, the
federal government, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, or any other governmental
agency.
Relative to investing for retirement, the holding period for college investors is very short (e.g., 5-
20 years versus 30- 60 years). Also, the need for liquidity during the withdrawal phase (to pay for
qualified higher education expenses) generally is very important. The Client should strongly
consider the level of risk she wishes to assume when completing the risk questionnaire upon
Account opening.
Limited Investment Direction - The Client may not direct the underlying investments in an
Account. The ongoing money management is the responsibility of Wealthfront Advisers. The only
manner in which the Client can affect the money management is to change their risk score, which
is limited to two times per year, or upon the change of the Beneficiary. The choice of the
underlying investments of the municipal fund securities is subject to the approval of the board of
trustees of the state 529 plan trust (the “Board”). Automatic investment exchanges that occur as
the Client’s assets move through the glide path do not count towards your twice per calendar year
investment exchange limit.
Liquidity - Investments in a 529 Plan are considered less liquid than other types of investments
(e.g., investments in mutual fund shares) because the circumstances in which an Account owner
may withdraw money from a 529 Plan account without a penalty or adverse tax consequences are
significantly more limited.
Potential Changes to the Plan - The Board reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to
discontinue the Plan or to change any aspect of the Plan. For example, the Board may change the
Plan’s fees and expenses; add, subtract, or merge the municipal fund securities; close a particular
municipal fund security to new investors; or change the Plan’s program manager or the underlying
investment(s) of a municipal fund security. Depending on the nature of the change, the Client may
be required to, or prohibited from, participating in the change with respect to Accounts
established before the change. The current program manager for the Plan may not necessarily
continue as Plan’s program manager, and Wealthfront Advisers may not necessarily continue as
investment adviser and distributor to the Plan (although Wealthfront Advisers will continue as the
Client’s investment adviser until either Wealthfront Advisers or the Client terminates that
investment advisory relationship).
If the Client has established Accounts prior to the time such changes are made to the Plan, the
Client may be required to participate in such changes or may be prohibited (according to Section
529 regulations or other guidance issued by the Internal Revenue Service) from participating in
such changes, unless the Client opens a new Account. Furthermore, the Board may terminate the
Plan by giving written notice to the Client, but the Plan may not thereby be diverted from the
exclusive benefit of the Client and the Beneficiary.
During the transition from one underlying investment to another underlying investment, a Plan
municipal fund security may be temporarily uninvested and lack market exposure to an asset
class. The transaction costs associated with any liquidation, as well as any market impact on the
value of the securities being liquidated, will be borne by the Plan municipal fund security and
Client Portfolios holding that Plan municipal fund security.
Status of Federal And State Law And Regulations Governing The Plan - Federal and state
law and regulations governing the administration of 529 plans could change in the future. In
addition, federal and state laws on related matters, such as the funding of higher education
expenses, treatment of financial aid, and tax matters are subject to frequent change. It is unknown
what effect these kinds of changes could have on an Account or the Plan. The Client should also
consider the potential impact of any other state laws on the Client’s Account. The Client should
consult your tax advisor for more information.
No Indemnification - Neither the Plan, the state trust, Wealthfront Advisers or other Plan-related
entities or individuals, nor any other person will indemnify the Client or the Beneficiary against
losses or other claims arising from the official or unofficial acts, negligent or otherwise, of Board
members or state employees.
Eligibility for Financial Aid - The treatment of Account assets may have an adverse effect on the
Beneficiary’s eligibility to receive assistance under various federal, state, and institutional
financial aid programs.
●
In making decisions about eligibility for financial aid programs offered by the US
government and the amount of such aid required, the US Department of Education takes
into consideration a variety of factors, including among other things the assets owned by
the student (i.e., the Beneficiary) and the assets owned by the student’s parents. The US
Department of Education generally expects the student to spend a substantially larger
portion of their own assets on educational expenses than the parents.
● For federal financial aid purposes, Account assets will be considered (i) assets of a
student’s parent, if the student is a dependent student and the owner of the Account is the
parent or the student, or (ii) assets of the student, if the student is the owner of the
Account and not a dependent student.
● For purposes of financial aid programs offered by states, other non-federal sources, and
educational institutions, the treatment of Account assets may follow or differ from the
treatment described above for federal financial aid purposes. Clients and Beneficiaries are
advised to consult a financial aid professional and/or the state or educational institution
offering a particular financial aid program, to determine how assets held in an Account
may affect eligibility for financial aid.
● Under Nevada law, assets in an Account are not taken into consideration in determining
the eligibility of the Beneficiary, parent or guardian of the Account for a grant,
scholarship or work opportunity that is based on need and offered or administered by a
state agency, except as otherwise required by the source of the funding of the grant,
scholarship or work opportunity.
The federal and non-federal financial aid program treatments of assets in a 529 plan are subject to
change at any time. Clients therefore should check and periodically monitor the applicable laws
and other official guidance, as well as particular program and institutional rules and requirements,
to determine the impact of 529 plan assets on eligibility under particular financial aid programs.
No Guarantee That Investments Will Cover Qualified Higher Education Expenses; Inflation
and Qualified Higher Education Expenses - There is no guarantee that the money in the
Client’s Account will be sufficient to cover all of a Beneficiary’s qualified higher education
expenses, even if contributions are made in the maximum allowable amount for the Beneficiary.
The future rate of increase in qualified higher education expenses is uncertain and could exceed
the rate of investment return earned by an Account over any relevant period of time.
Education Savings and Investment Alternatives - In addition to the Plan, there are many other
529 plans, including programs designed to provide prepaid tuition and certain other educational
expenses, as well as other education savings and investment alternatives. These alternative
programs may offer different investment vehicles and may result in different tax and other
consequences. They may have different eligibility requirements and other features, as well as fees
and expenses that may be more or less than those charged by the Plan. Clients should consider
other investment alternatives before establishing an Account.
No Guarantee of Admittance - Participation in the Plan does not guarantee or otherwise provide
a commitment that the Beneficiary will be admitted to, allowed to continue to attend, or receive a
degree from any educational institution. Participation in the Plan also does not guarantee that a
Beneficiary will be treated as a state resident of any state for tuition or any other purpose.
Medicaid and Other Federal And State Benefits - The effect of an Account on eligibility for
Medicaid or other state and federal benefits is uncertain. There can be no assurance that an
Account will not be viewed as a “countable resource” in determining an individual’s financial
eligibility for Medicaid. Withdrawals from an Account during certain periods may also have the
effect of delaying the disbursement of Medicaid payments. Clients should consult a qualified
advisor to determine how an Account may affect eligibility for Medicaid or other state and federal
benefits.
Suitability and Education Savings Alternatives - Neither the Board nor the Plan’s program
manager makes any representations regarding the suitability or appropriateness of the municipal
fund securities or Client’s portfolio as an investment. Other types of investments may be more
appropriate depending upon an individual’s financial status, tax situation, risk tolerance, age,
investment goals, savings needs, and investment time horizons of the Client or the Beneficiary.
There are programs and investment options other than the Plan available as education investment
alternatives. They may entail tax and other fee or expense consequences and features different
from the Plan including, for example, different investments and different levels of Client control.
Anyone considering investing in the Plan may wish to consider these alternatives prior to opening
an Account.
Differences Between Performances of Plan Municipal Fund Securities And Underlying ETFs - The
performances of the Plan municipal fund securities will differ from the performances of the ETFs
underlying the Plan municipal fund securities. This is primarily due to differences in expense ratios and
differences in the trade dates of municipal fund securities purchases and the purchases of the underlying
ETFs. The Plan municipal fund securities and the underlying ETFs have different expense ratios over
comparable periods of time, so, all other things being equal, there also will be performance differences
between the Plan municipal fund securities and the underlying ETFs. Performance differences also are
caused by differences in the trade dates of the Client’s Plan municipal fund securities purchases and the
underlying ETF purchases. When the Client invests money in a Plan municipal fund security, the Client
will receive state trust interests as of the appropriate trade date. The state trust will use that money to
purchase the underlying ETFs to be held in the municipal fund security(ies) that make up a Client’s
portfolio. However, the trade date for the state trust’s purchase of the underlying ETF typically will be
one (1) business day after the trade date for the Client’s purchase of trust interests of the selected
municipal fund security. Depending on the amount of cash flow into or out of the Plan municipal fund
security and whether the underlying ETF is going up or down in value, this timing difference will cause
the Plan municipal fund security’s performance either to trail or exceed the underlying ETF’s
performance.
Differences Between Performances Of Client Portfolios and Municipal Fund Securities - The
performance of each Client’s portfolio will differ from the Plan municipal fund securities because
it is a mix of one or more of the Plan municipal fund securities. Thus, a Client portfolio’s
performance may lag that of any one Plan municipal fund security due to the lower performances
of other Plan municipal fund securities included in the Client’s portfolio.
Municipal Fund Securities Investment Risk - Accounts are subject to a variety of investment
risks that will vary depending upon the municipal fund security and the ETF underlying that Plan
municipal security. See the Plan Description and Participation Agreement available at
www.wealthfront.com/529 for further discussions of the investment objective and principal risks
of each underlying ETF Investment. With respect to the underlying ETF, please remember that the
information is only a summary of the main risks of each underlying ETF Investment; please
consult each underlying ETFs prospectus and statement of additional information for additional
risks that apply to each underlying ETF.
ETF Risks, including Net Asset Valuations and Tracking Error - ETF performance may not
exactly match the performance of the index or market benchmark that the ETF is designed to
track because 1) the ETF will incur expenses and transaction costs not incurred by any applicable
index or market benchmark; 2) certain securities comprising the index or market benchmark
tracked by the ETF may, from time to time, temporarily be unavailable; and 3) supply and
demand in the market for either the ETF and/or for the securities held by the ETF may cause the
ETF shares to trade at a premium or discount to the actual net asset value of the securities owned
by the ETF. Certain ETF strategies may from time to time include the purchase of fixed income,
commodities, foreign securities, American Depositary Receipts, or other securities for which
expenses and commission rates could be higher than normally charged for exchange-traded equity
securities, and for which market quotations or valuation may be limited or inaccurate.
An ETF typically includes embedded expenses that may reduce the ETF's net asset value, and
therefore directly affect the ETF's performance, thereby affecting the related Plan municipal fund
security’s performance, and indirectly affecting a Client’s portfolio performance or an index
benchmark comparison. Expenses of the ETF may include investment adviser management fees,
custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and legal and accounting fees. ETF expenses may change
from time to time at the sole discretion of the ETF issuer. Wealthfront Advisers discloses each
underlying ETF’s current information, including expenses, in the Plan Description and
Participation Agreement available at www.wealthfront.com/529. ETF tracking error and expenses
may vary.
Clients should be aware that to the extent they invest in Plan municipal fund securities, which
investment in turn invests in ETF securities, they will pay two levels of compensation – advisory
fees charged by Wealthfront Advisers plus any management fees charged by the Plan
recordkeeper and the Board at the municipal security level, plus any management fees charged by
the adviser or sponsor of the ETF at the ETF level. This scenario may cause a higher advisory
cost (and potentially lower investment returns) than if a Client purchased the ETF directly.
Client Portfolio Investment Risk - Accounts are subject to a variety of investment risks that will
vary depending upon the Plan municipal fund security(ies) that constitute a Client’s portfolio. See
the Plan Description and Participation Agreement available at www.wealthfront.com/529.
Moreover, it is possible that various risks of Plan municipal fund securities could combine to
present greater risks than any single Plan municipal fund security.
Investors in any Plan should read the Plan’s offering documents and any related participation
agreement carefully before investing or sending money. For more information on risks related to
529 Accounts, see the "Plan Risks" section of the Wealthfront 529 College Savings Plan
Description and Participation Agreement.
Item 7 Client Information Provided to Portfolio Managers
On a periodic basis, Wealthfront Advisers contacts each Client to remind them to review and
update the profile information they previously provided. Wealthfront Advisers also requests that
Clients reconfirm the same information on an annual basis. These notifications and confirmations
include a link to the Client’s current information and contact information for the Wealthfront
Advisers support team. Currently the Wealthfront Advisers team members whose tasks include
supervising, arranging and responding to these notifications, confirmations and reviews are: the
Chief Compliance Officer with help from Client Services.
Wealthfront Advisers conducts separate reviews related to the ETFs used for the Plan municipal
fund securities making up Client 529 portfolios. These reviews are approved by Wealthfront
Advisers’ Investment Committee, which has the authority, if necessary, to recommend to the
Board for the Board’s action, in its sole discretion, up to and including the removal, addition or
replacement of an ETF, from the Plan municipal fund securities making up the portfolios advised
by Wealthfront Advisers.
Item 8 Client Contact with Portfolio Managers
All client contacts and communications regarding participation in the Wrap Fee Program will
occur through contact with Wealthfront Advisers via email or the Site. Subject to the tax
limitation of only two changes to the Client’s risk score and profile per tax year or upon a change
of Beneficiary, Wealthfront Advisers will promptly make any changes to Client’s goals and
financial situation. If tax law prevents a change to the Client’s risk score and profile, the Client
will bear the risk and consequences of the Client’s portfolio potentially not corresponding to the
risk score and profile corresponding to Client’s changed circumstances until such time as
applicable law permits the change to the Client’s risk score and profile.
Item 9 Additional Information
Disciplinary Information
On December 21, 2018, Wealthfront Advisers reached a settlement with the Securities and
Exchange Commission. The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers improperly
retweeted certain clients’ positive tweets from its corporate account and had made compensation
to some bloggers for client referrals without proper disclosures. Additionally, the settlement order
found that Wealthfront Advisers did not have proper disclosures in its TLH whitepaper concerning
monitoring for any and all wash sales that could occur in client accounts. A wash sale prevents the
tax benefit of having sold the asset to realize a loss. Thus, a wash sale can diminish the
effectiveness of TLH by deferring to a future year a tax loss that could have been used to offset
income or capital gains in the current year. In Wealthfront’s TLH program, wash sales could occur,
or were permitted, in certain circumstances relating to the management of a client account such as
rebalancing a client portfolio or client directed transactions. The SEC order noted that a significant
percentage of client accounts enrolled in Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH strategy experienced wash
sales in the period from October 2012 to May 2016 and that wash sales represented approximately
2.3% of tax losses harvested for clients in the period from January 2014 to December 2016.
The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers violated the antifraud, advertising,
compliance, and other provisions of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. Without admitting or
denying the SEC’s findings, Wealthfront Advisers consented to the entry of the SEC’s order
censuring it, requiring it to cease and desist from further violations, and imposing a $250,000
penalty.
Other Financial Industry Activities and Affiliations
Wealthfront Advisers utilizes its affiliate, Wealthfront Brokerage, to effect transactions on behalf
of the Clients. In respect to the Plan, Wealthfront Brokerage instructs the Plan’s recordkeeper and
custodian on behalf of Wealthfront Advisers, where applicable, to provide execution services for
the Client’s 529 Account transactions pursuant to the authority the Client has given under the
applicable 529 Client Agreement and Brokerage Agreement. 529 Accounts are carried by
Ascensus College Savings Recordkeeping Services, LLC (“Ascensus”), which has a custodial
arrangement with the Bank of New York Mellon Corporation.
Code of Ethics, Participation or Interest in Client Transactions and Personal Trading
Wealthfront Advisers’ paramount ethical, professional, and legal duty is to act at all times as a
fiduciary to its Clients. This means that Wealthfront Advisers puts the interests of its Clients
ahead of its own, and carefully manages for any perceived or actual conflict of interest that may
arise in relation to its advisory services. Wealthfront Advisers has adopted a Code of Ethics,
which is designed to ensure that we meet our fiduciary obligation to Clients, enhance our culture
of compliance within the firm, and detect and prevent any violations of securities laws.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Code of Ethics (the “Code”) establishes standards of conduct for all
Wealthfront Advisers’ employees, including all officers, directors, employees, certain contractors
and others, and is consistent with the code of ethics requirements of Rule 204A-1 under the
Investment Advisers Act of 1940, as amended. The Code includes general requirements that all
employees comply with their fiduciary obligations to Clients and applicable securities laws, and
specific requirements relating to, among other things, personal trading, insider trading, conflicts
of interest, and confidentiality of client information.
Each new Wealthfront Advisers’ employee receives a copy of the Code when hired or engaged
by Wealthfront Advisers. Wealthfront Advisers sends copies of any amendments to the Code to
all supervised persons, who must acknowledge in writing having received the Code and the
amendments. Annually or as otherwise required, each supervised person must confirm to
Wealthfront Advisers that they have complied with the Code during such preceding period.
Wealthfront Advisers’ employees may personally invest in securities recommended by
Wealthfront Advisers, specifically the ETFs recommended for each asset class and individual
large and mid-capitalization stocks recommended for advanced forms of TLH. Wealthfront
Advisers’ employees may also buy or sell specific securities for their own accounts that are not
purchased or sold ahead of Clients. Wealthfront Advisers monitors the securities transactions of
all employees to determine whether there have been any improper use of client trading
information by employees. It also requires all employees to report any violations of the Code
promptly to Wealthfront Advisers’ Chief Compliance Officer. The complete Code of Ethics is
available to any client or prospective Client upon request.
Review of Accounts
Wealthfront Advisers provides all Clients with continuous access via the App and/or the Site
where Clients can access their Account documents, such as account statements, and review their
time-weighted and money-weighted returns. Clients may also receive periodic e-mail
communications describing portfolio performance, Account information, and product features.
Wealthfront Advisers’ software based 529 investment advisory service assumes that a portfolio
created using MPT-based techniques will not stay optimized over time and must be periodically
rebalanced back to its original targets to maintain the intended risk level and asset allocations.
Wealthfront Advisers reviews each Client’s Account when it is opened and using software,
continuously monitors and periodically rebalances each Client’s portfolio to seek to maintain a
Client’s targeted risk tolerance and optimal return for the Client’s risk level. Wealthfront Advisers
also conducts reviews when Clients make changes to their risk profiles. Wealthfront Advisers also
determines how the Client’s portfolio’s allocations of Plan municipal fund securities will change
over time pursuant to the assigned glide path. Each glide path gradually shifts the asset allocations
of the municipal fund securities in the Client’s portfolio to progressively decreasing levels of
expected risk as the expected matriculation date of the Beneficiary approaches.
On a periodic basis, Wealthfront Advisers contacts each Client to remind them to review and
update personal profile information they previously provided. Wealthfront Advisers also requests
that Clients reconfirm the same information on an annual basis. These notifications and
confirmations include a link to the Client’s current information and contact information for the
Wealthfront Advisers support team. Currently the Wealthfront Advisers team members whose
tasks include supervising, arranging and responding to these notifications, confirmations and
reviews are: the Client Services Manager and the Client Services team.
Wealthfront Advisers periodically reviews the ETFs used for the municipal fund securities
making up Client 529 portfolios. Wealthfront Advisers’ Investment Committee, a committee of
certain other Wealthfront Advisers officers who are not members of the Wealthfront Advisers
investment research team, approves of these reviews. The committee has the authority, if
necessary, to remove, add or replace an ETF from the municipal fund securities making up the
portfolios advised by Wealthfront Advisers.
Client Referrals and Other Compensation
Wealthfront Advisers expects from time to time to run promotional campaigns to attract Clients to
open 529 Accounts on the Site. These promotions may include additional Account services or
products offered on a limited basis to select Clients, more favorable fee arrangements, and/or
reduced or waived advisory fees for Clients, including Wealthfront Advisers’ Invite Program
pursuant to which Clients may invite friends, family and others to open an account with
Wealthfront Advisers. Wealthfront Advisers waives its advisory fee on $5,000 of Account assets
for both the referring Client and the referred Client for each referral. Wealthfront Advisers may
also invite non- Clients to open an account with Wealthfront Advisers via the Invite Program. For
non-Clients who become Clients via direct invitation from Wealthfront Advisers, Wealthfront
Advisers will waive its advisory fee on a predetermined amount of the Client’s Account assets.
These arrangements may create an incentive for a third-party or other existing Client to refer
prospective Clients to Wealthfront Advisers, even if the third-party would otherwise not make the
referral. These arrangements may also create a conflict of interest for a Client to maintain a
certain level of assets managed through Wealthfront Advisers if doing so would result in
eligibility to receive an incentive, bonus or additional compensation.
In the past, Wealthfront Advisers had certain arrangements in which it paid bloggers and others
who posted advertisements for Wealthfront Advisers based on the assets initially deposited by
individuals responding to such advertisements. Currently, Wealthfront Advisers has certain
arrangements in which it pays bloggers and others who post advertisements for Wealthfront a flat
fee per client responding to such advertisements who opens an account regardless of whether said
client funds the account.
Voting Client Securities
Wealthfront Advisers, as a matter of policy and as a fiduciary to our clients, has responsibility for
voting proxies for portfolio securities consistent with the best economic interests of the Clients.
Our firm maintains policies and procedures as to the handling, research, voting and reporting of
proxy voting and makes appropriate disclosures about our firm’s proxy policies and practices. Our
policy and practice includes the responsibility to monitor corporate actions, receive and vote
client proxies and disclose any potential conflicts of interest as well as making information
available to clients about the voting of proxies for their portfolio securities and maintaining
relevant and required records. Clients may request information regarding how Wealthfront
Advisers voted a Client’s proxies, and Clients may request a copy of the firm's proxy policies and
procedures by emailing support@wealthfront.com. Clients should not become or continue as a
Client if they wish to vote such proxies.
Financial Information
This Item is not applicable because Wealthfront Advisers does not require or solicit the
prepayment of any advisory fees and does not have any adverse financial condition that is
reasonably likely to impair our ability to continuously meet our contractual commitments to our
Client.
Additional Brochure: CLIENT BROCHURE OCTOBER 2025 (2025-10-07)
View Document Text
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261 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, California 94301
www.wealthfront.com
Form ADV Part 2A
Wealthfront Advisers
Client Brochure
October 6, 2025
Item 1 Cover Page
This brochure (“Brochure”) provides information about the qualifications and business
practices of Wealthfront Advisers LLC (“Wealthfront Advisers”), an investment adviser
registered with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”).
Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training but only indicates that
Wealthfront Advisers has registered its business with state and federal regulatory
authorities, including the SEC (our SEC number is 801-69766). The information in this
Brochure has not been approved or verified by the SEC or by any state securities
authority.
If you have any questions about the contents of this Brochure, please contact us at
844-995-8437 or support@wealthfront.com. Additional information about Wealthfront
Advisers is also available on the SEC’s website at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov and on
Wealthfront Advisers’ website, www.wealthfront.com (the “Site”).
Item 2 Material Changes
Since the updating amendment to Wealthfront Advisers’ Form ADV Part 2 brochure on
August 1, 2025, we have updated this Brochure to describe Wealthfront’s Nasdaq-100
Direct (“Nasdaq-100 Direct”), which enables clients to invest directly in the individual
stocks that comprise the Nasdaq-100® index.
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 1 Cover Page
Item 2 Material Changes
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 4 Advisory Business
Item 5 Fees and Compensation
Item 6 Performance-Based Fees and Side--by--Side Management
Item 7 Types of Clients
Item 8 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk of Loss
Item 9 Disciplinary Information
Item 10 Other Financial Industry Activities and Affiliations
Item 11 Code of Ethics, Participation or Interest in Client Transactions and Personal Trading
Item 12 Brokerage Practices
Item 13 Review of Accounts
Item 14 Client Referrals and Other Compensation
Item 15 Custody
Item 16 Investment Discretion
Item 17 Voting Client Securities
Item 18 Financial Information
Form ADV Part 2B
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Item 4 Advisory Business
A.
General Description of the Company
Wealthfront Advisers is an automated investment adviser registered with the SEC. Wealthfront
Advisers provides clients with software-based investment advisory and portfolio management
services through the Wealthfront Advisers Program (see also the attached Wealthfront Advisers
Program Brochure). This Program, launched in December 2011, is made available via brokerage
accounts that all clients open at Wealthfront Brokerage LLC (“Wealthfront Brokerage”), a
member of Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”). Wealthfront Advisers became
the successor investment adviser to Wealthfront Inc. effective August 1, 2018. On the same date,
Wealthfront Inc. changed its name to Wealthfront Corporation. Software-based financial
planning tools and services (as described further in Item 4.B below) are provided by Wealthfront
Software LLC (“Wealthfront Software”). Since February 2019, Wealthfront Brokerage has
offered a cash account to Clients (the “Wealthfront Cash Account”), where Wealthfront
Brokerage conveys uninvested cash account funds to depository institutions that accept and
maintain such deposits (“program banks”). Neither Wealthfront Brokerage nor its affiliates are a
bank. The cash balance in a Client’s Wealthfront Cash Account is swept to one or more program
banks, where it earns a variable rate of interest and is eligible for Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation (“FDIC”) insurance while such cash balance awaits investments. FDIC insurance is
not provided, and interest is not earned, until the funds arrive at the program banks. In addition,
Wealthfront Brokerage offers a margin lending product called Portfolio Line of Credit ("PLOC"),
which is offered to Clients who meet the required minimum balance in a taxable investment
account advised by Wealthfront Advisers, in addition to other minimum account thresholds.
Wealthfront Brokerage charges interest on the funds borrowed under a PLOC for the time that
the loan is outstanding although it is not due until the loan is repaid. Wealthfront Advisers offers
a Securities Lending Program , which is available to Clients who meet suitability requirements
based on their financial situation, investment objectives, risk tolerance, and other relevant
information. Wealthfront Advisers, Wealthfront Brokerage, and Wealthfront Software are wholly
owned subsidiaries of Wealthfront Corporation, which is a privately held company headquartered
in Palo Alto, California. As of July 31, 2025, Wealthfront Corporation oversaw, through its
wholly owned subsidiaries Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage, approximately
$88.2 billion in assets for over 1.3 million funded clients. Additional information about
Wealthfront Advisers’ products, structure and directors is provided on Part 1 of Wealthfront
Advisers’ Form ADV which
is available online at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov or at
www.wealthfront.com. We encourage visiting our website www.wealthfront.com for additional
information.
B.
Summary of Investment Advisory Services
Wealthfront Advisers offers an automated investment advisory service that makes it possible for
anyone who enters into a Wealthfront Advisers Advisory Client Agreement (the “Advisory
Client Agreement”), to access state-of-the-art investment advisory and portfolio management
services. As provided in separate Advisory Client Agreements, advisory clients (“Clients”) grant
Wealthfront Advisers either (1) full discretionary authority to manage Client assets; or (2)
limited discretionary authority regarding time, price, number of securities, and units or dollar
amounts in such securities, while Client retains general investment discretion regarding the
specific securities to buy or sell in an Account. Client accounts (“Client Accounts” or
“Accounts”) are opened and maintained at Wealthfront Brokerage (and in the case of the 529
college savings plan, the sponsoring state trust fund account) pursuant to the Wealthfront
Brokerage Customer Brokerage and Custody Agreement (the “Brokerage Agreement”).
Automated Investing Account
Wealthfront Advisers may manage a Client Account on a fully discretionary basis (“Automated
Investing Account”). This means that Wealthfront Advisers is authorized to trade our Clients’
exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) or other investments in an Automated Investing Account to
maintain the Client’s target investment allocation. Wealthfront Advisers utilizes software to
conduct this trading to invest Client assets, fund Client withdrawals, perform rebalancing to
maintain target portfolio allocations, and execute TLH where appropriate. Clients may open an
Automated Investing Account that is either: (1) an individualized taxable account or an
individual retirement account (“IRA”) that allows Clients to choose between portfolios we
recommend and the ability to customize certain of our recommendations; or (2) 529 college
savings account (which consists of an account with the sponsoring state trust fund and a related
brokerage account at Wealthfront Brokerage) (“529 Account”). Our Automated Investing
Account is a diversified, automated portfolio designed to maximize returns for Clients’
individual risk tolerances and other preferences.
Wealthfront Advisers creates an investment plan and manages a Client’s taxable or IRA portfolio
by identifying: 1) optimal asset classes in which to invest, 2) efficient ETFs or other investments
to represent each of those asset classes, and 3) an ideal mix of asset classes based on the Client’s
specific risk tolerance. Clients may also choose to customize our recommendations and make
adjustments to our recommended investment allocations, increasing or decreasing the target
percentage of a particular ETF or investment. Clients can also choose from a list of additional
ETFs or other investments and request specific allocations to each.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers constructs an individual portfolio based on the Client’s
individual risk tolerances that uses up to nine of the 529 plan’s separate municipal fund
securities (each a “MFS”), of which each MFS contains a single underlying ETF. Using the
Client’s risk score, Wealthfront Advisers assigns the Client’s individual portfolio to one out of
20 glide paths, each of which determines how the Client’s individual portfolio’s allocations of
designated portfolios will change over time. Each glide path gradually shifts the asset allocations
of the MFSs in the Client’s individual portfolio to progressively decreasing levels of expected
risk as the beneficiary’s expected matriculation date approaches. The Client’s starting point
along the specific glide path is determined by the beneficiary’s expected time to matriculation.
We do not support Client-customized portfolio allocations for 529 Accounts.
For a taxable Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers offers tax-loss harvesting
(“TLH”) strategies. TLH is a technique designed to help lower your taxes while maintaining the
expected risk and return profile of your portfolio. TLH harvests previously unrecognized
investment losses to offset taxes due on your other gains and income by selling a security at a
loss to accelerate the realization of capital loss and investing the proceeds in a security with
closely correlated risk and return characteristics. The realized loss can be applied to lower your
tax liability and the tax savings can be reinvested to grow the value of your portfolio.
Wealthfront Advisers’ basic TLH harvests tax losses on a Client’s ETFs and individual stocks by
selling those instruments at a loss and replacing it with an alternative ETF that tracks a different,
but highly correlated index to maintain the risk and return characteristics of the Client’s portfolio.
Wealthfront Advisers also offers more advanced versions of TLH—available to Clients with
larger account sizes—that involve allocating a portion of the Client’s portfolio to a range of
individual US stocks, which increases the Client’s opportunity to harvest tax losses. Clients with
taxable accounts that have between $100,000 and $500,000 in assets can choose our US Direct
Indexing product as an enhanced form of TLH that looks for movements in individual stocks to
harvest more tax losses. Instead of using a single ETF or index fund to invest in US stocks, US
Direct Indexing purchases the largest individual stocks in the US equity market (the number of
such individual stocks purchased depends on account size) on a market-weighted basis to
increase the opportunity for TLH presented by the movement of individual stocks. The US Direct
Indexing product also invests in ETFs (referred to in our white paper as “completion ETFs”) to
provide exposure to US equities with smaller capitalizations. Clients with a taxable Automated
Investing Account that have at least $500,000 qualify for our no-fee Smart Beta service, which
serves as an enhancement to our US Direct Indexing product. As noted in Item 7.3, Clients who
signed up for our US Direct Indexing product may specify US stocks they choose to restrict but
may not customize the portfolio allocations in those accounts.
Automated Bond Portfolio
Clients may open an “Automated Bond Portfolio,” which is personalized to a Client’s individual
tax situation, based on their state of residence and stated, taxable income. The Automated Bond
Portfolio is managed on a fully discretionary basis and includes a diversified mix of bond ETFs.
Wealthfront Advisers utilizes software to invest Client funds and dividends, fund Client
withdrawals, perform rebalancing to maintain target portfolio allocations, and execute TLH
where appropriate.
Automated Bond Ladder
Clients may open an “Automated Bond Ladder,” which is a portfolio of US Treasury securities,
including Treasury Bills, Treasury Notes, or Treasury Bonds (collectively, “Treasuries”)
designed to provide a tax-advantaged means of preserving capital and generating yield with an
extremely low risk of principal loss for clients who hold their Treasuries to maturity. The
Automated Bond Ladder also seeks to reduce exposure to interest rate fluctuations. The
Automated Bond Ladder allows clients to configure a “ladder” of Treasuries with a maximum
length that can range from 6 months to 6 years. Wealthfront Advisers manages Automated Bond
Ladders on a fully discretionary basis, utilizing software that seeks to invest in Treasuries that
mature on a monthly basis through the length of the ladder (assuming Treasuries with the
required monthly maturities are available in the market for the entirety of the client’s selected
ladder length). As Treasuries mature or interest is paid, Wealthfront Advisers will automatically
reinvest the proceeds to purchase new Treasuries with later maturity dates in the Client’s ladder
in a way that seeks to maintain as close as possible to equally weighted investment in Treasuries
with monthly maturities through the Client’s desired ladder length.
Stock Investing Account
Clients may open a “Stock Investing Account,” which is a taxable account that allows Clients to
invest in certain exchange-traded securities, including stocks. In a Stock Investing Account,
Clients grant Wealthfront Advisers limited discretion, with Wealthfront Advisers exercising
discretion over the specifics of the transaction, including the time, price, number of shares, and
units or dollar amounts in the transaction. The Client retains general investment discretion over
other matters, including the ultimate decision as to which securities to include in the account.
Upon opening a Stock Investing Account, Clients who do not have an active Wealthfront Cash
Account must open a separate Wealthfront Cash Account.
S&P 500 Direct
Clients may also open Wealthfront’s S&P 500 Direct account, which enables Clients to invest
directly in the individual stocks that comprise the S&PⓇ 500 index, which is a stock market
index that tracks the performance of 500 of the largest publicly traded companies in the US. S&P
500 Direct combines the benefits of index investing with Wealthfront Advisers’ automated TLH,
helping Clients save on taxes while closely tracking the performance of the S&PⓇ 500 index.
Nasdaq-100 Direct
Clients may also open Wealthfront’s Nasdaq-100 Direct account, which enables Clients to invest
directly in the individual stocks that comprise the Nasdaq-100® Index. The Nasdaq-100® Index
is a stock market index that includes 100 of the largest domestic and international non-financial
companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, and spans sectors including technology,
healthcare, communications, and more. The Nasdaq-100 Direct account combines the benefits of
index investing with Wealthfront Advisers’ automated TLH, helping Clients save on taxes while
closely tracking the performance of the Nasdaq-100® index.
Securities Lending Program
Wealthfront Advisers offers Clients the option to participate in its Securities Lending
Program, which provides an opportunity for Clients to earn additional income by lending
securities held in eligible Accounts (taxable Automated Investment Accounts, Automated
Bond Portfolios, Stock Investing Accounts, S&P 500 Direct accounts, and Nasdaq-100
Direct accounts) to Wealthfront Brokerage. Clients may opt in or out of the Securities
Lending Program at any time. Clients who opt in to the Securities Lending Program
(“Participants”) grant Wealthfront Advisers the discretionary authority to lend their fully
paid securities to Wealthfront Brokerage. Wealthfront Brokerage will lend the securities to
unaffiliated third parties, such as broker-dealers, banks, or other financial institutions. These
securities loans are collateralized with cash, in an amount between 102% and 105% of the
market value of the loaned securities and held in a segregated account at JPMorgan Chase
Bank, N.A., for the benefit of Participants, with Wilmington Trust acting as trustee.
Participants receive 50% of what we earn when their shares are lent, which amount will vary
based on market demand, interest rates, and the specific securities lent. Compensation will
be paid on a monthly basis. Participants retain contractual rights to all shares lent to
Wealthfront Brokerage and the ability to opt out of the Securities Lending Program or
withdraw funds at any time. Following such instructions, Wealthfront Advisers will recall
Participants’ shares from Wealthfront Brokerage.
Automated Savings
In addition to investment advisory and portfolio management services, Wealthfront Advisers
offers a service called Automated Savings to Clients, free of charge. Clients may opt into this
service and can stop or restart its use at any time at no cost to them. With Automated Savings,
Wealthfront Advisers monitors a Client’s checking account or Wealthfront Cash Account for
excess cash over the maximum balance set by the Client. If the monitored account has exceeded
the Client’s prescribed maximum balance by at least $100, Wealthfront Advisers will schedule
transfers of the excess cash from the monitored account to one or more of the Client’s
Wealthfront accounts of choice. The Client will receive an email notification when these transfers
have been scheduled and will have 24 hours to cancel the transfers before they occur.
Financial Planning Through Software
In addition to investment advisory and portfolio management services, Wealthfront Advisers,
through its affiliate Wealthfront Software, provides certain software-based financial planning
tools and services (the “Financial Planning Service”) to its Clients. The Financial Planning
Service is a product offered by Wealthfront Software and is made available to Wealthfront
Advisers’ Clients free of charge through a contractual arrangement between Wealthfront
Advisers and Wealthfront Software. The Financial Planning Service allows Clients to explore
potential future financial scenarios, including retirement, college funding and purchasing a home,
and provide recommendations for reaching their financial goals. The Financial Planning Service
allows Clients to link their external financial accounts, including bank, brokerage, retirement,
college savings, loan and credit card accounts and mortgages, in order to eliminate the need for
the traditional financial planner interview that is usually required to acquire the necessary inputs
to build a financial plan.
Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Software do not represent that the Financial Planning
Service is meant to replace a comprehensive evaluation of a Client's entire financial plan
considering all
the Client’s circumstances. Should a Client choose to implement any
recommendation made by the Financial Planning Service, the Client should consult with their tax
advisor regarding the Client’s personal circumstances. Implementation of a financial plan
recommendation is entirely at the Client’s discretion, and currently information Clients enter into
the financial planning model, or obtained by linking other accounts, does not automatically change
their risk scores. Clients can only change their risk scores by changing their personal financial
information through the Wealthfront Advisers’ website (the “Site”) and through the Wealthfront
mobile application (the “App”). While the data from third parties used in the financial models of
the Financial Planning Service is believed to be reliable, Wealthfront Advisers or Wealthfront
Software cannot ensure the accuracy or completeness of data provided by clients or third parties.
C.
Tailored Services and Investment Restrictions
Wealthfront Advisers tailors its software-based investment advisory service to the individual
needs of each of its Clients, in accordance with the portfolio allocation chosen by Clients, and
subject to certain account limitations that prospective investors should consider, as described
further below and in Item 7. Wealthfront Advisers uses its software to determine an investor’s
risk tolerance. Wealthfront Advisers asks each prospective Client a series of questions to evaluate
both the individual’s objective capacity to take risk and subjective willingness to take risk. We
ask subjective risk questions to determine both the level of risk an individual is willing to take
and the consistency among the answers. For example, if an individual is willing to take a lot of
risk in one case and very little in another, then the individual is deemed inconsistent and is
therefore assigned a lower risk tolerance score than the simple weighted average of their
answers. We ask objective questions to estimate with as few questions as possible whether an
individual is likely to have enough money saved at retirement to afford their likely spending
needs. The greater the excess income, the more risk the Client is able to take. As noted in Item
7.3, Clients who signed up for our US Direct Indexing product may specify US stocks they
choose to restrict, but may not customize the portfolio allocations in those accounts.
Customization is also not supported in our Automated Bond Portfolio and Automated Bond
Ladder offerings.
Further, our Automated Investing Account,Automated Bond Portfolio, and Automated Bond
Ladder are subject to Rule 3a-4 of the Investment Company Act of 1940. This means: (1)
Wealthfront Advisers manages each Client’s account based on the Client’s individual financial
situation and investment objectives, which information is obtained at account opening; (2)
Wealthfront Advisers contacts Clients via email on a quarterly basis to request whether there
have been any changes to the Client’s financial situation or objectives; (3) as noted in Item 7.3,
Clients may, at account opening or anytime thereafter, impose reasonable restrictions on how
their Account is managed by customizing our recommended portfolios or by updating their
settings to restrict investments in certain US stocks, (4) Clients may contact Product Support
team members (who are Wealthfront Advisers personnel who are knowledgeable about the
Accounts and their management) to ask questions relating to their Account; (5) Clients receive
monthly statements of all activity in their Account; and (6) Clients retain rights of ownership in
the underlying securities in their accounts.
D. Wealthfront Advisers Program
Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct
Client assets in these types of accounts are managed on a fully discretionary basis as part of the
Wealthfront Advisers Program (see also the attached Wealthfront Advisers Program Brochure).
As such, Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct are professionally managed accounts in which all
expenses, including brokerage commissions (if any), management fees, and administrative costs,
are “wrapped” into a single charge (technically known as a “wrap account”). The Wealthfront
Advisers Program provides Clients with an Automated Investing Account with investment plans,
portfolio management, and necessary brokerage services for one comprehensive fee based on a
percentage of the Clients’ respective account assets. The Wealthfront Advisers Program provides
a Client with an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond
Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct with portfolio management and necessary
brokerage services for one comprehensive fee based on a percentage of the Client’s respective
account assets.
For Clients that use Wealthfront Advisers’ recommended portfolio allocation in an Automated
Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with the Client’s
investment plan, which is designed to seek an investment return suitable for the goals and risk
profile of each distinct Automated Investing Account. For Clients that use Wealthfront Advisers’
Automated Bond Portfolio, Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with a
Client’s portfolio allocation, which is designed to seek yield and is personalized to the Client’s
individual tax situation. For Clients that use our Automated Bond Ladder, Wealthfront Advisers
buys or sells securities consistent with the Client’s selected ladder length.
For Clients that customize our recommended portfolio allocation (not supported in the
Automated Bond Portfolio or the Automated Bond Ladder) in their IRA or taxable account,
Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with a Client’s target portfolio allocation.
Wealthfront Advisers determines when to buy or sell securities by reviewing each Client’s
individual account and Client-provided data. This review includes a number of factors, including
the type of account, goals, overall financial condition, income, assets, risk tolerance, Client
instructions or preferences, state of residence and tax filing status, or other factors unique to the
individual Client’s situation. Wealthfront Advisers manages each of these accounts on an
individualized basis.
Stock Investing Account
In a Stock Investing Account, Clients grant Wealthfront Advisers limited discretion, with
Wealthfront Advisers exercising discretion over the specifics of the transaction, including the
time, price, number of shares, and units or dollar amounts in the transaction. The Client retains
general investment discretion over other matters, including the ultimate decision as to which
securities to include in the portfolio. The wrap account fee does not apply to the Stock Investing
Account. Instead, Wealthfront Brokerage pays Wealthfront Advisers a percentage of the net
interest margin it earns on funds in Clients’ required Wealthfront Cash Accounts. As a result,
Clients pay no out of pocket advisory fees, nor does this reduce the rate of interest clients receive
from cash maintained in their Wealthfront Cash Accounts. Proceeds from the sale of securities
held in a Stock Investing Account are automatically swept to the Client’s Wealthfront Cash
Account.
E.
Discretionary and Non-discretionary Assets
As of August 31, 2025, Wealthfront Advisers manages $41,666,660,509 in client assets on a
fully discretionary basis. As of the same date, Wealthfront Advisers manages $1,282,127,155 in
Client assets in Stock Investing Accounts on a limited discretionary basis. Because Clients retain
general investment discretion in Stock Investing Accounts, we report Stock Investing Accounts
as non-discretionary assets on Item 5.F.(2) of our Form ADV Part 1.
Item 5 Fees and Compensation
A.
Advisory Fees
Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct
For Clients with either an Automated Investing Account or Automated Bond Portfolio
Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee of
0.25% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with an Automated Bond
Ladder, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.15% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with a S&P 500 Direct
account, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.09% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with a Nasdaq-100 Direct
account, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.12% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. In some cases, Clients can have a portion
of their assets managed for free. There is no fee or charge for participation in the Securities
Lending Program.
Wealthfront Advisers’ fees are charged on a monthly basis and they are not charged in advance.
Fees are charged utilizing the following calculation: Wealthfront Advisers calculates a daily
advisory fee, which is equal to the fee rate multiplied by the net market value of the Client’s
Account as of the close of trading on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) (herein, “close of
markets”) on such day, or as of the close of markets on the immediately preceding trading day for
any day when the NYSE is closed, and then divided by 365 (or 366 in any leap year). The
advisory fee for a calendar month is equal to the total of the daily fees calculated during that
month (less any deductions or fee waivers) and is deducted from an Automated Investing
Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100
Direct no later than the tenth business day of the following month.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers waives its investment advisory fees on the first $25,000
it manages for Nevada residents who open a 529 Account, and this fee waiver applies to the
aggregate of all of the Nevada residents’ Wealthfront Advisers account assets. This advisory fee
is separate from the fees and expenses of the MFSs in which a Client invests in the 529 Account,
which include the fees and expenses of the ETFs underlying such securities, the fees of the 529
Account recordkeeper and the fees of the state trust that issues the MFSs (“Plan Administration
Fees”). Plan Administration Fees may change without prior notice.
Stock Investing Account
Wealthfront Brokerage pays Wealthfront Advisers up to 10% of the net interest margin it earns
on funds in clients’ required Wealthfront Cash Accounts. As a result, clients pay no out of pocket
advisory fees, nor does this reduce the rate of interest clients receive from cash maintained in
their Cash Accounts. Additional information about Wealthfront’s Cash Accounts is available in
the Cash Sweep Program Disclosure. Please see Item 4.D above for additional information on the
advisory fee paid in relation to a Stock Investing Account.
Fee Changes
Wealthfront Advisers reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to negotiate, reduce or waive the
advisory fee for certain Client Accounts for any period of time determined solely by Wealthfront
Advisers. In addition, Wealthfront Advisers may reduce or waive its fees for the Accounts of
some Clients without notice to, or fee adjustment for, other Clients. For Clients who had opened
accounts prior to April 1, 2018, Wealthfront Advisers waived its investment advisory fees for the
first $10,000 of assets in any Wealthfront Advisers investment advisory account(s). However,
this benefit is no longer available for new Clients who opened their initial account on or after
April 1, 2018.
Automated Savings
Wealthfront Advisers offers the free service Automated Savings as described above in Item 4.
Financial Planning Service
Through its affiliate Wealthfront Software, Wealthfront Advisers offers a Financial Planning
Service, as described above in Item 4, to all Clients free of charge.
B.
Product Fees
The issuers of certain investments we purchase for Clients (such as ETFs, investment trusts, or
other investments) may charge Clients separate product fees. Wealthfront Advisers does not
charge these product fees to Clients, nor does it benefit directly or indirectly from any such fees.
Product fees typically include embedded fund expenses that may reduce an investment fund's net
asset value, and therefore directly affect the fund's performance and indirectly affect a Client’s
portfolio performance or an index benchmark comparison. Fund expenses may include
management fees, custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and legal and accounting fees. Fund
expenses may change from time to time at the sole discretion of the fund issuer. Wealthfront
Advisers discloses current information for the investments we purchase for Clients, including
product fees, on the Site.
Clients who use the PLOC offered by Wealthfront Brokerage to obtain a loan secured by the
assets of their taxable Accounts will be charged interest on the outstanding balance.
C.
Other Compensation - Securities Lending Program
In connection with the Securities Lending Program described in Item 4 above, Wealthfront
Brokerage will receive compensation from third-party borrowers in connection with Securities
Lending Program activity, a portion of which will be paid to Sharegain Securities Inc.
(“Sharegain”), a registered broker-dealer, which acts as lending agent to Wealthfront
Brokerage as described in Item 10 below. Participants will receive 50% of the net
compensation generated from lending activities. The remaining 50% is shared between
Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage and, with each receiving 25% of the net
compensation. Compensation will be paid on a monthly basis. Wealthfront Advisers, therefore,
has a financial incentive to approve Participants for the Securities Lending Program. In addition
to sharing the financial incentive to earn compensation along with Participants, Wealthfront
Advisers mitigates this potential conflict by only recommending participation in the Securities
Lending Program to Clients for whom the program is deemed suitable, as discussed in Item 8.
Item 6 Performance-Based Fees and Side--by--Side Management
Wealthfront Advisers does not charge performance-based fees. Clients are only charged an
annual advisory fee as disclosed in Item 5 above.
Item 7 Types of Clients
The minimum amount required to open and maintain an Automated Investing Account, an
Automated Bond Portfolio, or an Automated Bond Ladder with Wealthfront Advisers is $500.
The minimum amount required to open an S&P 500 Direct account or a Nasdaq-100 Direct
account is $5,000. Clients with Stock Investing Accounts must maintain an active Wealthfront
Cash Account.
As a result of the automation associated with offering its services online, Wealthfront Advisers
makes it possible for retail investors, as well as retirement accounts and trusts, to access its
service with much lower account minimums than normally available in the industry. Clients have
access to their Accounts through the Site. Additional requirements for opening an Account with
Wealthfront Advisers are described in Item 4 above.
For Accounts other than IRA accounts or 529 Accounts, Clients, acting as trustees, may open
Accounts on behalf of trusts. As with other accounts, the trustee must be authorized to manage
the Account consistent with the trust’s investment objectives. Such clients should provide
account profile information, including answering the risk questionnaire, in a manner that is
consistent with the trust’s investment objectives, including risk tolerance and tax attributes. If the
trustee has a separate Account (for example, an individual Account, unrelated to the trust) or
intends to open such an Account, the trustee should consider maintaining a separate account
log-in and profile for the trust, using a different email account. This will allow Wealthfront
Advisers to independently manage the trust-held Account pursuant to the trust’s unique profile
and investment objectives.
At any time, a Client may terminate an Account, make partial or full withdrawals from an
Account (provided an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated
Bond Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct balance does not fall below $500), update
their investment profile, or customize our recommended allocation, including adding or
removing specific ETFs or other investments from their designated allocation. These actions may
initiate an adjustment in the Account’s holdings. In such cases, unless otherwise directed by the
Client, for example, in a Stock Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers will sell the securities in
the Account (or portion of the Account, in the case of a partial withdrawal or update) at market
prices in a reasonable and timely manner. However, Wealthfront Advisers does not represent or
guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers will respond to any such Client actions or requests
immediately or in accordance with a set time schedule. See Item 16 for a description of
Wealthfront Advisers’ discretionary investment authority, including the timing of Wealthfront
Advisers’ placement of Client trade orders.
Investors evaluating Wealthfront Advisers’ software-based investment advisory service should
be aware that Wealthfront Advisers’ relationship with Clients is likely to be different from the
“traditional” investment advisory relationship in several aspects:
1. Wealthfront Advisers is a software-based investment adviser which means each Client
must acknowledge their ability and willingness to conduct their relationship with
Wealthfront Advisers on an electronic basis. Under the terms of the Advisory Client
Agreement and the Brokerage Agreement, each Client agrees to receive all Account
information and Account documents (including this Client Brochure and the Wealthfront
Advisers Program Brochure), and any updates or changes to same, through their access to
the Site and Wealthfront Advisers’ electronic communications. Unless noted otherwise on
the Site or within this Brochure, Wealthfront Advisers’ investment advisory service,
Wealthfront Brokerage’s brokerage services, the signature for the Advisory Client
Agreement and the Brokerage Agreement, and all documentation related to the advisory
services are managed electronically. Wealthfront Advisers does make individual
representatives available to discuss servicing matters with Clients.
2. To provide its investment advisory services and tailor its investment recommendations to
each Client’s specific needs, Wealthfront Advisers collects information from each Client,
including specific information about their investing profile such as financial situation,
investment experience, and investment objectives. Wealthfront Advisers maintains this
information in strict confidence subject to its Privacy Policy, which is provided on the
Site. Although Wealthfront Advisers contacts its Clients periodically as described further
in Item 13 below, a Client must promptly notify Wealthfront Advisers of any change in
their financial situation or investment objectives that might require a review or revision of
their portfolio.
3. Clients with an Automated Investing Account can choose a portfolio Wealthfront
Advisers recommends, which includes allocations to preselected ETFs or customize our
recommended portfolios for their IRA or taxable accounts by increasing or decreasing
portfolio allocations to the ETFs or investments in our recommended portfolio or by
choosing from a list of available ETFs or other investments and requesting specific
allocations to each. At account opening or anytime thereafter, Wealthfront Advisers
allows Clients to update their settings to restrict Wealthfront Advisers from investing in
the stocks of public companies designated by the Client.
4. In a Stock Investing Account, Clients may request that Wealthfront Advisers undertake
certain transactions, including the purchase and sale of securities.
Item 8 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk of Loss
A. Modern Portfolio Theory (“MPT”)
For the Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers offers three types of recommended,
diversified, automated portfolios to clients with an IRA or taxable account: Classic portfolios,
Socially Responsible portfolios, and Direct Indexing portfolios. Classic portfolios include
allocations to preselected ETFs designed to provide a tradeoff between risk and long-term,
after-tax, net-of-fee return through a diversified set of global asset classes. Socially Responsible
portfolios are designed to offer similar risk-adjusted returns as our Classic portfolios with a focus
on socially responsible investing (“SRI”). Although SRI does not have a single, agreed-upon
definition, it may be described as an investment strategy that evaluates companies based on their
benefit and/or detriment to society, rather than profits or intrinsic value alone. This concept
comes from an ethical framework called “social responsibility,” in which individuals and
corporations have an obligation to cooperate with others to benefit greater society. Some
investors may take up SRI strategies due to a long-term belief in its investment value, and others
may decide to use this strategy purely due to ethics. Direct Indexing portfolios use our US Direct
Indexing product to replace the ETF that represents the US public equities asset class with
individual securities that comprise up to 1,000 US stocks with the largest market capitalizations
as a way of generating additional tax savings. Direct Indexing portfolios are available in taxable
accounts that have between $100,000 and $500,000. As noted in Item 7.3, Clients’ Direct
Indexing portfolios may specify US stocks they choose to restrict but may not customize the
portfolio allocations in those accounts.
The composition of Classic, Socially Responsible, and Direct Indexing portfolios are based on
Modern Portfolio Theory (“MPT”). MPT attempts to maximize a portfolio’s expected return for
a given amount of portfolio risk, or equivalently minimize risk for a given level of expected
return, by selecting the proportions of various asset classes rather than selecting individual
securities. Historically, rigorous MPT-based financial advice has been available primarily
through certain high-end financial advisors. Wealthfront Advisers’ goal is to enable anyone with
at least $500 to access the benefits of MPT.
Prior to the launch of the Wealthfront Advisers software-based investment advisory service, it
was not practical to offer rigorous and complete MPT to everyone because delivering a complete
solution was too complex. Specifically, the number of calculations required to identify an
optimized asset allocation, the ideal securities to represent each asset class, and an individual’s
true risk tolerance are beyond the scope of free, web-based tools. The job becomes even more
difficult when considering the importance of periodically rebalancing a portfolio to maintain a
desired risk level.
To employ MPT properly, one must start with an accurate determination of an individual’s
objective and subjective tolerance for risk. Achieving accuracy requires sophisticated software
applied to more detailed questions than are typically asked by advisers. Based on this risk
analysis, Wealthfront Advisers seeks to create an individualized investment plan using the
optimal asset classes in which to invest, the most efficient and inexpensive ETFs to represent
each of those asset classes, and the ideal mix of asset classes based on the Client’s specific risk
tolerance. Wealthfront Advisers uses Mean Variance Optimization to rigorously evaluate every
possible combination of the following twelve asset classes: US equities, foreign developed
markets equities, emerging markets equities, dividend growth equities, real estate, natural
resources, treasury inflation protected securities (TIPS), municipal bonds, corporate bonds,
emerging markets bonds, and US government bonds. Mean Variance Optimization uses the
expected return and volatility for each asset class and the covariance among asset classes to find
the combination that delivers the highest possible return for any given standard deviation of a
portfolio’s returns. Wealthfront Advisers, however, must limit the number of asset classes for
very small portfolios.
Wealthfront Advisers periodically reviews the entire population of more than 1,000 ETFs to
identify the most appropriate ETFs to represent each asset class in our recommended portfolios.
We look for ETFs that minimize cost and tracking error and offer market liquidity. Many
investors do not realize that ETFs do not exactly track the indexes they were created to mimic.
Choosing an ETF with a low expense ratio that does not track the asset class recommended by
our service runs the risk of sub-optimizing a Client’s portfolio’s performance. We choose ETFs
that are expected to have sufficient liquidity to allow Client withdrawals at any time. Finally, we
select ETFs that have conservative and shareholder-friendly securities lending policies.
In addition to choosing what we believe to be the best ETFs at the time, we explain in white
papers on our website why we chose each one. We provide a detailed analysis of how the
selected ETF stacked up against the second and third best choice for each asset class on the
dimensions described in the paragraph above.
Wealthfront Advisers continuously monitors our Clients’ portfolios and periodically rebalances
them back to the Clients’ target mix in an effort to optimize returns for the intended level of risk.
Wealthfront Advisers considers tax implications and the volatility associated with each of the
chosen asset classes when deciding when and how to rebalance, however no assurance can be
made by Wealthfront Advisers that Clients will not incur capital gains, and in certain instances
significant capital gains, when Client portfolios are rebalanced periodically. Wealthfront
Advisers assumes no responsibility to its Clients for any tax consequences of any transaction,
including any capital gains that may result from the rebalancing of an Automated Investing
Account and Automated Bond Portfolio.
B.
Long Term, Buy and Hold Investment Philosophy
For Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers adheres to a long-term, “buy-and-hold”
investment philosophy. While Wealthfront Advisers reserves the right to act otherwise if it feels
that it is in the best interests of its Clients, Wealthfront Advisers does not try to time the market
and in general, Wealthfront Advisers intentionally does not react to market movements in
managing Client Accounts other than through rebalancing and TLH in a taxable Automated
Investing Account. Wealthfront Advisers believes that numerous academic and industry studies
show that “short-term fluctuations in markets, which loom so large to investors, have little to do
with the long-term accumulation of wealth.” J. Siegel, Stocks for the Long Run (1977).
C.
Automated Bond Portfolio
The Automated Bond Portfolio includes allocations to preselected bond ETFs that, based on a
Client’s tax situation (income, state of residence, and tax filing status), are designed to maximize
after-tax yields for Clients. As with Wealthfront’s other portfolios, Wealthfront Advisers selects
optimal ETFs to achieve the portfolio's strategy, and we explain in white papers on our website
the analysis underlying our selections.
D.
Automated Bond Ladder
The Automated Bond Ladder is a portfolio that uses a laddering strategy designed to preserve
capital and generate yield. Wealthfront Advisers seeks to achieve this by investing Client assets
in “rungs” of Treasuries in equal weights and that mature on a monthly basis. This strategy is
designed to produce relatively stable yield at a lower risk for Clients while also reducing
exposure to interest rate fluctuations. Clients may utilize automatic reinvesting to maintain the
Client’s selected ladder length on a rolling basis. Clients may also disable automatic
reinvestment of interest or principal paid at maturity. Additionally, Clients may set a target
withdrawal date, and Wealthfront Advisers will only invest in Treasuries that mature prior to that
date. When all Treasuries have matured, Wealthfront Advisers will transfer the proceeds to the
Client’s Wealthfront Cash Account and close their Automated Bond Ladder Account. Perfectly
equal rungs and/or maturities in every month of a particular ladder may not always be possible,
depending on account size, market conditions, ladder length, and other factors. We provide
further detail about our strategy in white papers on our website.
E.
Tax-Loss Harvesting (“TLH”)
TLH is a technique designed to help appropriately reduce a Client’s taxes while maintaining the
expected risk and return profile of the Client’s portfolio. It harvests previously unrecognized
investment losses to offset taxes due on the Client’s other gains and income by selling a security
at a loss to accelerate the realization of capital loss and investing the proceeds in a security with
closely correlated risk and return characteristics. The realized loss can be applied to reduce the
Client’s tax liability and the tax savings can be reinvested to grow the value of the Client’s
portfolio. Wealthfront Advisers’ basic TLH strategy, which is only applied to ETFs, is available
to all Clients with a taxable Automated Investing Account. TLH is also available to Clients who
customize our recommended Classic or Socially Responsible portfolios as long as their
allocations include eligible ETFs. Eligible ETFs are those for which we have identified an
alternative ETF that tracks a different, but closely correlated index to maintain the risk and return
characteristics of the Client’s portfolio. Advanced versions of TLH—such as Direct Indexing
portfolios and Smart Beta—are available for Clients with larger account sizes and are generally
applied to individual stocks that comprise the domestic equity allocation in their taxable account
portfolios.
F.
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct allows Clients to hold many of the individual stocks that
make up the S&P 500® index and Nasdaq-100® index, respectively and uses Wealthfront’s
automated TLH to turn individual stock declines into tax savings. This strategy enhances
after-tax returns while closely tracking the performance of the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100®
index. S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct are designed for Clients seeking US large-cap
equity exposure and Wealthfront Advisers uses mathematical optimization to balance two
objectives: minimizing tracking error relative to the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index and
maximizing after-tax benefits of harvested losses (“tax alpha”). Tax alpha is achieved by selling
stocks that decline in value to harvest losses, while tracking error is reduced by purchasing
correlated replacement stocks to maintain alignment with the index. Portfolio diversification and
wash-sale avoidance are managed through constraints, including but not limited to limits on
stock weights.
The minimum investment to open an S&P 500 Direct account or a Nasdaq-100 Direct account is
$5,000. These Accounts will attempt to hold all stocks of the 500 or 100 companies in the
corresponding index, but due to TLH, which sells stocks that have decreased in value and
purchases similar stocks which the Account may already hold to replace them, the actual number
of stocks in the portfolio is likely to be less. Generally, the higher the total value of the portfolio,
the more stocks the portfolio will be able to hold in the Account and the closer the Client’s
portfolio can track the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index. This is because, even though we
are able to hold stocks at a fraction of a share, Wealthfront Advisers may choose not to hold
certain stocks if the fraction is extremely small. For example, S&P 500 Direct accounts of
$5,000 may hold roughly 200-300 stocks and Accounts with more than $25,000 will likely hold
more than 400 stocks. For Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, we will likely hold 60-100 stocks on
average. The number of individual stocks held in a S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 account is
generally lower initially, but increases over time with tax-loss harvesting activity and add-on
deposits.
Additionally, if you hold multiple S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, Wealthfront
Advisers will coordinate trades in the Accounts in a manner designed to avoid wash sales. Under
these circumstances, it is possible that our wash sale avoidance may cause harvested losses to be
slightly lower. Our white paper provides additional detail regarding the methodology and
strategy used in S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts.
G. Customized Portfolios
Wealthfront Advisers offers a wider selection of ETFs and other investments to Clients who
choose to customize our Classic or Socially Responsible portfolios in their IRA or taxable
account. These ETFs and other investments may represent additional asset classes beyond the
ones used in our recommended portfolios, or narrower subsets of these asset classes, allowing a
more precise expression of Client investment preferences. We select these additional investments
based on their overall level of risk, liquidity, tracking error to underlying indices (where
applicable), cost of ownership, and popularity.
H. Securities Lending Program
Wealthfront Advisers offers Clients the option to participate in its Securities Lending Program,
which provides Clients the opportunity to earn income by lending their fully paid securities held
in eligible Accounts (taxable Automated Investment Accounts, Automated Bond Portfolios,
Stock Investing Accounts, S&P 500 Direct accounts, and Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts) to
Wealthfront Brokerage, which will lend these securities to third-party borrowers. Participants
receive 50% of what we earn when their shares are lent, which amount will vary based on
market demand, interest rates, and the specific securities lent. Compensation will be paid on a
monthly basis.
Participation in this program is optional and subject to a suitability determination based on the
Client’s investment objectives, risk tolerance, financial profile, and investment experience and
knowledge. While loans are fully collateralized with cash and administered with daily
mark-to-market practices, participation entails certain risks detailed below,
including
counterparty default, loss of voting rights, and potential adverse tax treatment of payments
received in lieu of dividends. Participants retain contractual rights to all shares lent to
Wealthfront Brokerage. Participants may opt out or withdraw funds from eligible Accounts at
any time. Following such instructions, Wealthfront Advisers will recall Participants’ shares from
Wealthfront Brokerage.
I.
Risk Considerations
Wealthfront Advisers cannot guarantee any level of performance or that any Client will avoid a
loss of Account assets. Also, to the extent that Client requests investments other than as
recommended by Wealthfront Advisers, Client understands and agrees that such investments
may be inconsistent with the Client’s investment profile. If Client has not provided sufficient,
timely, or accurate information to Wealthfront Advisers, or if Client chooses not to follow
Wealthfront Advisers’ recommendations and advice, Client’s investments may not achieve
results consistent with Client’s investment profile. Any investment in securities involves the
possibility of financial loss that Clients should be prepared to bear.
When evaluating risk, financial loss may be viewed differently by each Client and may depend
on many different risk items, each of which may affect the probability of adverse consequences
and the magnitude of any potential losses. The following risks may not be all-inclusive, but
should be considered carefully by a prospective Client before retaining Wealthfront Advisers’
services. These risks should be considered as possibilities, with additional regard to their actual
probability of occurring and the effect on a Client if there is in fact an occurrence.
Market Risk – The price of any security or the value of an entire asset class can decline for a
variety of reasons outside of Wealthfront Advisers’ control, including, but not limited to, changes
in the macroeconomic environment, unpredictable market sentiment, forecasted or unforeseen
economic developments, interest rates, regulatory changes, and domestic or foreign political,
demographic, or social events. If a Client has a high allocation in a particular asset class, it may
negatively affect overall performance to the extent that the asset class underperforms relative to
other market assets. Conversely, a low allocation to a particular asset class that outperforms other
asset classes in a particular period will cause that Client Account to underperform relative to the
overall market.
investment advisory service. Wealthfront Advisers and
Advisory Risk – There is no guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers’ judgment or investment
decisions about particular securities or asset classes will necessarily produce the intended results.
It is possible that Clients or Wealthfront Advisers itself may experience computer equipment
failure, loss of internet access, viruses, or other events that may impair access to Wealthfront
Advisers’ software-based
its
representatives are not responsible to any Client for losses unless caused by Wealthfront
Advisers’ breach of its fiduciary duty.
Software Risk – Wealthfront Advisers delivers its investment advisory services entirely through
software. Consequently, Wealthfront Advisers rigorously designs, develops and tests its software
extensively before putting such software into production with actual Client Accounts and assets
and periodically monitors the behaviors of such software after its deployment. Notwithstanding
this rigorous design, development, testing and monitoring, it is possible that such software may
not always perform exactly as intended or as disclosed on the Site, mobile app, blogs or other
Wealthfront Advisers disclosure documents, especially in certain combinations of unusual
circumstances. For example, there may be occasions where a number of Client Accounts may not
experience TLH (even if TLH had been activated for such accounts) or rebalancing back to the
Client’s target asset allocation for extended periods of time, due to certain errors in the
deployment of the software. Wealthfront Advisers continuously strives to monitor, detect and
correct any software that does not perform as expected or as disclosed.
Volatility and Correlation Risk – Wealthfront Advisers’ Security selection process is based in
part on a careful evaluation of past price performance and volatility to evaluate future
probabilities. It is possible that different or unrelated asset classes may exhibit similar price
changes in similar directions which may adversely affect a Client’s account and may become
more acute in times of market upheaval or high volatility. Past performance is no guarantee of
future results, and any historical returns, expected returns, or probability projections may
not reflect actual future performance.
Liquidity and Valuation Risk – High volatility and/or the lack of deep and active liquid
markets for a security may prevent a Client from selling their securities at all, or at an
advantageous time or price because Wealthfront Advisers’ executing broker-dealer may have
difficulty finding a buyer and may be forced to sell at a significant discount to market value.
Some securities (including ETFs) that hold or trade financial instruments may be adversely
affected by liquidity issues as they manage their portfolios. While Wealthfront Advisers values
the securities held in Client Accounts based on reasonably available exchange traded security
data, Wealthfront Advisers may from time to time receive or use inaccurate data, which could
adversely affect security valuations, transaction size for purchases or sales, and/or the resulting
advisory fees paid by a Client to Wealthfront Advisers.
Credit Risk – Wealthfront Advisers cannot control, and Clients are exposed to the risk that,
financial intermediaries or security issuers may experience adverse economic consequences that
may include impaired credit ratings, default, bankruptcy or insolvency, any of which may affect
portfolio values or management. This risk applies to assets held with any broker-dealer,
notwithstanding asset segregation and insurance requirements that are beneficial to broker-dealer
clients generally. In addition, exchange trading venues or trade settlement and clearing
intermediaries could experience adverse events that may temporarily or permanently limit
trading or adversely affect the value of Client securities. Finally, any issuer of securities may
experience a credit event that could impair or erase the value of the issuer’s securities held by a
Client. Wealthfront Advisers seeks to limit credit risk by generally adhering to the purchase of
ETFs, which are subject to regulatory limits on asset segregation and leverage such that fund
shareholders are given liquidation priority versus the fund issuer; however, certain funds and
products, which Wealthfront Advisers generally does not invest in, may involve higher issuer
credit risk because they are not structured as a registered fund.
Legislative and Tax Risk - Performance may directly or indirectly be affected by government
legislation or regulation, which may include, but is not limited to: changes in investment adviser
/ financial advisor or securities trading regulation; change in the US government’s guarantee of
ultimate payment of principal and interest on certain government securities; and changes in the
tax code that could affect interest income, income characterization and/or tax reporting
obligations (particularly for ETF securities dealing in natural resources). Wealthfront Advisers
does not engage in tax planning, and in certain circumstances a Client may incur taxable income
on their investments without a cash distribution to pay the tax due.
Tax-Loss Harvesting Risk - Clients who activate TLH, including Clients with S&P 500 Direct
or Nasdaq-100 Direct, are alerted to the following risks:
● Clients should confer with their personal tax advisor regarding the tax consequences
of investing with Wealthfront Advisers and engaging in TLH, based on their
particular circumstances. Clients and their personal tax advisors are responsible for
how the transactions in the Client’s account are reported to the Internal Revenue Service
(“IRS”) or any other taxing authority. Wealthfront Advisers assumes no responsibility to
you for the tax consequences of any transaction, including any capital gains and/or wash
sales that may result from TLH.
● Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH is not intended as tax advice, and Wealthfront Advisers does
not represent in any manner that the tax consequences described will be obtained or that
Wealthfront Advisers’ investment strategy will result in any particular tax consequence.
The tax consequences of this strategy and other Wealthfront Advisers strategies are
complex and may be subject to challenge by the IRS. This strategy was not developed to
be used by, and it cannot be used by, any investor to avoid penalties or interest.
● When Wealthfront Advisers replaces investments with “similar” investments as part of
TLH, it is a reference to investments that are expected, but are not guaranteed, to perform
similarly and that might reduce a Client’s tax bill while maintaining a similar expected
risk and return on the Client’s portfolio. Expected returns and risk characteristics are
no guarantee of actual performance.
● A Client must notify Wealthfront Advisers of specific stocks in which the Client is
prohibited from investing. If a Client instructs Wealthfront Advisers not to purchase
certain stocks, Wealthfront Advisers will select an alternate stock to purchase on the
Client’s behalf or if Wealthfront Advisers deems no other stock as appropriate, not invest
in an alternate stock. The Client shall notify Wealthfront Advisers immediately if you
consider any investments recommended or made for the Account to violate such
restrictions.
● The performance of the new securities purchased through the TLH may be better or
worse than the performance of the securities that are sold for TLH purposes.
● The effectiveness of TLH to reduce the tax liability of the Client will depend on the
Client’s entire tax and investment profile, including purchases and dispositions in a
Client’s (or Client’s spouse’s) accounts outside of Wealthfront Advisers and type of
investments (e.g., taxable or nontaxable) or holding period (e.g., short-term or long-term).
Clients who customize our recommended portfolios may also influence the effectiveness
of TLH. For example, Clients who allocate significant portions of their portfolio to ETFs
that are not currently supported for TLH may decrease the effectiveness of this service by
reducing the number and/or amount of ETFs from which to harvest losses. Clients with
S&P 500 Direct and/or or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts will experience, in varying
degrees, differences in performance from the performance of the S&P 500® or
Nasdaq-100® indices as a result of TLH in their accounts. The utilization of losses
harvested through the strategy will depend upon the recognition of capital gains in the
same or a future tax period, and in addition may be subject to limitations under applicable
tax laws, e.g., if there are insufficient realized gains in the tax period, the use of harvested
losses is limited to a $3,000 deduction against ordinary income and distributions. Losses
harvested through the strategy that are not utilized in the tax period when recognized
(e.g., because of insufficient capital gains and/or significant capital loss carryforwards),
generally may be carried forward to offset future capital gains, if any. Additionally, if you
have multiple S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, given the two indices have
a sizable overlap, Wealthfront Advisers will coordinate trades between these accounts in
a manner designed to avoid creating wash sales. Under these circumstances, losses
captured through tax-loss harvesting may be slightly lower.
● Be aware that if the Client and/or the Client’s spouse have other taxable or non-taxable
investment accounts, and the Client holds in those accounts any of the securities
(including options contracts) held in the Client’s account at Wealthfront Advisers, the
Client cannot trade any of those securities 30 days before or after Wealthfront Advisers
trades those same securities as part of TLH to avoid possible wash sales and, as a result, a
nullification of any tax benefits of the strategy. For more information on the wash sale
rule, please read IRS Publication 550.
● Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH is designed to avoid creating “wash sales” in Clients’
accounts with Wealthfront Advisers. Clients, however, are responsible for monitoring
their accounts outside of Wealthfront Advisers to ensure that transactions in the same
security or a substantially identical security do not create a wash sale. A wash sale occurs
when a taxpayer sells a security at a loss and then purchases the same security or a
substantially identical security over a period of 61 days: the day of the sale, the 30 days
before the sale, and the 30 days after the sale. If a wash sale occurs, the IRS may not
allow the loss for current tax reporting purposes. Wash sales can occur even if the
securities are sold and then bought in different accounts. Therefore Wealthfront Advisers
may lack visibility to certain wash sales, should they occur as a result of transactions in
external or unlinked accounts. Under those circumstances, Wealthfront Advisers may not
be able to provide notice of such wash sale in advance of the Client's receipt of the IRS
Form 1099. Further, if a Client opens multiple Accounts using different login information
(for example, the Client uses different email addresses across multiple Accounts),
Wealthfront Advisers may not be able to prevent wash sales between those Accounts.
Conversely, if a Client uses the same login information for an individual Account and a
trust-held Account, as described above, Wealthfront Adviser will manage both Accounts
pursuant to the single investment profile for that account. This includes investment
objectives, risk tolerance, and tax attributes. Clients should be aware that under such
circumstances Wealthfront Advisers will seek to avoid wash sales in one or more
Accounts maintained under the client’s investment profile.
● Except as set forth below, Wealthfront Advisers will monitor only a Client’s accounts at
Wealthfront Advisers to determine if there are unrealized losses for purposes of
determining whether to harvest such losses. Transactions outside of accounts at
Wealthfront Advisers may affect whether a loss is successfully harvested and, if so,
whether that loss is usable by the Client in the most efficient manner.
● Under certain circumstances, there is a chance that Wealthfront Advisers trading
attributed to TLH may create capital gains and/or wash sales. In addition, TLH may
produce losses which may not be offset by sufficient gains in the account.
● From time to time, in order to mitigate wash sales risk, a Client’s IRA Account might
invest in a so-called “secondary” ETF (as identified in Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH white
paper) rather than a so-called “primary” ETF identified in such white paper or in the
Client’s plan.
● Not all the losses may be used to offset gains in the year they were recognized due to
wash sales. Thus, wash sales can diminish the effectiveness of TLH by deferring to a
future year a tax loss that could have been used to offset income or capital gains in the
current year.
● Frequent deposits in an Account (such as deposits that are less than 30 days apart) tend to
create multiple orders for the same stocks. In order to avoid wash sales, Wealthfront
Advisers will avoid harvesting losses in those stocks for the short-term. Thus, the amount
of losses captured through TLH will likely be lower, especially if the deposit size is a
significant percentage of the Client’s Account size before deposit.
Potentially High Levels of Trading Risk - Certain situations, such as the simultaneous receipt
of a high volume of Client deposits or withdrawal requests, can lead Wealthfront Advisers to
engage in high levels of trading. High levels of trading could result in (a) bid-ask spread
expense; (b) trade executions that may occur at prices beyond the bid-ask spread (if quantity
demanded exceeds quantity available at the bid or ask); (c) trading that may adversely move
prices, such that subsequent transactions occur at worse prices; (d) trading that may disqualify
some dividends from qualified dividend treatment; unfulfilled orders or portfolio drift, in the
event that markets are disorderly or trading halts altogether; and (f) unforeseen trading errors.
Foreign Investing and Emerging Markets Risk - Foreign investing involves risks not typically
associated with US investments, and the risks may be exacerbated further in emerging market
countries. These risks may include, among others, adverse fluctuations in foreign currency
values, as well as adverse political, social and economic developments affecting one or more
foreign countries. In addition, foreign investing may involve less publicly available information
and more volatile or less liquid securities markets, particularly in markets that trade a small
number of securities, have unstable governments, or involve limited industry. Investments in
foreign countries could be affected by factors not present in the US, such as restrictions on
receiving the investment proceeds from a foreign country, foreign tax laws or tax withholding
requirements, unique trade clearance or settlement procedures, and potential difficulties in
enforcing contractual obligations or other legal rules that jeopardize shareholder protection.
Foreign accounting may be less transparent than US accounting practices and foreign regulation
may be inadequate or irregular.
ETF Risks, including Net Asset Valuations and Tracking Error - ETF performance may not
exactly match the performance of the index or market benchmark that the ETF is designed to
track because 1) the ETF will incur expenses and transaction costs not incurred by any applicable
index or market benchmark; 2) certain securities comprising the index or market benchmark
tracked by the ETF may, from time to time, temporarily be unavailable; and 3) supply and
demand in the market for either the ETF and/or for the securities held by the ETF may cause the
ETF shares to trade at a premium or discount to the actual net asset value of the securities owned
by the ETF. Certain ETF strategies may from time to time include the purchase of fixed income,
commodities, foreign securities, American Depositary Receipts, or other securities for which
expenses and commission rates could be higher than normally charged for exchange traded
equity securities, and for which market quotations or valuation may be limited or inaccurate.
Clients should be aware that to the extent they invest in ETF securities they will pay two levels
of advisory compensation – advisory fees charged by Wealthfront Advisers plus any
management fees charged by the issuer of the ETF. This scenario may cause a higher advisory
cost (and potentially lower investment returns) than if a Client purchased the ETF directly.
An ETF typically includes embedded expenses that may reduce the fund's net asset value, and
therefore directly affect the fund's performance and indirectly affect a Client’s portfolio
performance or an index benchmark comparison. Expenses of the fund may include ETF
management fees, custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and legal and accounting fees. ETF
expenses may change from time to time at the sole discretion of the ETF issuer. Wealthfront
Advisers discloses each ETF’s current information, including expenses, on the Site. ETF tracking
error and expenses may vary.
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct Risk - S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct
accounts aim to closely track the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index, but several factors
will cause deviations in performance, which may be called “tracking difference.” For instance,
TLH involves selling stocks at a loss and replacing them with similar investments to maintain
portfolio correlation with the index. However, these trades may lead to slight variations in stock
weights, potentially impacting portfolio performance. Additionally, portfolios are unlikely to
hold all 500 stocks in the S&P 500® index or 100 stocks in the Nasdaq-100® index due to
minimum investment constraints, resulting in a less precise replication of the index’s
composition.
Stock exclusions also contribute to tracking difference. When Clients instruct Wealthfront
Advisers to restrict specific stocks from trading, Wealthfront Advisers will substitute those
stocks with other stocks, which may not fully replicate the restricted stocks' impact on the index.
Over time, such exclusions may lead to greater performance differences between the Client’s
portfolio and the S&P 500® or Nasdaq-100® indices. Although Wealthfront Advisers uses
mathematical optimization to minimize tracking difference, short-term market fluctuations and
index changes can amplify these variances.
While tracking difference may occasionally cause underperformance relative to the index, they
are generally expected to balance out over the long term. Clients should be prepared for potential
deviations in pre-tax returns and understand that Wealthfront does not guarantee perfect
alignment with the S&P 500® or Nasdaq-100® indices.
Socially Responsible Investing Risk - Clients who select Wealthfront Advisers’ Socially
Responsible portfolio or who customize their portfolio to include SRI investments may choose
such investments based on their benefit and/or detriment to society, rather than profits or intrinsic
value alone. This may result in lower returns for the Client compared to a Classic or Direct
Indexing portfolio. This may also reduce a Client Account’s exposure to certain sectors or types
of investments, which could negatively impact the Client Account’s performance. Additionally, a
Client may disagree with the SRI classification of an issuer by our data provider. SRI norms
differ by region, and an issuer’s practices may change over time. Accordingly, if an investment
no longer meets the criteria for SRI, Wealthfront Advisers may be required to sell the investment
at a disadvantageous price or time.
Exposure to Digital Assets through Statutory Trusts - Wealthfront Advisers offers long-term
exposure to digital assets through investments in certain statutory trusts. The term digital asset
refers to an asset that is issued and/or transferred using distributed ledger or blockchain
technology, including, but not limited to, so-called “virtual currencies,” “coins,” and “tokens.”
Although Wealthfront Advisers does not offer direct investment in digital assets, Clients opting
to customize their portfolios may include an allocation of up to 10% of their total portfolio value
to statutory trusts that hold digital assets (“Digital Assets Trusts”).
Unlike ETFs, Digital Assets Trusts may lack efficient creation and redemption mechanisms. As a
result, the price of Digital Assets Trusts can differ significantly from the value of the underlying
digital assets. Further, because of the nature of underlying digital assets and their markets,
investments in Digital Assets Trusts (and cryptocurrencies themselves) may be significantly
more volatile than most securities-based ETFs, and are not suitable for all investors. Digital
Assets Trusts may be significantly riskier than investments in more traditional assets like stocks,
bonds, mutual funds, or ETFs. The price history of a Digital Assets Trust may not be reflective of
its future price potential, and digital asset investors should be able to withstand significant if not
complete loss of invested capital.
Inflation, Currency, and Interest Rate Risks - Security prices and portfolio returns will likely
vary in response to changes in inflation and interest rates. Inflation causes the value of future
dollars to be worth less and may reduce the purchasing power of an investor’s future interest
payments and principal. Inflation also generally leads to higher interest rates, which in turn may
cause the value of many types of fixed income investments to decline. In addition, the relative
value of the US dollar-denominated assets primarily managed by Wealthfront Advisers may be
affected by the risk that currency devaluations affect Client purchasing power.
Risks Relating to Investment in a Concentrated Number of Securities or to Investment in
Only One Industry Sector (or in Only a Few Sectors) - When strategies invest in a
concentrated number of securities, a decline in the value of these securities would cause your
overall account value to decline to a greater degree than that of a less concentrated portfolio.
Strategies that invest a large percentage of assets in only one industry sector (or in only a few
sectors) are more vulnerable to price fluctuation than strategies that diversify among a broad
range of sectors.
Automated Bond Ladder Risks - A bond ladder, depending on the length and amount of
securities within the ladder, may not ensure adequate diversification of your investment portfolio.
Compared to other fixed income strategies, a bond ladder strategy may potentially result in future
reinvestment at lower interest rates, which may require higher minimum investments to maintain
cost-effectiveness.
Investment value will fluctuate, and Treasuries, if sold before maturity, may be worth more or
less than original cost. Fixed income securities are subject to various other risks including
changes in interest rates and credit quality, market valuations, liquidity, prepayments, early
redemption, corporate events, tax ramifications, and other factors.
Although Treasuries in Automated Bond Ladders are backed by the full faith and credit of the
United States, circumstances could arise that could prevent the timely payment of interest or
principal, such as reaching a legislative “debt ceiling.” Such non-payment may result in payment
delays or losses to the Client. Certain Treasuries can be less liquid than other investments.
Partial or Fractional Shares - Wealthront does not currently support ownership of fractional
shares for an Automated Investing Account, or Automated Bond Portfolio. Without fractional
shares, it may be more difficult to achieve a diversified portfolio because the price of a single
share of a given security may be high and may deplete the budget available to build a diversified
portfolio. At the same time, without fractional shares, Clients may hold more cash than may be
advisable because of the high price of buying a whole share of a given security.
College Savings Account Risks - 529 Accounts are subject to various risks, including but not
limited to:
Special Nature of Plan Interests - The Client and the Client’s beneficiary do not have
access or rights to any assets of the state sponsoring our 529 Plan or any assets of the
state trust of the Section 529 college savings plan (a “Plan”) other than the assets credited
to the Client’s account for that beneficiary. The 529 Account is an investment vehicle.
529 Accounts are subject to certain risks including: (i) the possibility that the Client may
lose money over short or even long periods of time; (ii) the risk of changes in applicable
federal and state tax laws and regulations; (iii) the risk of Plan changes including changes
in fees and expenses; and (iv) the risk that contributions to the 529 Account may
adversely affect the eligibility of the beneficiary or the Client for financial aid or other
benefits. Some MFSs in a Client’s 529 Account carry more and/or different risks than
others. Clients should weigh such risks with the understanding that they could arise at
any time during the life of the Client’s account.
Municipal Fund Securities - When the Client contributes to the 529 Account, the Client’s
money will be invested in MFSs. An investment in the Client’s 529 Account is not a bank
deposit. None of the Client’s account, the principal the Client invests, nor any investment
return is insured or guaranteed by (i) any state or any state agencies, instrumentalities or
funds, (ii) any officer, official, staff member of any state, (iii) any Plan or any program
manager of any such Plan, (iv) any board of any state trust issuing MFSs for a Plan (a
“Board”), (v) any such state trust (as “State Trust”), (vi) Wealthfront Advisers, (vii) each
of their respective affiliates, officials, officers, directors, employees and representatives,
(viii) the federal government, (ix) the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”),
or (x) any other governmental agency. Investment returns will vary depending upon the
performance of the designated portfolios in the Client’s account. A Client could lose all
or a portion of the Client’s investment.\
Relatively Short Investment Time Horizon - Relative to investing for retirement, the
holding period for college savings investors is very short (e.g., 10 years versus 60 years).
Also, the need for liquidity during the withdrawal phase (to pay for qualified higher
education expenses) generally is very important. Clients should strongly consider the
level of risk they wish to assume when completing the risk questionnaire upon account
opening.
Limited Investment Direction - Clients may not direct the underlying investments in their
529 Account. The ongoing money management is the responsibility of Wealthfront
Advisers. The only manner in which Clients can affect the money management is to
change their risk score, which is limited to two times per year, or upon the change of the
beneficiary. Once the permitted two per calendar year risk score changes are made in the
Client’s account, a subsequent risk score change in the Client’s account within the same
calendar year will not be processed. The choice of the underlying investments of the
MFSs is subject to the approval of the Board. Automatic investment exchanges that occur
as the Client’s assets move through the glide path do not count towards the Client’s twice
per calendar year investment exchange limit.
Liquidity Risk - Investments in a Plan are considered less liquid than other types of
investments (e.g., investments in mutual fund shares) because the circumstances in which
a Client may withdraw money from a Plan account without a penalty or adverse tax
consequences are significantly more limited.
Potential Changes to the Plan – Boards generally reserve the right, in their sole
discretion, to discontinue the Plan or to change any aspect of the Plan. For example, the
Board may change the Plan’s fees and expenses; add, subtract, or merge the MFSs; close
a MFS to new investors; or change the program manager or the underlying investment(s)
of a MFS. Depending on the nature of the change, a Client may be required to, or
prohibited from, participating in the change with respect to accounts established before
the change. A particular program manager may not necessarily continue as the Plan’s
program manager, and Wealthfront Advisers may not necessarily continue as investment
adviser and distributor to a Plan (although Wealthfront Advisers will continue as the
Client’s investment adviser until either Wealthfront Advisers or the Client terminates that
investment advisory relationship).
Changes to a Plan may or may not be beneficial to Clients. The Board may terminate the
Plan by giving written notice to the Client, but even if the Board terminates the Plan, the
Client and the Client’s beneficiary’s rights to the Client’s account assets will be
unaffected. An MFS may be temporarily uninvested during a transition from one
investment underlying an MFS to another underlying investment. The transaction costs
associated with any liquidation, as well as any market impact on the value of the
securities being liquidated, will be borne by the MFS which ultimately may impact the
individual portfolios holding that MFS.
Status of Federal and State Law and Regulations Governing a Plan - Federal and state
law and regulations governing the administration of Plans could change in the future. In
addition, federal and state laws on related matters, such as the funding of higher
education expenses, treatment of financial aid, and tax matters are subject to frequent
change. It is unknown what effect these kinds of changes could have on a 529 Account.
Clients should also consider the potential impact of any other state laws on their account.
Clients should consult their tax advisor for more information.
Eligibility for Financial Aid - The treatment of 529 Account assets may have an adverse
effect on the beneficiary’s eligibility to receive assistance under various federal, state,
and institutional financial aid programs.
No Guarantee That Investments Will Cover Qualified Higher Education Expenses;
Inflation and Qualified Higher Education Expenses - There is no guarantee that the
money in a Client’s 529 Account will be sufficient to cover all of a beneficiary’s
qualified higher education expenses, even if contributions are made in the maximum
allowable amount for the beneficiary. The future rate of increase in qualified higher
education expenses is uncertain and could exceed the rate of investment return earned by
a Plan account over any relevant period of time.
Investors in any Plan should read the Plan’s offering documents and any related
participation agreement carefully before investing or sending money. For more
information on risks related to 529 Accounts, see the "Plan Risks" section of the
Wealthfront 529 College Savings Plan Description and Participation Agreement.
Portfolio Line of Credit - Qualified clients who choose to use Wealthfront Brokerage’s PLOC
are alerted to the following risks:
● PLOC is a margin loan product offered by Wealthfront Brokerage exclusively to Clients
of Wealthfront Advisers with a fully discretionary, taxable account by Wealthfront
Advisers and who meet other minimum account thresholds. Clients should review the
risks listed below and in Wealthfront Brokerage’s Margin Handbook, and consider them
before borrowing. For the purposes of this document, Client Accounts utilizing the PLOC
may be referred to as “margin accounts.”
● Clients who utilize margin loans can lose more funds than are held in their margin
accounts. In addition, a decline in the value of the securities in margin accounts may
require such Clients to provide Wealthfront Brokerage with additional funds to avoid the
forced sale of securities or other securities or assets in their margin accounts. This is
called a “margin call.”
● Wealthfront Brokerage can issue a margin call and force the sale of securities in Client
margin accounts if the equity in a Client margin account falls below the minimum
requirement described in our Margin Handbook. Wealthfront Brokerage can sell the
securities in any of the Client’s margin accounts held with Wealthfront Brokerage to
cover the margin deficiency. Clients also will be responsible for any shortfall in the
margin account after such a sale.
● Wealthfront Brokerage notifies Clients whose portfolio balances approach our minimum
margin requirement well before a margin call is likely to happen even though such notice
is not strictly required. Unless such Clients pay back their loan or a portion of it,
Wealthfront Brokerage can sell Client securities in margin accounts without further
contacting the Client if the margin account falls below our minimum margin requirement.
Even if Wealthfront Brokerage has contacted a Client and provided a specific date by
which the Client can meet a margin call, Wealthfront Brokerage can still take necessary
steps to protect its financial interests, including immediately selling the securities without
notice to the Client.
● In the event it is necessary to sell securities to meet minimum margin requirements,
Wealthfront Advisers will automatically liquidate securities to cover the minimum
margin requirements while also maintaining appropriate asset allocations in the Client’s
portfolio. Clients are not entitled to choose which securities in their account(s) are
liquidated or sold to meet a margin call.
● Wealthfront Brokerage can increase its minimum margin requirements at any time and is
not required to provide advance written notice to Clients. These changes in Wealthfront
Brokerage’s policy often take effect immediately and may result in the issuance of a
maintenance margin call. A Client failure to satisfy the call will cause Wealthfront
Brokerage to liquidate or sell securities in Client margin accounts.
● Clients are not entitled to an extension of time on a margin call. While an extension of
time to meet margin requirements may be available to a Client under certain conditions, a
Client does not have a right to the extension.
Securities Lending Program - Participation in the Securities Lending Program involves risks
that Participants should carefully consider. Loaned securities are not covered by Securities
Investor Protection Corporation (“SIPC”) protections once transferred from the Participant’s
account, meaning that in the event of a default by Wealthfront Brokerage or a third-party
borrower, recourse may be limited to the cash collateral pledged for the loans. Wealthfront
Brokerage will maintain collateral at levels ranging from 102% to 105% of the value of the
loaned securities. The value of securities on loan will be monitored daily, and collateral will be
adjusted accordingly. Fluctuations in market value and the timing of payments to maintain
collateral, however, may impact the adequacy of collateral. Participants will not have voting
rights on loaned securities. Participants will receive cash payments in lieu of dividends, which are
subject to different (generally less favorable) tax treatment than qualified dividends, and
Wealthfront Advisers will not compensate Participants for any increased tax liability resulting
from this different treatment. Additionally, loaned securities may be used by third-party
borrowers to facilitate short selling, which may make Clients’ lent securities “hard-to-borrow” or
be used to satisfy delivery requirements resulting from short sales, which could put downward
pressure on the price of those securities. Wealthfront Advisers does not guarantee the return of
loaned securities or uninterrupted participation in the Program. Participants should consult a tax
advisor to evaluate the tax implications of participating in the Program, as tax treatment may vary
depending on individual circumstances.
Item 9 Disciplinary Information
On December 21, 2018, Wealthfront Advisers reached a settlement with the Securities and
Exchange Commission. The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers improperly
retweeted certain clients’ positive tweets from its corporate account and compensated certain
bloggers for client referrals without proper disclosures. Additionally, the settlement order found
that Wealthfront Advisers did not have proper disclosures in its TLH white paper concerning
monitoring for any and all wash sales that could occur in client accounts. A wash sale prevents the
tax benefit of having sold the asset to realize a loss. Thus, a wash sale can diminish the
effectiveness of TLH by deferring to a future year a tax loss that could have been used to offset
income or capital gains in the current year. In Wealthfront’s TLH program, wash sales could occur,
or were permitted, in certain circumstances relating to the management of a client account such as
rebalancing a client portfolio or client directed transactions. The SEC order noted that a significant
percentage of client accounts enrolled in Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH strategy experienced wash
sales in the period from October 2012 to May 2016 and that wash sales represented approximately
2.3% of tax losses harvested for clients in the period from January 2014 to December 2016.
The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers violated the antifraud, advertising,
compliance, and other provisions of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. Without admitting or
denying the SEC’s findings, Wealthfront Advisers consented to the entry of the SEC’s order
censuring it, requiring it to cease and desist from further violations, and imposing a $250,000
penalty.
Item 10 Other Financial Industry Activities and Affiliations
Wealthfront Advisers uses its affiliate, Wealthfront Brokerage, to effect transactions on behalf of
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients for non-529 Accounts. Wealthfront Brokerage is both a carrying
and introducing broker registered with the FINRA and the SEC, whose sole purpose is to service
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients and carry non-529 Accounts that Wealthfront Advisers manages
pursuant to fully discretionary and limited discretionary authority granted to Wealthfront
Advisers by its Clients. For Accounts other than 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Brokerage, as a
broker-dealer, has entered into an omnibus clearing agreement with RBC Clearing & Custody
(“RBC,” or “Clearing Broker”). Wealthfront Brokerage instructs the Clearing Broker on behalf
of Wealthfront Advisers to clear and settle Wealthfront Advisers Client transactions on an
omnibus basis for Client securities orders that Wealthfront Brokerage currently places with either
Citadel LLC, Virtu Financial, GTS Securities LLC, RBC, or Tradeweb LLC (the “Approved
Brokers”). The Clearing Broker also has omnibus custody of Client cash balances and securities
positions.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers uses Wealthfront Brokerage to effect Plan MFS
transactions on behalf of Clients by placing purchase and redemption orders with the Plan
recordkeepers and by holding funds pending their investment in Plan MFSs and holding
proceeds of redemptions of Plan MFSs pending disbursement per Client instructions. 529
Accounts are carried by Ascensus College Savings Recordkeeping Services, LLC (“Ascensus”),
which has a custodial arrangement with the Bank of New York Mellon Corporation.
For Securities Lending activity, securities held in Participant accounts may be loaned to
Wealthfront Brokerage. Wealthfront Brokerage has engaged Sharegain to act as lending
agent. Sharegain provides infrastructure to facilitate the lending of securities to third-party
borrowers and supports program operations including borrower onboarding. This support
includes assistance with Wealthfront Brokerage’s screening and approving eligible
third-party borrowers, loan matching, and collateral management. Wealthfront Brokerage
supervises all third-party borrower due diligence and lending activity conducted through
Sharegain’s platform. Cash collateral received from third-party borrowers is transferred to
and maintained in a segregated account at JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. for the benefit of
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients, with Wilmington Trust, National Association, acting as
trustee. Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage receive a portion of the
compensation generated from securities lending, and Sharegain is compensated pursuant to a
separate agreement with Wealthfront Brokerage.
Wealthfront Brokerage also exclusively offers its PLOC to eligible Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients
who meet certain minimum account thresholds.
Item 11 Code of Ethics, Participation or Interest in Client Transactions and Personal Trading
Wealthfront Advisers’ paramount ethical, professional, and legal duty is to act at all times as a
fiduciary to its Clients. This means that Wealthfront Advisers puts the interests of its Clients
ahead of its own, and carefully manages for any perceived or actual conflict of interest that may
arise in relation to its advisory services. Wealthfront Advisers has adopted a Code of Ethics,
which is designed to ensure that we meet our fiduciary obligation to Clients, enhance our culture
of compliance within the firm, and detect and prevent any violations of securities laws.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Code of Ethics (the “Code”) establishes standards of conduct for all
Wealthfront Advisers’ employees, including all officers, directors, employees, certain contractors
and others (“Access Persons”), and is consistent with the code of ethics requirements of Rule
204A-1 under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, as amended. The Code includes general
requirements that all Access Persons comply with their fiduciary obligations to Clients and
applicable securities laws, and specific requirements relating to, among other things, personal
trading, insider trading, conflicts of interest, and confidentiality of client information.
Each new Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Person receives a copy of the Code after obtaining
access to company systems. Wealthfront Advisers sends copies of any amendments to the Code
to all Access Persons, who must acknowledge in writing having received the Code and the
amendments. Annually or as otherwise required, each Access Person must confirm to
Wealthfront Advisers that they have complied with the Code during such preceding period.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Persons may personally invest in securities recommended by
Wealthfront Advisers, specifically the ETFs or other investments recommended for each asset
class and individual large and mid-capitalization stocks recommended for advanced forms of
TLH. Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Persons may also buy or sell specific securities for their own
accounts that are not purchased or sold ahead of Clients. Wealthfront Advisers monitors the
securities transactions of all Access Persons to determine whether there have been any improper
use of client trading information by Access Persons. It also requires all Access Persons to report
any violations of the Code promptly to Wealthfront Advisers’ Chief Compliance Officer. The
complete Code of Ethics is available to any client or prospective Client upon request.
Item 12 Brokerage Practices
Wealthfront Advisers places all trade orders for securities transactions on behalf of Client
Accounts solely with Wealthfront Brokerage, with whom Clients must open brokerage accounts
if they are to become Wealthfront Advisers investment advisory clients. Wealthfront Brokerage
currently has reviewed and approved different broker-dealer firms to execute orders for all Client
taxable and IRA account securities transactions, namely the “Approved Brokers.” Wealthfront
Brokerage clears and settles all Client taxable and IRA account trade order securities transactions
with RBC on an omnibus basis, and all costs associated with the clearing and settlement of such
securities transactions are borne by Wealthfront Brokerage. Clients also do not pay any securities
transaction costs (e.g., commissions or SEC fees) for trades executed through the Approved
Brokers, as Wealthfront Brokerage acts as agent for such trades, and the Approved Brokers
execute Client trade orders on a principal or agency basis. Further, Wealthfront Brokerage does
not receive any compensation from the Clients, the Approved Brokers or third parties in
connection with such transactions.
Wealthfront Advisers seeks to ensure that its Client taxable and IRA accounts receive the best
overall execution for securities transactions from the Approved Brokers by continuing to monitor
and review the best execution capability of the Approved Brokers. When assessing the best
execution capability of the Approved Brokers, Wealthfront Advisers will consider the following
factors: execution speed, price improvement versus the national best bid and offer (NBBO) and
overall execution quality among other factors. To the extent that an Approved Broker’s best
execution capability does not appear to meet the quality of best execution on a consistent basis,
Wealthfront Advisers would look to remove and replace such broker from the Approved Broker
list.
Wealthfront Advisers does not engage in any “soft dollar” practices involving the receipt of
research or other brokerage service in connection with Client transactions, nor does Wealthfront
Advisers compensate or otherwise reward any brokers for client referrals. Also, neither
Wealthfront Advisers nor Wealthfront Brokerage accept payment for Clients’ order flow.
Wealthfront Advisers seeks to aggregate orders for Clients when possible based on Clients’
instructions, account type, and timing of Wealthfront Advisers’ investment decisions and
operations. These aggregations may lead to higher volume orders that may result in better
execution prices for these Clients. However, aggregation is not always possible. Consequently,
some transactions of Clients are executed on an individual basis pursuant to a randomized
selection process that seeks to ensure that each Client has generally equal priority over time. If a
Client’s order is not aggregated, then the Client may receive disparate prices from trading at
different times during the day. Additionally, the process of aggregating orders may delay the
execution timing for a particular order. If order execution is delayed, then the Client may also
receive disparate prices from trading at different times during the day.
Wealthfront Advisers places all 529 Account purchase and redemption trade orders with
Wealthfront Brokerage, who in turn must transmit such trade orders exclusively to the 529 plan
recordkeeper.
Item 13 Review of Accounts
Wealthfront Advisers provides all Clients with continuous access via the App and/or the Site
where Clients can access their Account documents, such as account statements, and review their
time-weighted and money-weighted returns. Clients also receive periodic e-mail communications
describing portfolio performance, Account information, and product features.
Wealthfront Advisers software-based investment advisory service assumes a Client’s portfolio
will not stay optimized over time and must be periodically rebalanced back to its target
allocation. Wealthfront Advisers’ software continuously monitors and periodically rebalances
each Client’s portfolio that is fully-discretionary. Wealthfront Advisers also conducts reviews
when Clients make changes to their risk profiles. Wealthfront Advisers considers tax
implications and the volatility associated with each of the chosen asset classes when deciding
when and how to rebalance, however no assurance can be made by Wealthfront Advisers that
Clients will not incur capital gains, and in certain instances significant capital gains, when Client
portfolios are rebalanced periodically. Wealthfront Advisers assumes no responsibility to its
Clients for any tax consequences of any transaction, including any capital gains that may result
from the rebalancing of Client Accounts.
On a periodic basis, Wealthfront Advisers contacts each Client to remind them to review and
update personal profile information they previously provided. Wealthfront Advisers also requests
that Clients reconfirm the same information on an annual basis. These notifications and
confirmations include a link to the Client’s current information and contact information for the
Wealthfront Advisers support team. Currently the Wealthfront Advisers team members whose
tasks include supervising, arranging and responding to these notifications, confirmations and
reviews are the Product Support team.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Investment Committee (the “Committee”), a committee of certain
Wealthfront Advisers officers who are not members of Wealthfront Advisers’ investment
research team, conducts and approves separate reviews related to the securities used for Client
portfolios. The Committee has the authority, if necessary, to remove, add, or replace securities or
other investments from portfolios held at Wealthfront Advisers.
Item 14 Client Referrals and Other Compensation
Wealthfront Advisers expects from time to time to run promotional campaigns to measure
interest and to attract Clients to open Accounts on the Site. These promotions may include, but
are not limited to, referral programs pursuant to which Clients, or third parties, invite non-Clients
to open an account with Wealthfront Advisers. These promotions may also include additional
Account services or products offered on a limited basis to select current and prospective Clients
(including, but not limited to, current or prospective Clients who are employees of the same
company or other current or prospective Clients with common characteristics), such as different
fee arrangement structures, which could include more favorable fee arrangements, a higher
interest rate, cash compensation and/or cash contributions to an Account, reduced or waived
advisory fees for Clients, and/or periodic, flat fees for certain advisory or account services.
These arrangements may create an incentive for a third party or other existing Client to refer
prospective Clients to Wealthfront Advisers, even if the third party would otherwise not make the
referral. These arrangements may also create a conflict of interest for a Client to maintain a
certain level of assets managed through Wealthfront Advisers if doing so would result in
eligibility to receive an incentive, bonus, or additional compensation.
Wealthfront Advisers compensates third parties to create and share advertising materials
regardless of whether an individual funds an Account. Additionally, in certain instances,
Wealthfront Brokerage provides Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients compensation as a promotional
offer to open accounts at Wealthfront Brokerage.
Item 15 Custody
Wealthfront Advisers is deemed to have custody of Client assets due to its affiliation with
Wealthfront Brokerage, which maintains Client funds as a qualified custodian and primarily with
respect to cash that is not held by RBC. Additionally, Forge Trust Co. serves as custodian of
Clients’ IRA Accounts. Wealthfront Advisers provides instructions to Wealthfront Brokerage
regarding the investment of the Client’s assets (see Item 10).
Each Client can access Account documentation, including trade confirmations and/or monthly
account statements, directly from Wealthfront Brokerage by logging into their Client Account.
Each Client should carefully review this information when they are evaluating Account
performance, securities holdings, and transactions. While Wealthfront Advisers reconciles
trading information with Wealthfront Brokerage on a regular basis, a Client may experience
differences in the information displayed on the Site as compared to the Account documentation
due to pending transactions, dividends, interest, corporate actions, cash movements or
withdrawals, or other activity. Only Wealthfront Brokerage’s trading confirmations and
statements represent the official records of a Client’s Account.
Item 16 Investment Discretion
Wealthfront Advisers requires that a Client who decides to retain Wealthfront Advisers as their
investment adviser complete and execute an Advisory Client Agreement. Under the terms of the
Advisory Client Agreement, Wealthfront Advisers assumes either full discretionary or limited
discretionary trading and investment authority over the Client’s assets in accounts held with
Wealthfront Brokerage. For fully-discretionary Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers is given
discretionary authority to select the timing, quantity, and identity of securities to buy and sell for
the Client as well as enter into, amend or terminate contracts relating to the Account.
A Client should understand that subject only to Wealthfront Advisers’ fiduciary duties,
Wealthfront Advisers’ full-discretionary trading and investment authority over the Client’s assets
in an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder, S&P
500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct held at Wealthfront Brokerage means that the timing, quantity,
and identity of securities to buy and sell on behalf of the Client is completely within Wealthfront
Advisers’ discretionary authority. While Wealthfront Advisers seeks to respond to Client
deposits, Client withdrawal requests, including without limitation requests in connection with
terminations, Client changes in risk profiles, Client changes to the portfolio allocation, and other
reasonable Client requests in a timely and reasonable manner, Wealthfront Advisers does not
represent or guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers will respond to any such Client actions or
requests immediately or in accordance with a set time schedule. Further, Wealthfront Advisers is
not responsible to Client for any failures, delays and/or interruptions in the timely or proper
execution of trades or any other trading instructions placed by Wealthfront Advisers on behalf of
Client through Wealthfront Brokerage due to any reason or no reason, including without
limitation any or all of the following, which are likely to happen from time to time: (A) any kind
of interruption of the services provided by Wealthfront Brokerage or its clearing or executing
broker-dealers or Wealthfront Advisers’ ability to communicate with Wealthfront Brokerage or
its clearing or executing broker-dealers (B) hardware or software malfunction, failure or
unavailability; (C) Wealthfront Brokerage system outages; (D) internet service failure or
unavailability; (E) the actions of any governmental, judicial or regulatory body; and/or (F) force
majeure.
For Stock Investing Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers does not have the same trading and
investment authority as other Wealthfront Accounts. The Stock Investing Account, unlike
Wealthfront’s Automated Investing Account, is not a fully discretionary account. The Client
retains general investment discretion over other matters, including the ultimate decision as to
which securities to include in the account. Wealthfront Advisers will not effect transactions in a
Client’s Stock Investing Account without the Client’s consent, except for i) determining the
specific time, price, number of shares, and units or dollar amounts appropriate to effect Client’s
request, ii) trading securities that Wealthfont Advisers or its affiliates no longer support in the
account, or iii) complying with applicable laws, regulations, or court orders. Additional
information about the Advisory Client Agreement can be found in Items 4 and 7 above.
Item 17 Voting Client Securities
Wealthfront Advisers, as a matter of policy and as a fiduciary to our clients, has responsibility for
voting proxies for portfolio securities consistent with the best economic interests of the Clients.
Our firm maintains policies and procedures as to the handling, research, voting, and reporting of
proxy voting and makes appropriate disclosures about our firm’s proxy policies and practices.
Our policy and practice includes the responsibility to monitor corporate actions, receive and vote
client proxies and disclose any potential conflicts of interest as well as making information
available to clients about the voting of proxies for their portfolio securities and maintaining
relevant and required records. Clients may request information regarding how Wealthfront
Advisers voted a Client’s proxies, and Clients may request a copy of the firm's proxy policies
and procedures by emailing support@wealthfront.com. Participants in the Securities Lending
Program should be aware that they do not retain voting rights on any securities that have been
lent. During the period in which a security is on loan, neither the Client nor Wealthfront Advisers
is able to vote proxies for those shares until the securities are returned to the Client’s Account.
Item 18 Financial Information
This Item is not applicable because Wealthfront Advisers does not require or solicit the
prepayment of any advisory fees and does not have any adverse financial condition that is
reasonably likely to impair our ability to continuously meet our contractual commitments to our
Clients.
261 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, California 94301
www.wealthfront.com
Form ADV Part 2B
Client Brochure Supplement
October 6, 2025
This Brochure Supplement provides information about certain Wealthfront Advisers employees
listed below that supplements the Wealthfront Advisers Brochure you should have received
above. Please contact Wealthfront Advisers at 844-995-8437 or support@wealthfront.com if you
did not receive Wealthfront Advisers’ Brochure or if you have any questions about the contents
of this Brochure Supplement.
Wealthfront Advisers’ automated investment advice is managed by software, based on input
provided by a team of supervised persons. This team is led by highly qualified individuals whose
experience and credentials are provided below.
Burton Malkiel, born 1932
Education
BS, Harvard University, 1953
MBA, Harvard University, 1955
Ph.D., Princeton University, 1964
Business Background
Associate, Investment Banking, Smith Barney & Co. 1958 -1960, 1964 - present
Princeton University (now Professor Emeritus) 2012 - present
Chief Investment Officer, Wealthfront Advisers LLC 2012 - present
Chief Investment Officer, AlphaShares, LLC
Disciplinary Information
None
Other Business Activity
Director: Theravance, Inc.; Genmab A/S; Vanguard Europe
Editorial Board Member, Emerging Markets Review and Applied Financial Economics
Supervision
Dr. Malkiel is supervised by David Fortunato.
Alexander Michalka, born 1984
Education
BA, University of California, Berkeley, 2006
MS / Ph.D., Columbia University, 2013
Business Background
2006 –2009 Quantitative Research, The Climate Corporation
2013 – 2019 Vice President, AQR Capital Management
2019 – present Vice President of Research, Wealthfront Advisers LLC
2019 – 2025 Portfolio Manager, Wealthfront Risk Parity Fund
Disciplinary
Information
None
Other Business Activity
None
Supervision
Dr. Michalka is supervised by David Fortunato
Additional Brochure: WRAP BROCHURE OCTOBER 2025 (2025-10-07)
View Document Text
-
261 Hamilton Avenue
Palo Alto, California 94301
www.wealthfront.com
Form ADV Part 2A
Wealthfront Advisers
Client Brochure
October 6, 2025
Item 1 Cover Page
This brochure (“Brochure”) provides information about the qualifications and business
practices of Wealthfront Advisers LLC (“Wealthfront Advisers”), an investment adviser
registered with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”).
Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training but only indicates that
Wealthfront Advisers has registered its business with state and federal regulatory
authorities, including the SEC (our SEC number is 801-69766). The information in this
Brochure has not been approved or verified by the SEC or by any state securities
authority.
If you have any questions about the contents of this Brochure, please contact us at
844-995-8437 or support@wealthfront.com. Additional information about Wealthfront
Advisers is also available on the SEC’s website at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov and on
Wealthfront Advisers’ website, www.wealthfront.com (the “Site”).
Item 2 Material Changes
Since the updating amendment to Wealthfront Advisers’ Form ADV Part 2 brochure on
August 1, 2025, we have updated this Brochure to describe Wealthfront’s Nasdaq-100
Direct (“Nasdaq-100 Direct”), which enables clients to invest directly in the individual
stocks that comprise the Nasdaq-100® index.
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 1 Cover Page
Item 2 Material Changes
Item 3 Table of Contents
Item 4 Advisory Business
Item 5 Fees and Compensation
Item 6 Performance-Based Fees and Side--by--Side Management
Item 7 Types of Clients
Item 8 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk of Loss
Item 9 Disciplinary Information
Item 10 Other Financial Industry Activities and Affiliations
Item 11 Code of Ethics, Participation or Interest in Client Transactions and Personal Trading
Item 12 Brokerage Practices
Item 13 Review of Accounts
Item 14 Client Referrals and Other Compensation
Item 15 Custody
Item 16 Investment Discretion
Item 17 Voting Client Securities
Item 18 Financial Information
Form ADV Part 2B
1
2
3
4
10
12
12
14
28
29
30
30
31
32
33
33
34
34
35
Item 4 Advisory Business
A.
General Description of the Company
Wealthfront Advisers is an automated investment adviser registered with the SEC. Wealthfront
Advisers provides clients with software-based investment advisory and portfolio management
services through the Wealthfront Advisers Program (see also the attached Wealthfront Advisers
Program Brochure). This Program, launched in December 2011, is made available via brokerage
accounts that all clients open at Wealthfront Brokerage LLC (“Wealthfront Brokerage”), a
member of Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”). Wealthfront Advisers became
the successor investment adviser to Wealthfront Inc. effective August 1, 2018. On the same date,
Wealthfront Inc. changed its name to Wealthfront Corporation. Software-based financial
planning tools and services (as described further in Item 4.B below) are provided by Wealthfront
Software LLC (“Wealthfront Software”). Since February 2019, Wealthfront Brokerage has
offered a cash account to Clients (the “Wealthfront Cash Account”), where Wealthfront
Brokerage conveys uninvested cash account funds to depository institutions that accept and
maintain such deposits (“program banks”). Neither Wealthfront Brokerage nor its affiliates are a
bank. The cash balance in a Client’s Wealthfront Cash Account is swept to one or more program
banks, where it earns a variable rate of interest and is eligible for Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation (“FDIC”) insurance while such cash balance awaits investments. FDIC insurance is
not provided, and interest is not earned, until the funds arrive at the program banks. In addition,
Wealthfront Brokerage offers a margin lending product called Portfolio Line of Credit ("PLOC"),
which is offered to Clients who meet the required minimum balance in a taxable investment
account advised by Wealthfront Advisers, in addition to other minimum account thresholds.
Wealthfront Brokerage charges interest on the funds borrowed under a PLOC for the time that
the loan is outstanding although it is not due until the loan is repaid. Wealthfront Advisers offers
a Securities Lending Program , which is available to Clients who meet suitability requirements
based on their financial situation, investment objectives, risk tolerance, and other relevant
information. Wealthfront Advisers, Wealthfront Brokerage, and Wealthfront Software are wholly
owned subsidiaries of Wealthfront Corporation, which is a privately held company headquartered
in Palo Alto, California. As of July 31, 2025, Wealthfront Corporation oversaw, through its
wholly owned subsidiaries Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage, approximately
$88.2 billion in assets for over 1.3 million funded clients. Additional information about
Wealthfront Advisers’ products, structure and directors is provided on Part 1 of Wealthfront
Advisers’ Form ADV which
is available online at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov or at
www.wealthfront.com. We encourage visiting our website www.wealthfront.com for additional
information.
B.
Summary of Investment Advisory Services
Wealthfront Advisers offers an automated investment advisory service that makes it possible for
anyone who enters into a Wealthfront Advisers Advisory Client Agreement (the “Advisory
Client Agreement”), to access state-of-the-art investment advisory and portfolio management
services. As provided in separate Advisory Client Agreements, advisory clients (“Clients”) grant
Wealthfront Advisers either (1) full discretionary authority to manage Client assets; or (2)
limited discretionary authority regarding time, price, number of securities, and units or dollar
amounts in such securities, while Client retains general investment discretion regarding the
specific securities to buy or sell in an Account. Client accounts (“Client Accounts” or
“Accounts”) are opened and maintained at Wealthfront Brokerage (and in the case of the 529
college savings plan, the sponsoring state trust fund account) pursuant to the Wealthfront
Brokerage Customer Brokerage and Custody Agreement (the “Brokerage Agreement”).
Automated Investing Account
Wealthfront Advisers may manage a Client Account on a fully discretionary basis (“Automated
Investing Account”). This means that Wealthfront Advisers is authorized to trade our Clients’
exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) or other investments in an Automated Investing Account to
maintain the Client’s target investment allocation. Wealthfront Advisers utilizes software to
conduct this trading to invest Client assets, fund Client withdrawals, perform rebalancing to
maintain target portfolio allocations, and execute TLH where appropriate. Clients may open an
Automated Investing Account that is either: (1) an individualized taxable account or an
individual retirement account (“IRA”) that allows Clients to choose between portfolios we
recommend and the ability to customize certain of our recommendations; or (2) 529 college
savings account (which consists of an account with the sponsoring state trust fund and a related
brokerage account at Wealthfront Brokerage) (“529 Account”). Our Automated Investing
Account is a diversified, automated portfolio designed to maximize returns for Clients’
individual risk tolerances and other preferences.
Wealthfront Advisers creates an investment plan and manages a Client’s taxable or IRA portfolio
by identifying: 1) optimal asset classes in which to invest, 2) efficient ETFs or other investments
to represent each of those asset classes, and 3) an ideal mix of asset classes based on the Client’s
specific risk tolerance. Clients may also choose to customize our recommendations and make
adjustments to our recommended investment allocations, increasing or decreasing the target
percentage of a particular ETF or investment. Clients can also choose from a list of additional
ETFs or other investments and request specific allocations to each.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers constructs an individual portfolio based on the Client’s
individual risk tolerances that uses up to nine of the 529 plan’s separate municipal fund
securities (each a “MFS”), of which each MFS contains a single underlying ETF. Using the
Client’s risk score, Wealthfront Advisers assigns the Client’s individual portfolio to one out of
20 glide paths, each of which determines how the Client’s individual portfolio’s allocations of
designated portfolios will change over time. Each glide path gradually shifts the asset allocations
of the MFSs in the Client’s individual portfolio to progressively decreasing levels of expected
risk as the beneficiary’s expected matriculation date approaches. The Client’s starting point
along the specific glide path is determined by the beneficiary’s expected time to matriculation.
We do not support Client-customized portfolio allocations for 529 Accounts.
For a taxable Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers offers tax-loss harvesting
(“TLH”) strategies. TLH is a technique designed to help lower your taxes while maintaining the
expected risk and return profile of your portfolio. TLH harvests previously unrecognized
investment losses to offset taxes due on your other gains and income by selling a security at a
loss to accelerate the realization of capital loss and investing the proceeds in a security with
closely correlated risk and return characteristics. The realized loss can be applied to lower your
tax liability and the tax savings can be reinvested to grow the value of your portfolio.
Wealthfront Advisers’ basic TLH harvests tax losses on a Client’s ETFs and individual stocks by
selling those instruments at a loss and replacing it with an alternative ETF that tracks a different,
but highly correlated index to maintain the risk and return characteristics of the Client’s portfolio.
Wealthfront Advisers also offers more advanced versions of TLH—available to Clients with
larger account sizes—that involve allocating a portion of the Client’s portfolio to a range of
individual US stocks, which increases the Client’s opportunity to harvest tax losses. Clients with
taxable accounts that have between $100,000 and $500,000 in assets can choose our US Direct
Indexing product as an enhanced form of TLH that looks for movements in individual stocks to
harvest more tax losses. Instead of using a single ETF or index fund to invest in US stocks, US
Direct Indexing purchases the largest individual stocks in the US equity market (the number of
such individual stocks purchased depends on account size) on a market-weighted basis to
increase the opportunity for TLH presented by the movement of individual stocks. The US Direct
Indexing product also invests in ETFs (referred to in our white paper as “completion ETFs”) to
provide exposure to US equities with smaller capitalizations. Clients with a taxable Automated
Investing Account that have at least $500,000 qualify for our no-fee Smart Beta service, which
serves as an enhancement to our US Direct Indexing product. As noted in Item 7.3, Clients who
signed up for our US Direct Indexing product may specify US stocks they choose to restrict but
may not customize the portfolio allocations in those accounts.
Automated Bond Portfolio
Clients may open an “Automated Bond Portfolio,” which is personalized to a Client’s individual
tax situation, based on their state of residence and stated, taxable income. The Automated Bond
Portfolio is managed on a fully discretionary basis and includes a diversified mix of bond ETFs.
Wealthfront Advisers utilizes software to invest Client funds and dividends, fund Client
withdrawals, perform rebalancing to maintain target portfolio allocations, and execute TLH
where appropriate.
Automated Bond Ladder
Clients may open an “Automated Bond Ladder,” which is a portfolio of US Treasury securities,
including Treasury Bills, Treasury Notes, or Treasury Bonds (collectively, “Treasuries”)
designed to provide a tax-advantaged means of preserving capital and generating yield with an
extremely low risk of principal loss for clients who hold their Treasuries to maturity. The
Automated Bond Ladder also seeks to reduce exposure to interest rate fluctuations. The
Automated Bond Ladder allows clients to configure a “ladder” of Treasuries with a maximum
length that can range from 6 months to 6 years. Wealthfront Advisers manages Automated Bond
Ladders on a fully discretionary basis, utilizing software that seeks to invest in Treasuries that
mature on a monthly basis through the length of the ladder (assuming Treasuries with the
required monthly maturities are available in the market for the entirety of the client’s selected
ladder length). As Treasuries mature or interest is paid, Wealthfront Advisers will automatically
reinvest the proceeds to purchase new Treasuries with later maturity dates in the Client’s ladder
in a way that seeks to maintain as close as possible to equally weighted investment in Treasuries
with monthly maturities through the Client’s desired ladder length.
Stock Investing Account
Clients may open a “Stock Investing Account,” which is a taxable account that allows Clients to
invest in certain exchange-traded securities, including stocks. In a Stock Investing Account,
Clients grant Wealthfront Advisers limited discretion, with Wealthfront Advisers exercising
discretion over the specifics of the transaction, including the time, price, number of shares, and
units or dollar amounts in the transaction. The Client retains general investment discretion over
other matters, including the ultimate decision as to which securities to include in the account.
Upon opening a Stock Investing Account, Clients who do not have an active Wealthfront Cash
Account must open a separate Wealthfront Cash Account.
S&P 500 Direct
Clients may also open Wealthfront’s S&P 500 Direct account, which enables Clients to invest
directly in the individual stocks that comprise the S&PⓇ 500 index, which is a stock market
index that tracks the performance of 500 of the largest publicly traded companies in the US. S&P
500 Direct combines the benefits of index investing with Wealthfront Advisers’ automated TLH,
helping Clients save on taxes while closely tracking the performance of the S&PⓇ 500 index.
Nasdaq-100 Direct
Clients may also open Wealthfront’s Nasdaq-100 Direct account, which enables Clients to invest
directly in the individual stocks that comprise the Nasdaq-100® Index. The Nasdaq-100® Index
is a stock market index that includes 100 of the largest domestic and international non-financial
companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, and spans sectors including technology,
healthcare, communications, and more. The Nasdaq-100 Direct account combines the benefits of
index investing with Wealthfront Advisers’ automated TLH, helping Clients save on taxes while
closely tracking the performance of the Nasdaq-100® index.
Securities Lending Program
Wealthfront Advisers offers Clients the option to participate in its Securities Lending
Program, which provides an opportunity for Clients to earn additional income by lending
securities held in eligible Accounts (taxable Automated Investment Accounts, Automated
Bond Portfolios, Stock Investing Accounts, S&P 500 Direct accounts, and Nasdaq-100
Direct accounts) to Wealthfront Brokerage. Clients may opt in or out of the Securities
Lending Program at any time. Clients who opt in to the Securities Lending Program
(“Participants”) grant Wealthfront Advisers the discretionary authority to lend their fully
paid securities to Wealthfront Brokerage. Wealthfront Brokerage will lend the securities to
unaffiliated third parties, such as broker-dealers, banks, or other financial institutions. These
securities loans are collateralized with cash, in an amount between 102% and 105% of the
market value of the loaned securities and held in a segregated account at JPMorgan Chase
Bank, N.A., for the benefit of Participants, with Wilmington Trust acting as trustee.
Participants receive 50% of what we earn when their shares are lent, which amount will vary
based on market demand, interest rates, and the specific securities lent. Compensation will
be paid on a monthly basis. Participants retain contractual rights to all shares lent to
Wealthfront Brokerage and the ability to opt out of the Securities Lending Program or
withdraw funds at any time. Following such instructions, Wealthfront Advisers will recall
Participants’ shares from Wealthfront Brokerage.
Automated Savings
In addition to investment advisory and portfolio management services, Wealthfront Advisers
offers a service called Automated Savings to Clients, free of charge. Clients may opt into this
service and can stop or restart its use at any time at no cost to them. With Automated Savings,
Wealthfront Advisers monitors a Client’s checking account or Wealthfront Cash Account for
excess cash over the maximum balance set by the Client. If the monitored account has exceeded
the Client’s prescribed maximum balance by at least $100, Wealthfront Advisers will schedule
transfers of the excess cash from the monitored account to one or more of the Client’s
Wealthfront accounts of choice. The Client will receive an email notification when these transfers
have been scheduled and will have 24 hours to cancel the transfers before they occur.
Financial Planning Through Software
In addition to investment advisory and portfolio management services, Wealthfront Advisers,
through its affiliate Wealthfront Software, provides certain software-based financial planning
tools and services (the “Financial Planning Service”) to its Clients. The Financial Planning
Service is a product offered by Wealthfront Software and is made available to Wealthfront
Advisers’ Clients free of charge through a contractual arrangement between Wealthfront
Advisers and Wealthfront Software. The Financial Planning Service allows Clients to explore
potential future financial scenarios, including retirement, college funding and purchasing a home,
and provide recommendations for reaching their financial goals. The Financial Planning Service
allows Clients to link their external financial accounts, including bank, brokerage, retirement,
college savings, loan and credit card accounts and mortgages, in order to eliminate the need for
the traditional financial planner interview that is usually required to acquire the necessary inputs
to build a financial plan.
Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Software do not represent that the Financial Planning
Service is meant to replace a comprehensive evaluation of a Client's entire financial plan
considering all
the Client’s circumstances. Should a Client choose to implement any
recommendation made by the Financial Planning Service, the Client should consult with their tax
advisor regarding the Client’s personal circumstances. Implementation of a financial plan
recommendation is entirely at the Client’s discretion, and currently information Clients enter into
the financial planning model, or obtained by linking other accounts, does not automatically change
their risk scores. Clients can only change their risk scores by changing their personal financial
information through the Wealthfront Advisers’ website (the “Site”) and through the Wealthfront
mobile application (the “App”). While the data from third parties used in the financial models of
the Financial Planning Service is believed to be reliable, Wealthfront Advisers or Wealthfront
Software cannot ensure the accuracy or completeness of data provided by clients or third parties.
C.
Tailored Services and Investment Restrictions
Wealthfront Advisers tailors its software-based investment advisory service to the individual
needs of each of its Clients, in accordance with the portfolio allocation chosen by Clients, and
subject to certain account limitations that prospective investors should consider, as described
further below and in Item 7. Wealthfront Advisers uses its software to determine an investor’s
risk tolerance. Wealthfront Advisers asks each prospective Client a series of questions to evaluate
both the individual’s objective capacity to take risk and subjective willingness to take risk. We
ask subjective risk questions to determine both the level of risk an individual is willing to take
and the consistency among the answers. For example, if an individual is willing to take a lot of
risk in one case and very little in another, then the individual is deemed inconsistent and is
therefore assigned a lower risk tolerance score than the simple weighted average of their
answers. We ask objective questions to estimate with as few questions as possible whether an
individual is likely to have enough money saved at retirement to afford their likely spending
needs. The greater the excess income, the more risk the Client is able to take. As noted in Item
7.3, Clients who signed up for our US Direct Indexing product may specify US stocks they
choose to restrict, but may not customize the portfolio allocations in those accounts.
Customization is also not supported in our Automated Bond Portfolio and Automated Bond
Ladder offerings.
Further, our Automated Investing Account,Automated Bond Portfolio, and Automated Bond
Ladder are subject to Rule 3a-4 of the Investment Company Act of 1940. This means: (1)
Wealthfront Advisers manages each Client’s account based on the Client’s individual financial
situation and investment objectives, which information is obtained at account opening; (2)
Wealthfront Advisers contacts Clients via email on a quarterly basis to request whether there
have been any changes to the Client’s financial situation or objectives; (3) as noted in Item 7.3,
Clients may, at account opening or anytime thereafter, impose reasonable restrictions on how
their Account is managed by customizing our recommended portfolios or by updating their
settings to restrict investments in certain US stocks, (4) Clients may contact Product Support
team members (who are Wealthfront Advisers personnel who are knowledgeable about the
Accounts and their management) to ask questions relating to their Account; (5) Clients receive
monthly statements of all activity in their Account; and (6) Clients retain rights of ownership in
the underlying securities in their accounts.
D. Wealthfront Advisers Program
Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct
Client assets in these types of accounts are managed on a fully discretionary basis as part of the
Wealthfront Advisers Program (see also the attached Wealthfront Advisers Program Brochure).
As such, Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct are professionally managed accounts in which all
expenses, including brokerage commissions (if any), management fees, and administrative costs,
are “wrapped” into a single charge (technically known as a “wrap account”). The Wealthfront
Advisers Program provides Clients with an Automated Investing Account with investment plans,
portfolio management, and necessary brokerage services for one comprehensive fee based on a
percentage of the Clients’ respective account assets. The Wealthfront Advisers Program provides
a Client with an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond
Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct with portfolio management and necessary
brokerage services for one comprehensive fee based on a percentage of the Client’s respective
account assets.
For Clients that use Wealthfront Advisers’ recommended portfolio allocation in an Automated
Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with the Client’s
investment plan, which is designed to seek an investment return suitable for the goals and risk
profile of each distinct Automated Investing Account. For Clients that use Wealthfront Advisers’
Automated Bond Portfolio, Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with a
Client’s portfolio allocation, which is designed to seek yield and is personalized to the Client’s
individual tax situation. For Clients that use our Automated Bond Ladder, Wealthfront Advisers
buys or sells securities consistent with the Client’s selected ladder length.
For Clients that customize our recommended portfolio allocation (not supported in the
Automated Bond Portfolio or the Automated Bond Ladder) in their IRA or taxable account,
Wealthfront Advisers buys or sells securities consistent with a Client’s target portfolio allocation.
Wealthfront Advisers determines when to buy or sell securities by reviewing each Client’s
individual account and Client-provided data. This review includes a number of factors, including
the type of account, goals, overall financial condition, income, assets, risk tolerance, Client
instructions or preferences, state of residence and tax filing status, or other factors unique to the
individual Client’s situation. Wealthfront Advisers manages each of these accounts on an
individualized basis.
Stock Investing Account
In a Stock Investing Account, Clients grant Wealthfront Advisers limited discretion, with
Wealthfront Advisers exercising discretion over the specifics of the transaction, including the
time, price, number of shares, and units or dollar amounts in the transaction. The Client retains
general investment discretion over other matters, including the ultimate decision as to which
securities to include in the portfolio. The wrap account fee does not apply to the Stock Investing
Account. Instead, Wealthfront Brokerage pays Wealthfront Advisers a percentage of the net
interest margin it earns on funds in Clients’ required Wealthfront Cash Accounts. As a result,
Clients pay no out of pocket advisory fees, nor does this reduce the rate of interest clients receive
from cash maintained in their Wealthfront Cash Accounts. Proceeds from the sale of securities
held in a Stock Investing Account are automatically swept to the Client’s Wealthfront Cash
Account.
E.
Discretionary and Non-discretionary Assets
As of August 31, 2025, Wealthfront Advisers manages $41,666,660,509 in client assets on a
fully discretionary basis. As of the same date, Wealthfront Advisers manages $1,282,127,155 in
Client assets in Stock Investing Accounts on a limited discretionary basis. Because Clients retain
general investment discretion in Stock Investing Accounts, we report Stock Investing Accounts
as non-discretionary assets on Item 5.F.(2) of our Form ADV Part 1.
Item 5 Fees and Compensation
A.
Advisory Fees
Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder,
S&P 500 Direct, and Nasdaq-100 Direct
For Clients with either an Automated Investing Account or Automated Bond Portfolio
Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee of
0.25% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with an Automated Bond
Ladder, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.15% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with a S&P 500 Direct
account, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.09% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. For Clients with a Nasdaq-100 Direct
account, Wealthfront Advisers is compensated for its advisory services by charging an annual fee
of 0.12% on the net market value of a Client’s Account. In some cases, Clients can have a portion
of their assets managed for free. There is no fee or charge for participation in the Securities
Lending Program.
Wealthfront Advisers’ fees are charged on a monthly basis and they are not charged in advance.
Fees are charged utilizing the following calculation: Wealthfront Advisers calculates a daily
advisory fee, which is equal to the fee rate multiplied by the net market value of the Client’s
Account as of the close of trading on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) (herein, “close of
markets”) on such day, or as of the close of markets on the immediately preceding trading day for
any day when the NYSE is closed, and then divided by 365 (or 366 in any leap year). The
advisory fee for a calendar month is equal to the total of the daily fees calculated during that
month (less any deductions or fee waivers) and is deducted from an Automated Investing
Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100
Direct no later than the tenth business day of the following month.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers waives its investment advisory fees on the first $25,000
it manages for Nevada residents who open a 529 Account, and this fee waiver applies to the
aggregate of all of the Nevada residents’ Wealthfront Advisers account assets. This advisory fee
is separate from the fees and expenses of the MFSs in which a Client invests in the 529 Account,
which include the fees and expenses of the ETFs underlying such securities, the fees of the 529
Account recordkeeper and the fees of the state trust that issues the MFSs (“Plan Administration
Fees”). Plan Administration Fees may change without prior notice.
Stock Investing Account
Wealthfront Brokerage pays Wealthfront Advisers up to 10% of the net interest margin it earns
on funds in clients’ required Wealthfront Cash Accounts. As a result, clients pay no out of pocket
advisory fees, nor does this reduce the rate of interest clients receive from cash maintained in
their Cash Accounts. Additional information about Wealthfront’s Cash Accounts is available in
the Cash Sweep Program Disclosure. Please see Item 4.D above for additional information on the
advisory fee paid in relation to a Stock Investing Account.
Fee Changes
Wealthfront Advisers reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to negotiate, reduce or waive the
advisory fee for certain Client Accounts for any period of time determined solely by Wealthfront
Advisers. In addition, Wealthfront Advisers may reduce or waive its fees for the Accounts of
some Clients without notice to, or fee adjustment for, other Clients. For Clients who had opened
accounts prior to April 1, 2018, Wealthfront Advisers waived its investment advisory fees for the
first $10,000 of assets in any Wealthfront Advisers investment advisory account(s). However,
this benefit is no longer available for new Clients who opened their initial account on or after
April 1, 2018.
Automated Savings
Wealthfront Advisers offers the free service Automated Savings as described above in Item 4.
Financial Planning Service
Through its affiliate Wealthfront Software, Wealthfront Advisers offers a Financial Planning
Service, as described above in Item 4, to all Clients free of charge.
B.
Product Fees
The issuers of certain investments we purchase for Clients (such as ETFs, investment trusts, or
other investments) may charge Clients separate product fees. Wealthfront Advisers does not
charge these product fees to Clients, nor does it benefit directly or indirectly from any such fees.
Product fees typically include embedded fund expenses that may reduce an investment fund's net
asset value, and therefore directly affect the fund's performance and indirectly affect a Client’s
portfolio performance or an index benchmark comparison. Fund expenses may include
management fees, custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and legal and accounting fees. Fund
expenses may change from time to time at the sole discretion of the fund issuer. Wealthfront
Advisers discloses current information for the investments we purchase for Clients, including
product fees, on the Site.
Clients who use the PLOC offered by Wealthfront Brokerage to obtain a loan secured by the
assets of their taxable Accounts will be charged interest on the outstanding balance.
C.
Other Compensation - Securities Lending Program
In connection with the Securities Lending Program described in Item 4 above, Wealthfront
Brokerage will receive compensation from third-party borrowers in connection with Securities
Lending Program activity, a portion of which will be paid to Sharegain Securities Inc.
(“Sharegain”), a registered broker-dealer, which acts as lending agent to Wealthfront
Brokerage as described in Item 10 below. Participants will receive 50% of the net
compensation generated from lending activities. The remaining 50% is shared between
Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage and, with each receiving 25% of the net
compensation. Compensation will be paid on a monthly basis. Wealthfront Advisers, therefore,
has a financial incentive to approve Participants for the Securities Lending Program. In addition
to sharing the financial incentive to earn compensation along with Participants, Wealthfront
Advisers mitigates this potential conflict by only recommending participation in the Securities
Lending Program to Clients for whom the program is deemed suitable, as discussed in Item 8.
Item 6 Performance-Based Fees and Side--by--Side Management
Wealthfront Advisers does not charge performance-based fees. Clients are only charged an
annual advisory fee as disclosed in Item 5 above.
Item 7 Types of Clients
The minimum amount required to open and maintain an Automated Investing Account, an
Automated Bond Portfolio, or an Automated Bond Ladder with Wealthfront Advisers is $500.
The minimum amount required to open an S&P 500 Direct account or a Nasdaq-100 Direct
account is $5,000. Clients with Stock Investing Accounts must maintain an active Wealthfront
Cash Account.
As a result of the automation associated with offering its services online, Wealthfront Advisers
makes it possible for retail investors, as well as retirement accounts and trusts, to access its
service with much lower account minimums than normally available in the industry. Clients have
access to their Accounts through the Site. Additional requirements for opening an Account with
Wealthfront Advisers are described in Item 4 above.
For Accounts other than IRA accounts or 529 Accounts, Clients, acting as trustees, may open
Accounts on behalf of trusts. As with other accounts, the trustee must be authorized to manage
the Account consistent with the trust’s investment objectives. Such clients should provide
account profile information, including answering the risk questionnaire, in a manner that is
consistent with the trust’s investment objectives, including risk tolerance and tax attributes. If the
trustee has a separate Account (for example, an individual Account, unrelated to the trust) or
intends to open such an Account, the trustee should consider maintaining a separate account
log-in and profile for the trust, using a different email account. This will allow Wealthfront
Advisers to independently manage the trust-held Account pursuant to the trust’s unique profile
and investment objectives.
At any time, a Client may terminate an Account, make partial or full withdrawals from an
Account (provided an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated
Bond Ladder, S&P 500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct balance does not fall below $500), update
their investment profile, or customize our recommended allocation, including adding or
removing specific ETFs or other investments from their designated allocation. These actions may
initiate an adjustment in the Account’s holdings. In such cases, unless otherwise directed by the
Client, for example, in a Stock Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers will sell the securities in
the Account (or portion of the Account, in the case of a partial withdrawal or update) at market
prices in a reasonable and timely manner. However, Wealthfront Advisers does not represent or
guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers will respond to any such Client actions or requests
immediately or in accordance with a set time schedule. See Item 16 for a description of
Wealthfront Advisers’ discretionary investment authority, including the timing of Wealthfront
Advisers’ placement of Client trade orders.
Investors evaluating Wealthfront Advisers’ software-based investment advisory service should
be aware that Wealthfront Advisers’ relationship with Clients is likely to be different from the
“traditional” investment advisory relationship in several aspects:
1. Wealthfront Advisers is a software-based investment adviser which means each Client
must acknowledge their ability and willingness to conduct their relationship with
Wealthfront Advisers on an electronic basis. Under the terms of the Advisory Client
Agreement and the Brokerage Agreement, each Client agrees to receive all Account
information and Account documents (including this Client Brochure and the Wealthfront
Advisers Program Brochure), and any updates or changes to same, through their access to
the Site and Wealthfront Advisers’ electronic communications. Unless noted otherwise on
the Site or within this Brochure, Wealthfront Advisers’ investment advisory service,
Wealthfront Brokerage’s brokerage services, the signature for the Advisory Client
Agreement and the Brokerage Agreement, and all documentation related to the advisory
services are managed electronically. Wealthfront Advisers does make individual
representatives available to discuss servicing matters with Clients.
2. To provide its investment advisory services and tailor its investment recommendations to
each Client’s specific needs, Wealthfront Advisers collects information from each Client,
including specific information about their investing profile such as financial situation,
investment experience, and investment objectives. Wealthfront Advisers maintains this
information in strict confidence subject to its Privacy Policy, which is provided on the
Site. Although Wealthfront Advisers contacts its Clients periodically as described further
in Item 13 below, a Client must promptly notify Wealthfront Advisers of any change in
their financial situation or investment objectives that might require a review or revision of
their portfolio.
3. Clients with an Automated Investing Account can choose a portfolio Wealthfront
Advisers recommends, which includes allocations to preselected ETFs or customize our
recommended portfolios for their IRA or taxable accounts by increasing or decreasing
portfolio allocations to the ETFs or investments in our recommended portfolio or by
choosing from a list of available ETFs or other investments and requesting specific
allocations to each. At account opening or anytime thereafter, Wealthfront Advisers
allows Clients to update their settings to restrict Wealthfront Advisers from investing in
the stocks of public companies designated by the Client.
4. In a Stock Investing Account, Clients may request that Wealthfront Advisers undertake
certain transactions, including the purchase and sale of securities.
Item 8 Methods of Analysis, Investment Strategies and Risk of Loss
A. Modern Portfolio Theory (“MPT”)
For the Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers offers three types of recommended,
diversified, automated portfolios to clients with an IRA or taxable account: Classic portfolios,
Socially Responsible portfolios, and Direct Indexing portfolios. Classic portfolios include
allocations to preselected ETFs designed to provide a tradeoff between risk and long-term,
after-tax, net-of-fee return through a diversified set of global asset classes. Socially Responsible
portfolios are designed to offer similar risk-adjusted returns as our Classic portfolios with a focus
on socially responsible investing (“SRI”). Although SRI does not have a single, agreed-upon
definition, it may be described as an investment strategy that evaluates companies based on their
benefit and/or detriment to society, rather than profits or intrinsic value alone. This concept
comes from an ethical framework called “social responsibility,” in which individuals and
corporations have an obligation to cooperate with others to benefit greater society. Some
investors may take up SRI strategies due to a long-term belief in its investment value, and others
may decide to use this strategy purely due to ethics. Direct Indexing portfolios use our US Direct
Indexing product to replace the ETF that represents the US public equities asset class with
individual securities that comprise up to 1,000 US stocks with the largest market capitalizations
as a way of generating additional tax savings. Direct Indexing portfolios are available in taxable
accounts that have between $100,000 and $500,000. As noted in Item 7.3, Clients’ Direct
Indexing portfolios may specify US stocks they choose to restrict but may not customize the
portfolio allocations in those accounts.
The composition of Classic, Socially Responsible, and Direct Indexing portfolios are based on
Modern Portfolio Theory (“MPT”). MPT attempts to maximize a portfolio’s expected return for
a given amount of portfolio risk, or equivalently minimize risk for a given level of expected
return, by selecting the proportions of various asset classes rather than selecting individual
securities. Historically, rigorous MPT-based financial advice has been available primarily
through certain high-end financial advisors. Wealthfront Advisers’ goal is to enable anyone with
at least $500 to access the benefits of MPT.
Prior to the launch of the Wealthfront Advisers software-based investment advisory service, it
was not practical to offer rigorous and complete MPT to everyone because delivering a complete
solution was too complex. Specifically, the number of calculations required to identify an
optimized asset allocation, the ideal securities to represent each asset class, and an individual’s
true risk tolerance are beyond the scope of free, web-based tools. The job becomes even more
difficult when considering the importance of periodically rebalancing a portfolio to maintain a
desired risk level.
To employ MPT properly, one must start with an accurate determination of an individual’s
objective and subjective tolerance for risk. Achieving accuracy requires sophisticated software
applied to more detailed questions than are typically asked by advisers. Based on this risk
analysis, Wealthfront Advisers seeks to create an individualized investment plan using the
optimal asset classes in which to invest, the most efficient and inexpensive ETFs to represent
each of those asset classes, and the ideal mix of asset classes based on the Client’s specific risk
tolerance. Wealthfront Advisers uses Mean Variance Optimization to rigorously evaluate every
possible combination of the following twelve asset classes: US equities, foreign developed
markets equities, emerging markets equities, dividend growth equities, real estate, natural
resources, treasury inflation protected securities (TIPS), municipal bonds, corporate bonds,
emerging markets bonds, and US government bonds. Mean Variance Optimization uses the
expected return and volatility for each asset class and the covariance among asset classes to find
the combination that delivers the highest possible return for any given standard deviation of a
portfolio’s returns. Wealthfront Advisers, however, must limit the number of asset classes for
very small portfolios.
Wealthfront Advisers periodically reviews the entire population of more than 1,000 ETFs to
identify the most appropriate ETFs to represent each asset class in our recommended portfolios.
We look for ETFs that minimize cost and tracking error and offer market liquidity. Many
investors do not realize that ETFs do not exactly track the indexes they were created to mimic.
Choosing an ETF with a low expense ratio that does not track the asset class recommended by
our service runs the risk of sub-optimizing a Client’s portfolio’s performance. We choose ETFs
that are expected to have sufficient liquidity to allow Client withdrawals at any time. Finally, we
select ETFs that have conservative and shareholder-friendly securities lending policies.
In addition to choosing what we believe to be the best ETFs at the time, we explain in white
papers on our website why we chose each one. We provide a detailed analysis of how the
selected ETF stacked up against the second and third best choice for each asset class on the
dimensions described in the paragraph above.
Wealthfront Advisers continuously monitors our Clients’ portfolios and periodically rebalances
them back to the Clients’ target mix in an effort to optimize returns for the intended level of risk.
Wealthfront Advisers considers tax implications and the volatility associated with each of the
chosen asset classes when deciding when and how to rebalance, however no assurance can be
made by Wealthfront Advisers that Clients will not incur capital gains, and in certain instances
significant capital gains, when Client portfolios are rebalanced periodically. Wealthfront
Advisers assumes no responsibility to its Clients for any tax consequences of any transaction,
including any capital gains that may result from the rebalancing of an Automated Investing
Account and Automated Bond Portfolio.
B.
Long Term, Buy and Hold Investment Philosophy
For Automated Investing Account, Wealthfront Advisers adheres to a long-term, “buy-and-hold”
investment philosophy. While Wealthfront Advisers reserves the right to act otherwise if it feels
that it is in the best interests of its Clients, Wealthfront Advisers does not try to time the market
and in general, Wealthfront Advisers intentionally does not react to market movements in
managing Client Accounts other than through rebalancing and TLH in a taxable Automated
Investing Account. Wealthfront Advisers believes that numerous academic and industry studies
show that “short-term fluctuations in markets, which loom so large to investors, have little to do
with the long-term accumulation of wealth.” J. Siegel, Stocks for the Long Run (1977).
C.
Automated Bond Portfolio
The Automated Bond Portfolio includes allocations to preselected bond ETFs that, based on a
Client’s tax situation (income, state of residence, and tax filing status), are designed to maximize
after-tax yields for Clients. As with Wealthfront’s other portfolios, Wealthfront Advisers selects
optimal ETFs to achieve the portfolio's strategy, and we explain in white papers on our website
the analysis underlying our selections.
D.
Automated Bond Ladder
The Automated Bond Ladder is a portfolio that uses a laddering strategy designed to preserve
capital and generate yield. Wealthfront Advisers seeks to achieve this by investing Client assets
in “rungs” of Treasuries in equal weights and that mature on a monthly basis. This strategy is
designed to produce relatively stable yield at a lower risk for Clients while also reducing
exposure to interest rate fluctuations. Clients may utilize automatic reinvesting to maintain the
Client’s selected ladder length on a rolling basis. Clients may also disable automatic
reinvestment of interest or principal paid at maturity. Additionally, Clients may set a target
withdrawal date, and Wealthfront Advisers will only invest in Treasuries that mature prior to that
date. When all Treasuries have matured, Wealthfront Advisers will transfer the proceeds to the
Client’s Wealthfront Cash Account and close their Automated Bond Ladder Account. Perfectly
equal rungs and/or maturities in every month of a particular ladder may not always be possible,
depending on account size, market conditions, ladder length, and other factors. We provide
further detail about our strategy in white papers on our website.
E.
Tax-Loss Harvesting (“TLH”)
TLH is a technique designed to help appropriately reduce a Client’s taxes while maintaining the
expected risk and return profile of the Client’s portfolio. It harvests previously unrecognized
investment losses to offset taxes due on the Client’s other gains and income by selling a security
at a loss to accelerate the realization of capital loss and investing the proceeds in a security with
closely correlated risk and return characteristics. The realized loss can be applied to reduce the
Client’s tax liability and the tax savings can be reinvested to grow the value of the Client’s
portfolio. Wealthfront Advisers’ basic TLH strategy, which is only applied to ETFs, is available
to all Clients with a taxable Automated Investing Account. TLH is also available to Clients who
customize our recommended Classic or Socially Responsible portfolios as long as their
allocations include eligible ETFs. Eligible ETFs are those for which we have identified an
alternative ETF that tracks a different, but closely correlated index to maintain the risk and return
characteristics of the Client’s portfolio. Advanced versions of TLH—such as Direct Indexing
portfolios and Smart Beta—are available for Clients with larger account sizes and are generally
applied to individual stocks that comprise the domestic equity allocation in their taxable account
portfolios.
F.
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct allows Clients to hold many of the individual stocks that
make up the S&P 500® index and Nasdaq-100® index, respectively and uses Wealthfront’s
automated TLH to turn individual stock declines into tax savings. This strategy enhances
after-tax returns while closely tracking the performance of the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100®
index. S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct are designed for Clients seeking US large-cap
equity exposure and Wealthfront Advisers uses mathematical optimization to balance two
objectives: minimizing tracking error relative to the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index and
maximizing after-tax benefits of harvested losses (“tax alpha”). Tax alpha is achieved by selling
stocks that decline in value to harvest losses, while tracking error is reduced by purchasing
correlated replacement stocks to maintain alignment with the index. Portfolio diversification and
wash-sale avoidance are managed through constraints, including but not limited to limits on
stock weights.
The minimum investment to open an S&P 500 Direct account or a Nasdaq-100 Direct account is
$5,000. These Accounts will attempt to hold all stocks of the 500 or 100 companies in the
corresponding index, but due to TLH, which sells stocks that have decreased in value and
purchases similar stocks which the Account may already hold to replace them, the actual number
of stocks in the portfolio is likely to be less. Generally, the higher the total value of the portfolio,
the more stocks the portfolio will be able to hold in the Account and the closer the Client’s
portfolio can track the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index. This is because, even though we
are able to hold stocks at a fraction of a share, Wealthfront Advisers may choose not to hold
certain stocks if the fraction is extremely small. For example, S&P 500 Direct accounts of
$5,000 may hold roughly 200-300 stocks and Accounts with more than $25,000 will likely hold
more than 400 stocks. For Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, we will likely hold 60-100 stocks on
average. The number of individual stocks held in a S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 account is
generally lower initially, but increases over time with tax-loss harvesting activity and add-on
deposits.
Additionally, if you hold multiple S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, Wealthfront
Advisers will coordinate trades in the Accounts in a manner designed to avoid wash sales. Under
these circumstances, it is possible that our wash sale avoidance may cause harvested losses to be
slightly lower. Our white paper provides additional detail regarding the methodology and
strategy used in S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts.
G. Customized Portfolios
Wealthfront Advisers offers a wider selection of ETFs and other investments to Clients who
choose to customize our Classic or Socially Responsible portfolios in their IRA or taxable
account. These ETFs and other investments may represent additional asset classes beyond the
ones used in our recommended portfolios, or narrower subsets of these asset classes, allowing a
more precise expression of Client investment preferences. We select these additional investments
based on their overall level of risk, liquidity, tracking error to underlying indices (where
applicable), cost of ownership, and popularity.
H. Securities Lending Program
Wealthfront Advisers offers Clients the option to participate in its Securities Lending Program,
which provides Clients the opportunity to earn income by lending their fully paid securities held
in eligible Accounts (taxable Automated Investment Accounts, Automated Bond Portfolios,
Stock Investing Accounts, S&P 500 Direct accounts, and Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts) to
Wealthfront Brokerage, which will lend these securities to third-party borrowers. Participants
receive 50% of what we earn when their shares are lent, which amount will vary based on
market demand, interest rates, and the specific securities lent. Compensation will be paid on a
monthly basis.
Participation in this program is optional and subject to a suitability determination based on the
Client’s investment objectives, risk tolerance, financial profile, and investment experience and
knowledge. While loans are fully collateralized with cash and administered with daily
mark-to-market practices, participation entails certain risks detailed below,
including
counterparty default, loss of voting rights, and potential adverse tax treatment of payments
received in lieu of dividends. Participants retain contractual rights to all shares lent to
Wealthfront Brokerage. Participants may opt out or withdraw funds from eligible Accounts at
any time. Following such instructions, Wealthfront Advisers will recall Participants’ shares from
Wealthfront Brokerage.
I.
Risk Considerations
Wealthfront Advisers cannot guarantee any level of performance or that any Client will avoid a
loss of Account assets. Also, to the extent that Client requests investments other than as
recommended by Wealthfront Advisers, Client understands and agrees that such investments
may be inconsistent with the Client’s investment profile. If Client has not provided sufficient,
timely, or accurate information to Wealthfront Advisers, or if Client chooses not to follow
Wealthfront Advisers’ recommendations and advice, Client’s investments may not achieve
results consistent with Client’s investment profile. Any investment in securities involves the
possibility of financial loss that Clients should be prepared to bear.
When evaluating risk, financial loss may be viewed differently by each Client and may depend
on many different risk items, each of which may affect the probability of adverse consequences
and the magnitude of any potential losses. The following risks may not be all-inclusive, but
should be considered carefully by a prospective Client before retaining Wealthfront Advisers’
services. These risks should be considered as possibilities, with additional regard to their actual
probability of occurring and the effect on a Client if there is in fact an occurrence.
Market Risk – The price of any security or the value of an entire asset class can decline for a
variety of reasons outside of Wealthfront Advisers’ control, including, but not limited to, changes
in the macroeconomic environment, unpredictable market sentiment, forecasted or unforeseen
economic developments, interest rates, regulatory changes, and domestic or foreign political,
demographic, or social events. If a Client has a high allocation in a particular asset class, it may
negatively affect overall performance to the extent that the asset class underperforms relative to
other market assets. Conversely, a low allocation to a particular asset class that outperforms other
asset classes in a particular period will cause that Client Account to underperform relative to the
overall market.
investment advisory service. Wealthfront Advisers and
Advisory Risk – There is no guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers’ judgment or investment
decisions about particular securities or asset classes will necessarily produce the intended results.
It is possible that Clients or Wealthfront Advisers itself may experience computer equipment
failure, loss of internet access, viruses, or other events that may impair access to Wealthfront
Advisers’ software-based
its
representatives are not responsible to any Client for losses unless caused by Wealthfront
Advisers’ breach of its fiduciary duty.
Software Risk – Wealthfront Advisers delivers its investment advisory services entirely through
software. Consequently, Wealthfront Advisers rigorously designs, develops and tests its software
extensively before putting such software into production with actual Client Accounts and assets
and periodically monitors the behaviors of such software after its deployment. Notwithstanding
this rigorous design, development, testing and monitoring, it is possible that such software may
not always perform exactly as intended or as disclosed on the Site, mobile app, blogs or other
Wealthfront Advisers disclosure documents, especially in certain combinations of unusual
circumstances. For example, there may be occasions where a number of Client Accounts may not
experience TLH (even if TLH had been activated for such accounts) or rebalancing back to the
Client’s target asset allocation for extended periods of time, due to certain errors in the
deployment of the software. Wealthfront Advisers continuously strives to monitor, detect and
correct any software that does not perform as expected or as disclosed.
Volatility and Correlation Risk – Wealthfront Advisers’ Security selection process is based in
part on a careful evaluation of past price performance and volatility to evaluate future
probabilities. It is possible that different or unrelated asset classes may exhibit similar price
changes in similar directions which may adversely affect a Client’s account and may become
more acute in times of market upheaval or high volatility. Past performance is no guarantee of
future results, and any historical returns, expected returns, or probability projections may
not reflect actual future performance.
Liquidity and Valuation Risk – High volatility and/or the lack of deep and active liquid
markets for a security may prevent a Client from selling their securities at all, or at an
advantageous time or price because Wealthfront Advisers’ executing broker-dealer may have
difficulty finding a buyer and may be forced to sell at a significant discount to market value.
Some securities (including ETFs) that hold or trade financial instruments may be adversely
affected by liquidity issues as they manage their portfolios. While Wealthfront Advisers values
the securities held in Client Accounts based on reasonably available exchange traded security
data, Wealthfront Advisers may from time to time receive or use inaccurate data, which could
adversely affect security valuations, transaction size for purchases or sales, and/or the resulting
advisory fees paid by a Client to Wealthfront Advisers.
Credit Risk – Wealthfront Advisers cannot control, and Clients are exposed to the risk that,
financial intermediaries or security issuers may experience adverse economic consequences that
may include impaired credit ratings, default, bankruptcy or insolvency, any of which may affect
portfolio values or management. This risk applies to assets held with any broker-dealer,
notwithstanding asset segregation and insurance requirements that are beneficial to broker-dealer
clients generally. In addition, exchange trading venues or trade settlement and clearing
intermediaries could experience adverse events that may temporarily or permanently limit
trading or adversely affect the value of Client securities. Finally, any issuer of securities may
experience a credit event that could impair or erase the value of the issuer’s securities held by a
Client. Wealthfront Advisers seeks to limit credit risk by generally adhering to the purchase of
ETFs, which are subject to regulatory limits on asset segregation and leverage such that fund
shareholders are given liquidation priority versus the fund issuer; however, certain funds and
products, which Wealthfront Advisers generally does not invest in, may involve higher issuer
credit risk because they are not structured as a registered fund.
Legislative and Tax Risk - Performance may directly or indirectly be affected by government
legislation or regulation, which may include, but is not limited to: changes in investment adviser
/ financial advisor or securities trading regulation; change in the US government’s guarantee of
ultimate payment of principal and interest on certain government securities; and changes in the
tax code that could affect interest income, income characterization and/or tax reporting
obligations (particularly for ETF securities dealing in natural resources). Wealthfront Advisers
does not engage in tax planning, and in certain circumstances a Client may incur taxable income
on their investments without a cash distribution to pay the tax due.
Tax-Loss Harvesting Risk - Clients who activate TLH, including Clients with S&P 500 Direct
or Nasdaq-100 Direct, are alerted to the following risks:
● Clients should confer with their personal tax advisor regarding the tax consequences
of investing with Wealthfront Advisers and engaging in TLH, based on their
particular circumstances. Clients and their personal tax advisors are responsible for
how the transactions in the Client’s account are reported to the Internal Revenue Service
(“IRS”) or any other taxing authority. Wealthfront Advisers assumes no responsibility to
you for the tax consequences of any transaction, including any capital gains and/or wash
sales that may result from TLH.
● Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH is not intended as tax advice, and Wealthfront Advisers does
not represent in any manner that the tax consequences described will be obtained or that
Wealthfront Advisers’ investment strategy will result in any particular tax consequence.
The tax consequences of this strategy and other Wealthfront Advisers strategies are
complex and may be subject to challenge by the IRS. This strategy was not developed to
be used by, and it cannot be used by, any investor to avoid penalties or interest.
● When Wealthfront Advisers replaces investments with “similar” investments as part of
TLH, it is a reference to investments that are expected, but are not guaranteed, to perform
similarly and that might reduce a Client’s tax bill while maintaining a similar expected
risk and return on the Client’s portfolio. Expected returns and risk characteristics are
no guarantee of actual performance.
● A Client must notify Wealthfront Advisers of specific stocks in which the Client is
prohibited from investing. If a Client instructs Wealthfront Advisers not to purchase
certain stocks, Wealthfront Advisers will select an alternate stock to purchase on the
Client’s behalf or if Wealthfront Advisers deems no other stock as appropriate, not invest
in an alternate stock. The Client shall notify Wealthfront Advisers immediately if you
consider any investments recommended or made for the Account to violate such
restrictions.
● The performance of the new securities purchased through the TLH may be better or
worse than the performance of the securities that are sold for TLH purposes.
● The effectiveness of TLH to reduce the tax liability of the Client will depend on the
Client’s entire tax and investment profile, including purchases and dispositions in a
Client’s (or Client’s spouse’s) accounts outside of Wealthfront Advisers and type of
investments (e.g., taxable or nontaxable) or holding period (e.g., short-term or long-term).
Clients who customize our recommended portfolios may also influence the effectiveness
of TLH. For example, Clients who allocate significant portions of their portfolio to ETFs
that are not currently supported for TLH may decrease the effectiveness of this service by
reducing the number and/or amount of ETFs from which to harvest losses. Clients with
S&P 500 Direct and/or or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts will experience, in varying
degrees, differences in performance from the performance of the S&P 500® or
Nasdaq-100® indices as a result of TLH in their accounts. The utilization of losses
harvested through the strategy will depend upon the recognition of capital gains in the
same or a future tax period, and in addition may be subject to limitations under applicable
tax laws, e.g., if there are insufficient realized gains in the tax period, the use of harvested
losses is limited to a $3,000 deduction against ordinary income and distributions. Losses
harvested through the strategy that are not utilized in the tax period when recognized
(e.g., because of insufficient capital gains and/or significant capital loss carryforwards),
generally may be carried forward to offset future capital gains, if any. Additionally, if you
have multiple S&P 500 Direct or Nasdaq-100 Direct accounts, given the two indices have
a sizable overlap, Wealthfront Advisers will coordinate trades between these accounts in
a manner designed to avoid creating wash sales. Under these circumstances, losses
captured through tax-loss harvesting may be slightly lower.
● Be aware that if the Client and/or the Client’s spouse have other taxable or non-taxable
investment accounts, and the Client holds in those accounts any of the securities
(including options contracts) held in the Client’s account at Wealthfront Advisers, the
Client cannot trade any of those securities 30 days before or after Wealthfront Advisers
trades those same securities as part of TLH to avoid possible wash sales and, as a result, a
nullification of any tax benefits of the strategy. For more information on the wash sale
rule, please read IRS Publication 550.
● Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH is designed to avoid creating “wash sales” in Clients’
accounts with Wealthfront Advisers. Clients, however, are responsible for monitoring
their accounts outside of Wealthfront Advisers to ensure that transactions in the same
security or a substantially identical security do not create a wash sale. A wash sale occurs
when a taxpayer sells a security at a loss and then purchases the same security or a
substantially identical security over a period of 61 days: the day of the sale, the 30 days
before the sale, and the 30 days after the sale. If a wash sale occurs, the IRS may not
allow the loss for current tax reporting purposes. Wash sales can occur even if the
securities are sold and then bought in different accounts. Therefore Wealthfront Advisers
may lack visibility to certain wash sales, should they occur as a result of transactions in
external or unlinked accounts. Under those circumstances, Wealthfront Advisers may not
be able to provide notice of such wash sale in advance of the Client's receipt of the IRS
Form 1099. Further, if a Client opens multiple Accounts using different login information
(for example, the Client uses different email addresses across multiple Accounts),
Wealthfront Advisers may not be able to prevent wash sales between those Accounts.
Conversely, if a Client uses the same login information for an individual Account and a
trust-held Account, as described above, Wealthfront Adviser will manage both Accounts
pursuant to the single investment profile for that account. This includes investment
objectives, risk tolerance, and tax attributes. Clients should be aware that under such
circumstances Wealthfront Advisers will seek to avoid wash sales in one or more
Accounts maintained under the client’s investment profile.
● Except as set forth below, Wealthfront Advisers will monitor only a Client’s accounts at
Wealthfront Advisers to determine if there are unrealized losses for purposes of
determining whether to harvest such losses. Transactions outside of accounts at
Wealthfront Advisers may affect whether a loss is successfully harvested and, if so,
whether that loss is usable by the Client in the most efficient manner.
● Under certain circumstances, there is a chance that Wealthfront Advisers trading
attributed to TLH may create capital gains and/or wash sales. In addition, TLH may
produce losses which may not be offset by sufficient gains in the account.
● From time to time, in order to mitigate wash sales risk, a Client’s IRA Account might
invest in a so-called “secondary” ETF (as identified in Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH white
paper) rather than a so-called “primary” ETF identified in such white paper or in the
Client’s plan.
● Not all the losses may be used to offset gains in the year they were recognized due to
wash sales. Thus, wash sales can diminish the effectiveness of TLH by deferring to a
future year a tax loss that could have been used to offset income or capital gains in the
current year.
● Frequent deposits in an Account (such as deposits that are less than 30 days apart) tend to
create multiple orders for the same stocks. In order to avoid wash sales, Wealthfront
Advisers will avoid harvesting losses in those stocks for the short-term. Thus, the amount
of losses captured through TLH will likely be lower, especially if the deposit size is a
significant percentage of the Client’s Account size before deposit.
Potentially High Levels of Trading Risk - Certain situations, such as the simultaneous receipt
of a high volume of Client deposits or withdrawal requests, can lead Wealthfront Advisers to
engage in high levels of trading. High levels of trading could result in (a) bid-ask spread
expense; (b) trade executions that may occur at prices beyond the bid-ask spread (if quantity
demanded exceeds quantity available at the bid or ask); (c) trading that may adversely move
prices, such that subsequent transactions occur at worse prices; (d) trading that may disqualify
some dividends from qualified dividend treatment; unfulfilled orders or portfolio drift, in the
event that markets are disorderly or trading halts altogether; and (f) unforeseen trading errors.
Foreign Investing and Emerging Markets Risk - Foreign investing involves risks not typically
associated with US investments, and the risks may be exacerbated further in emerging market
countries. These risks may include, among others, adverse fluctuations in foreign currency
values, as well as adverse political, social and economic developments affecting one or more
foreign countries. In addition, foreign investing may involve less publicly available information
and more volatile or less liquid securities markets, particularly in markets that trade a small
number of securities, have unstable governments, or involve limited industry. Investments in
foreign countries could be affected by factors not present in the US, such as restrictions on
receiving the investment proceeds from a foreign country, foreign tax laws or tax withholding
requirements, unique trade clearance or settlement procedures, and potential difficulties in
enforcing contractual obligations or other legal rules that jeopardize shareholder protection.
Foreign accounting may be less transparent than US accounting practices and foreign regulation
may be inadequate or irregular.
ETF Risks, including Net Asset Valuations and Tracking Error - ETF performance may not
exactly match the performance of the index or market benchmark that the ETF is designed to
track because 1) the ETF will incur expenses and transaction costs not incurred by any applicable
index or market benchmark; 2) certain securities comprising the index or market benchmark
tracked by the ETF may, from time to time, temporarily be unavailable; and 3) supply and
demand in the market for either the ETF and/or for the securities held by the ETF may cause the
ETF shares to trade at a premium or discount to the actual net asset value of the securities owned
by the ETF. Certain ETF strategies may from time to time include the purchase of fixed income,
commodities, foreign securities, American Depositary Receipts, or other securities for which
expenses and commission rates could be higher than normally charged for exchange traded
equity securities, and for which market quotations or valuation may be limited or inaccurate.
Clients should be aware that to the extent they invest in ETF securities they will pay two levels
of advisory compensation – advisory fees charged by Wealthfront Advisers plus any
management fees charged by the issuer of the ETF. This scenario may cause a higher advisory
cost (and potentially lower investment returns) than if a Client purchased the ETF directly.
An ETF typically includes embedded expenses that may reduce the fund's net asset value, and
therefore directly affect the fund's performance and indirectly affect a Client’s portfolio
performance or an index benchmark comparison. Expenses of the fund may include ETF
management fees, custodian fees, brokerage commissions, and legal and accounting fees. ETF
expenses may change from time to time at the sole discretion of the ETF issuer. Wealthfront
Advisers discloses each ETF’s current information, including expenses, on the Site. ETF tracking
error and expenses may vary.
S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct Risk - S&P 500 Direct and Nasdaq-100 Direct
accounts aim to closely track the S&P 500® index or Nasdaq-100® index, but several factors
will cause deviations in performance, which may be called “tracking difference.” For instance,
TLH involves selling stocks at a loss and replacing them with similar investments to maintain
portfolio correlation with the index. However, these trades may lead to slight variations in stock
weights, potentially impacting portfolio performance. Additionally, portfolios are unlikely to
hold all 500 stocks in the S&P 500® index or 100 stocks in the Nasdaq-100® index due to
minimum investment constraints, resulting in a less precise replication of the index’s
composition.
Stock exclusions also contribute to tracking difference. When Clients instruct Wealthfront
Advisers to restrict specific stocks from trading, Wealthfront Advisers will substitute those
stocks with other stocks, which may not fully replicate the restricted stocks' impact on the index.
Over time, such exclusions may lead to greater performance differences between the Client’s
portfolio and the S&P 500® or Nasdaq-100® indices. Although Wealthfront Advisers uses
mathematical optimization to minimize tracking difference, short-term market fluctuations and
index changes can amplify these variances.
While tracking difference may occasionally cause underperformance relative to the index, they
are generally expected to balance out over the long term. Clients should be prepared for potential
deviations in pre-tax returns and understand that Wealthfront does not guarantee perfect
alignment with the S&P 500® or Nasdaq-100® indices.
Socially Responsible Investing Risk - Clients who select Wealthfront Advisers’ Socially
Responsible portfolio or who customize their portfolio to include SRI investments may choose
such investments based on their benefit and/or detriment to society, rather than profits or intrinsic
value alone. This may result in lower returns for the Client compared to a Classic or Direct
Indexing portfolio. This may also reduce a Client Account’s exposure to certain sectors or types
of investments, which could negatively impact the Client Account’s performance. Additionally, a
Client may disagree with the SRI classification of an issuer by our data provider. SRI norms
differ by region, and an issuer’s practices may change over time. Accordingly, if an investment
no longer meets the criteria for SRI, Wealthfront Advisers may be required to sell the investment
at a disadvantageous price or time.
Exposure to Digital Assets through Statutory Trusts - Wealthfront Advisers offers long-term
exposure to digital assets through investments in certain statutory trusts. The term digital asset
refers to an asset that is issued and/or transferred using distributed ledger or blockchain
technology, including, but not limited to, so-called “virtual currencies,” “coins,” and “tokens.”
Although Wealthfront Advisers does not offer direct investment in digital assets, Clients opting
to customize their portfolios may include an allocation of up to 10% of their total portfolio value
to statutory trusts that hold digital assets (“Digital Assets Trusts”).
Unlike ETFs, Digital Assets Trusts may lack efficient creation and redemption mechanisms. As a
result, the price of Digital Assets Trusts can differ significantly from the value of the underlying
digital assets. Further, because of the nature of underlying digital assets and their markets,
investments in Digital Assets Trusts (and cryptocurrencies themselves) may be significantly
more volatile than most securities-based ETFs, and are not suitable for all investors. Digital
Assets Trusts may be significantly riskier than investments in more traditional assets like stocks,
bonds, mutual funds, or ETFs. The price history of a Digital Assets Trust may not be reflective of
its future price potential, and digital asset investors should be able to withstand significant if not
complete loss of invested capital.
Inflation, Currency, and Interest Rate Risks - Security prices and portfolio returns will likely
vary in response to changes in inflation and interest rates. Inflation causes the value of future
dollars to be worth less and may reduce the purchasing power of an investor’s future interest
payments and principal. Inflation also generally leads to higher interest rates, which in turn may
cause the value of many types of fixed income investments to decline. In addition, the relative
value of the US dollar-denominated assets primarily managed by Wealthfront Advisers may be
affected by the risk that currency devaluations affect Client purchasing power.
Risks Relating to Investment in a Concentrated Number of Securities or to Investment in
Only One Industry Sector (or in Only a Few Sectors) - When strategies invest in a
concentrated number of securities, a decline in the value of these securities would cause your
overall account value to decline to a greater degree than that of a less concentrated portfolio.
Strategies that invest a large percentage of assets in only one industry sector (or in only a few
sectors) are more vulnerable to price fluctuation than strategies that diversify among a broad
range of sectors.
Automated Bond Ladder Risks - A bond ladder, depending on the length and amount of
securities within the ladder, may not ensure adequate diversification of your investment portfolio.
Compared to other fixed income strategies, a bond ladder strategy may potentially result in future
reinvestment at lower interest rates, which may require higher minimum investments to maintain
cost-effectiveness.
Investment value will fluctuate, and Treasuries, if sold before maturity, may be worth more or
less than original cost. Fixed income securities are subject to various other risks including
changes in interest rates and credit quality, market valuations, liquidity, prepayments, early
redemption, corporate events, tax ramifications, and other factors.
Although Treasuries in Automated Bond Ladders are backed by the full faith and credit of the
United States, circumstances could arise that could prevent the timely payment of interest or
principal, such as reaching a legislative “debt ceiling.” Such non-payment may result in payment
delays or losses to the Client. Certain Treasuries can be less liquid than other investments.
Partial or Fractional Shares - Wealthront does not currently support ownership of fractional
shares for an Automated Investing Account, or Automated Bond Portfolio. Without fractional
shares, it may be more difficult to achieve a diversified portfolio because the price of a single
share of a given security may be high and may deplete the budget available to build a diversified
portfolio. At the same time, without fractional shares, Clients may hold more cash than may be
advisable because of the high price of buying a whole share of a given security.
College Savings Account Risks - 529 Accounts are subject to various risks, including but not
limited to:
Special Nature of Plan Interests - The Client and the Client’s beneficiary do not have
access or rights to any assets of the state sponsoring our 529 Plan or any assets of the
state trust of the Section 529 college savings plan (a “Plan”) other than the assets credited
to the Client’s account for that beneficiary. The 529 Account is an investment vehicle.
529 Accounts are subject to certain risks including: (i) the possibility that the Client may
lose money over short or even long periods of time; (ii) the risk of changes in applicable
federal and state tax laws and regulations; (iii) the risk of Plan changes including changes
in fees and expenses; and (iv) the risk that contributions to the 529 Account may
adversely affect the eligibility of the beneficiary or the Client for financial aid or other
benefits. Some MFSs in a Client’s 529 Account carry more and/or different risks than
others. Clients should weigh such risks with the understanding that they could arise at
any time during the life of the Client’s account.
Municipal Fund Securities - When the Client contributes to the 529 Account, the Client’s
money will be invested in MFSs. An investment in the Client’s 529 Account is not a bank
deposit. None of the Client’s account, the principal the Client invests, nor any investment
return is insured or guaranteed by (i) any state or any state agencies, instrumentalities or
funds, (ii) any officer, official, staff member of any state, (iii) any Plan or any program
manager of any such Plan, (iv) any board of any state trust issuing MFSs for a Plan (a
“Board”), (v) any such state trust (as “State Trust”), (vi) Wealthfront Advisers, (vii) each
of their respective affiliates, officials, officers, directors, employees and representatives,
(viii) the federal government, (ix) the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”),
or (x) any other governmental agency. Investment returns will vary depending upon the
performance of the designated portfolios in the Client’s account. A Client could lose all
or a portion of the Client’s investment.\
Relatively Short Investment Time Horizon - Relative to investing for retirement, the
holding period for college savings investors is very short (e.g., 10 years versus 60 years).
Also, the need for liquidity during the withdrawal phase (to pay for qualified higher
education expenses) generally is very important. Clients should strongly consider the
level of risk they wish to assume when completing the risk questionnaire upon account
opening.
Limited Investment Direction - Clients may not direct the underlying investments in their
529 Account. The ongoing money management is the responsibility of Wealthfront
Advisers. The only manner in which Clients can affect the money management is to
change their risk score, which is limited to two times per year, or upon the change of the
beneficiary. Once the permitted two per calendar year risk score changes are made in the
Client’s account, a subsequent risk score change in the Client’s account within the same
calendar year will not be processed. The choice of the underlying investments of the
MFSs is subject to the approval of the Board. Automatic investment exchanges that occur
as the Client’s assets move through the glide path do not count towards the Client’s twice
per calendar year investment exchange limit.
Liquidity Risk - Investments in a Plan are considered less liquid than other types of
investments (e.g., investments in mutual fund shares) because the circumstances in which
a Client may withdraw money from a Plan account without a penalty or adverse tax
consequences are significantly more limited.
Potential Changes to the Plan – Boards generally reserve the right, in their sole
discretion, to discontinue the Plan or to change any aspect of the Plan. For example, the
Board may change the Plan’s fees and expenses; add, subtract, or merge the MFSs; close
a MFS to new investors; or change the program manager or the underlying investment(s)
of a MFS. Depending on the nature of the change, a Client may be required to, or
prohibited from, participating in the change with respect to accounts established before
the change. A particular program manager may not necessarily continue as the Plan’s
program manager, and Wealthfront Advisers may not necessarily continue as investment
adviser and distributor to a Plan (although Wealthfront Advisers will continue as the
Client’s investment adviser until either Wealthfront Advisers or the Client terminates that
investment advisory relationship).
Changes to a Plan may or may not be beneficial to Clients. The Board may terminate the
Plan by giving written notice to the Client, but even if the Board terminates the Plan, the
Client and the Client’s beneficiary’s rights to the Client’s account assets will be
unaffected. An MFS may be temporarily uninvested during a transition from one
investment underlying an MFS to another underlying investment. The transaction costs
associated with any liquidation, as well as any market impact on the value of the
securities being liquidated, will be borne by the MFS which ultimately may impact the
individual portfolios holding that MFS.
Status of Federal and State Law and Regulations Governing a Plan - Federal and state
law and regulations governing the administration of Plans could change in the future. In
addition, federal and state laws on related matters, such as the funding of higher
education expenses, treatment of financial aid, and tax matters are subject to frequent
change. It is unknown what effect these kinds of changes could have on a 529 Account.
Clients should also consider the potential impact of any other state laws on their account.
Clients should consult their tax advisor for more information.
Eligibility for Financial Aid - The treatment of 529 Account assets may have an adverse
effect on the beneficiary’s eligibility to receive assistance under various federal, state,
and institutional financial aid programs.
No Guarantee That Investments Will Cover Qualified Higher Education Expenses;
Inflation and Qualified Higher Education Expenses - There is no guarantee that the
money in a Client’s 529 Account will be sufficient to cover all of a beneficiary’s
qualified higher education expenses, even if contributions are made in the maximum
allowable amount for the beneficiary. The future rate of increase in qualified higher
education expenses is uncertain and could exceed the rate of investment return earned by
a Plan account over any relevant period of time.
Investors in any Plan should read the Plan’s offering documents and any related
participation agreement carefully before investing or sending money. For more
information on risks related to 529 Accounts, see the "Plan Risks" section of the
Wealthfront 529 College Savings Plan Description and Participation Agreement.
Portfolio Line of Credit - Qualified clients who choose to use Wealthfront Brokerage’s PLOC
are alerted to the following risks:
● PLOC is a margin loan product offered by Wealthfront Brokerage exclusively to Clients
of Wealthfront Advisers with a fully discretionary, taxable account by Wealthfront
Advisers and who meet other minimum account thresholds. Clients should review the
risks listed below and in Wealthfront Brokerage’s Margin Handbook, and consider them
before borrowing. For the purposes of this document, Client Accounts utilizing the PLOC
may be referred to as “margin accounts.”
● Clients who utilize margin loans can lose more funds than are held in their margin
accounts. In addition, a decline in the value of the securities in margin accounts may
require such Clients to provide Wealthfront Brokerage with additional funds to avoid the
forced sale of securities or other securities or assets in their margin accounts. This is
called a “margin call.”
● Wealthfront Brokerage can issue a margin call and force the sale of securities in Client
margin accounts if the equity in a Client margin account falls below the minimum
requirement described in our Margin Handbook. Wealthfront Brokerage can sell the
securities in any of the Client’s margin accounts held with Wealthfront Brokerage to
cover the margin deficiency. Clients also will be responsible for any shortfall in the
margin account after such a sale.
● Wealthfront Brokerage notifies Clients whose portfolio balances approach our minimum
margin requirement well before a margin call is likely to happen even though such notice
is not strictly required. Unless such Clients pay back their loan or a portion of it,
Wealthfront Brokerage can sell Client securities in margin accounts without further
contacting the Client if the margin account falls below our minimum margin requirement.
Even if Wealthfront Brokerage has contacted a Client and provided a specific date by
which the Client can meet a margin call, Wealthfront Brokerage can still take necessary
steps to protect its financial interests, including immediately selling the securities without
notice to the Client.
● In the event it is necessary to sell securities to meet minimum margin requirements,
Wealthfront Advisers will automatically liquidate securities to cover the minimum
margin requirements while also maintaining appropriate asset allocations in the Client’s
portfolio. Clients are not entitled to choose which securities in their account(s) are
liquidated or sold to meet a margin call.
● Wealthfront Brokerage can increase its minimum margin requirements at any time and is
not required to provide advance written notice to Clients. These changes in Wealthfront
Brokerage’s policy often take effect immediately and may result in the issuance of a
maintenance margin call. A Client failure to satisfy the call will cause Wealthfront
Brokerage to liquidate or sell securities in Client margin accounts.
● Clients are not entitled to an extension of time on a margin call. While an extension of
time to meet margin requirements may be available to a Client under certain conditions, a
Client does not have a right to the extension.
Securities Lending Program - Participation in the Securities Lending Program involves risks
that Participants should carefully consider. Loaned securities are not covered by Securities
Investor Protection Corporation (“SIPC”) protections once transferred from the Participant’s
account, meaning that in the event of a default by Wealthfront Brokerage or a third-party
borrower, recourse may be limited to the cash collateral pledged for the loans. Wealthfront
Brokerage will maintain collateral at levels ranging from 102% to 105% of the value of the
loaned securities. The value of securities on loan will be monitored daily, and collateral will be
adjusted accordingly. Fluctuations in market value and the timing of payments to maintain
collateral, however, may impact the adequacy of collateral. Participants will not have voting
rights on loaned securities. Participants will receive cash payments in lieu of dividends, which are
subject to different (generally less favorable) tax treatment than qualified dividends, and
Wealthfront Advisers will not compensate Participants for any increased tax liability resulting
from this different treatment. Additionally, loaned securities may be used by third-party
borrowers to facilitate short selling, which may make Clients’ lent securities “hard-to-borrow” or
be used to satisfy delivery requirements resulting from short sales, which could put downward
pressure on the price of those securities. Wealthfront Advisers does not guarantee the return of
loaned securities or uninterrupted participation in the Program. Participants should consult a tax
advisor to evaluate the tax implications of participating in the Program, as tax treatment may vary
depending on individual circumstances.
Item 9 Disciplinary Information
On December 21, 2018, Wealthfront Advisers reached a settlement with the Securities and
Exchange Commission. The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers improperly
retweeted certain clients’ positive tweets from its corporate account and compensated certain
bloggers for client referrals without proper disclosures. Additionally, the settlement order found
that Wealthfront Advisers did not have proper disclosures in its TLH white paper concerning
monitoring for any and all wash sales that could occur in client accounts. A wash sale prevents the
tax benefit of having sold the asset to realize a loss. Thus, a wash sale can diminish the
effectiveness of TLH by deferring to a future year a tax loss that could have been used to offset
income or capital gains in the current year. In Wealthfront’s TLH program, wash sales could occur,
or were permitted, in certain circumstances relating to the management of a client account such as
rebalancing a client portfolio or client directed transactions. The SEC order noted that a significant
percentage of client accounts enrolled in Wealthfront Advisers’ TLH strategy experienced wash
sales in the period from October 2012 to May 2016 and that wash sales represented approximately
2.3% of tax losses harvested for clients in the period from January 2014 to December 2016.
The settlement order found that Wealthfront Advisers violated the antifraud, advertising,
compliance, and other provisions of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. Without admitting or
denying the SEC’s findings, Wealthfront Advisers consented to the entry of the SEC’s order
censuring it, requiring it to cease and desist from further violations, and imposing a $250,000
penalty.
Item 10 Other Financial Industry Activities and Affiliations
Wealthfront Advisers uses its affiliate, Wealthfront Brokerage, to effect transactions on behalf of
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients for non-529 Accounts. Wealthfront Brokerage is both a carrying
and introducing broker registered with the FINRA and the SEC, whose sole purpose is to service
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients and carry non-529 Accounts that Wealthfront Advisers manages
pursuant to fully discretionary and limited discretionary authority granted to Wealthfront
Advisers by its Clients. For Accounts other than 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Brokerage, as a
broker-dealer, has entered into an omnibus clearing agreement with RBC Clearing & Custody
(“RBC,” or “Clearing Broker”). Wealthfront Brokerage instructs the Clearing Broker on behalf
of Wealthfront Advisers to clear and settle Wealthfront Advisers Client transactions on an
omnibus basis for Client securities orders that Wealthfront Brokerage currently places with either
Citadel LLC, Virtu Financial, GTS Securities LLC, RBC, or Tradeweb LLC (the “Approved
Brokers”). The Clearing Broker also has omnibus custody of Client cash balances and securities
positions.
For 529 Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers uses Wealthfront Brokerage to effect Plan MFS
transactions on behalf of Clients by placing purchase and redemption orders with the Plan
recordkeepers and by holding funds pending their investment in Plan MFSs and holding
proceeds of redemptions of Plan MFSs pending disbursement per Client instructions. 529
Accounts are carried by Ascensus College Savings Recordkeeping Services, LLC (“Ascensus”),
which has a custodial arrangement with the Bank of New York Mellon Corporation.
For Securities Lending activity, securities held in Participant accounts may be loaned to
Wealthfront Brokerage. Wealthfront Brokerage has engaged Sharegain to act as lending
agent. Sharegain provides infrastructure to facilitate the lending of securities to third-party
borrowers and supports program operations including borrower onboarding. This support
includes assistance with Wealthfront Brokerage’s screening and approving eligible
third-party borrowers, loan matching, and collateral management. Wealthfront Brokerage
supervises all third-party borrower due diligence and lending activity conducted through
Sharegain’s platform. Cash collateral received from third-party borrowers is transferred to
and maintained in a segregated account at JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. for the benefit of
Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients, with Wilmington Trust, National Association, acting as
trustee. Wealthfront Advisers and Wealthfront Brokerage receive a portion of the
compensation generated from securities lending, and Sharegain is compensated pursuant to a
separate agreement with Wealthfront Brokerage.
Wealthfront Brokerage also exclusively offers its PLOC to eligible Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients
who meet certain minimum account thresholds.
Item 11 Code of Ethics, Participation or Interest in Client Transactions and Personal Trading
Wealthfront Advisers’ paramount ethical, professional, and legal duty is to act at all times as a
fiduciary to its Clients. This means that Wealthfront Advisers puts the interests of its Clients
ahead of its own, and carefully manages for any perceived or actual conflict of interest that may
arise in relation to its advisory services. Wealthfront Advisers has adopted a Code of Ethics,
which is designed to ensure that we meet our fiduciary obligation to Clients, enhance our culture
of compliance within the firm, and detect and prevent any violations of securities laws.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Code of Ethics (the “Code”) establishes standards of conduct for all
Wealthfront Advisers’ employees, including all officers, directors, employees, certain contractors
and others (“Access Persons”), and is consistent with the code of ethics requirements of Rule
204A-1 under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, as amended. The Code includes general
requirements that all Access Persons comply with their fiduciary obligations to Clients and
applicable securities laws, and specific requirements relating to, among other things, personal
trading, insider trading, conflicts of interest, and confidentiality of client information.
Each new Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Person receives a copy of the Code after obtaining
access to company systems. Wealthfront Advisers sends copies of any amendments to the Code
to all Access Persons, who must acknowledge in writing having received the Code and the
amendments. Annually or as otherwise required, each Access Person must confirm to
Wealthfront Advisers that they have complied with the Code during such preceding period.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Persons may personally invest in securities recommended by
Wealthfront Advisers, specifically the ETFs or other investments recommended for each asset
class and individual large and mid-capitalization stocks recommended for advanced forms of
TLH. Wealthfront Advisers’ Access Persons may also buy or sell specific securities for their own
accounts that are not purchased or sold ahead of Clients. Wealthfront Advisers monitors the
securities transactions of all Access Persons to determine whether there have been any improper
use of client trading information by Access Persons. It also requires all Access Persons to report
any violations of the Code promptly to Wealthfront Advisers’ Chief Compliance Officer. The
complete Code of Ethics is available to any client or prospective Client upon request.
Item 12 Brokerage Practices
Wealthfront Advisers places all trade orders for securities transactions on behalf of Client
Accounts solely with Wealthfront Brokerage, with whom Clients must open brokerage accounts
if they are to become Wealthfront Advisers investment advisory clients. Wealthfront Brokerage
currently has reviewed and approved different broker-dealer firms to execute orders for all Client
taxable and IRA account securities transactions, namely the “Approved Brokers.” Wealthfront
Brokerage clears and settles all Client taxable and IRA account trade order securities transactions
with RBC on an omnibus basis, and all costs associated with the clearing and settlement of such
securities transactions are borne by Wealthfront Brokerage. Clients also do not pay any securities
transaction costs (e.g., commissions or SEC fees) for trades executed through the Approved
Brokers, as Wealthfront Brokerage acts as agent for such trades, and the Approved Brokers
execute Client trade orders on a principal or agency basis. Further, Wealthfront Brokerage does
not receive any compensation from the Clients, the Approved Brokers or third parties in
connection with such transactions.
Wealthfront Advisers seeks to ensure that its Client taxable and IRA accounts receive the best
overall execution for securities transactions from the Approved Brokers by continuing to monitor
and review the best execution capability of the Approved Brokers. When assessing the best
execution capability of the Approved Brokers, Wealthfront Advisers will consider the following
factors: execution speed, price improvement versus the national best bid and offer (NBBO) and
overall execution quality among other factors. To the extent that an Approved Broker’s best
execution capability does not appear to meet the quality of best execution on a consistent basis,
Wealthfront Advisers would look to remove and replace such broker from the Approved Broker
list.
Wealthfront Advisers does not engage in any “soft dollar” practices involving the receipt of
research or other brokerage service in connection with Client transactions, nor does Wealthfront
Advisers compensate or otherwise reward any brokers for client referrals. Also, neither
Wealthfront Advisers nor Wealthfront Brokerage accept payment for Clients’ order flow.
Wealthfront Advisers seeks to aggregate orders for Clients when possible based on Clients’
instructions, account type, and timing of Wealthfront Advisers’ investment decisions and
operations. These aggregations may lead to higher volume orders that may result in better
execution prices for these Clients. However, aggregation is not always possible. Consequently,
some transactions of Clients are executed on an individual basis pursuant to a randomized
selection process that seeks to ensure that each Client has generally equal priority over time. If a
Client’s order is not aggregated, then the Client may receive disparate prices from trading at
different times during the day. Additionally, the process of aggregating orders may delay the
execution timing for a particular order. If order execution is delayed, then the Client may also
receive disparate prices from trading at different times during the day.
Wealthfront Advisers places all 529 Account purchase and redemption trade orders with
Wealthfront Brokerage, who in turn must transmit such trade orders exclusively to the 529 plan
recordkeeper.
Item 13 Review of Accounts
Wealthfront Advisers provides all Clients with continuous access via the App and/or the Site
where Clients can access their Account documents, such as account statements, and review their
time-weighted and money-weighted returns. Clients also receive periodic e-mail communications
describing portfolio performance, Account information, and product features.
Wealthfront Advisers software-based investment advisory service assumes a Client’s portfolio
will not stay optimized over time and must be periodically rebalanced back to its target
allocation. Wealthfront Advisers’ software continuously monitors and periodically rebalances
each Client’s portfolio that is fully-discretionary. Wealthfront Advisers also conducts reviews
when Clients make changes to their risk profiles. Wealthfront Advisers considers tax
implications and the volatility associated with each of the chosen asset classes when deciding
when and how to rebalance, however no assurance can be made by Wealthfront Advisers that
Clients will not incur capital gains, and in certain instances significant capital gains, when Client
portfolios are rebalanced periodically. Wealthfront Advisers assumes no responsibility to its
Clients for any tax consequences of any transaction, including any capital gains that may result
from the rebalancing of Client Accounts.
On a periodic basis, Wealthfront Advisers contacts each Client to remind them to review and
update personal profile information they previously provided. Wealthfront Advisers also requests
that Clients reconfirm the same information on an annual basis. These notifications and
confirmations include a link to the Client’s current information and contact information for the
Wealthfront Advisers support team. Currently the Wealthfront Advisers team members whose
tasks include supervising, arranging and responding to these notifications, confirmations and
reviews are the Product Support team.
Wealthfront Advisers’ Investment Committee (the “Committee”), a committee of certain
Wealthfront Advisers officers who are not members of Wealthfront Advisers’ investment
research team, conducts and approves separate reviews related to the securities used for Client
portfolios. The Committee has the authority, if necessary, to remove, add, or replace securities or
other investments from portfolios held at Wealthfront Advisers.
Item 14 Client Referrals and Other Compensation
Wealthfront Advisers expects from time to time to run promotional campaigns to measure
interest and to attract Clients to open Accounts on the Site. These promotions may include, but
are not limited to, referral programs pursuant to which Clients, or third parties, invite non-Clients
to open an account with Wealthfront Advisers. These promotions may also include additional
Account services or products offered on a limited basis to select current and prospective Clients
(including, but not limited to, current or prospective Clients who are employees of the same
company or other current or prospective Clients with common characteristics), such as different
fee arrangement structures, which could include more favorable fee arrangements, a higher
interest rate, cash compensation and/or cash contributions to an Account, reduced or waived
advisory fees for Clients, and/or periodic, flat fees for certain advisory or account services.
These arrangements may create an incentive for a third party or other existing Client to refer
prospective Clients to Wealthfront Advisers, even if the third party would otherwise not make the
referral. These arrangements may also create a conflict of interest for a Client to maintain a
certain level of assets managed through Wealthfront Advisers if doing so would result in
eligibility to receive an incentive, bonus, or additional compensation.
Wealthfront Advisers compensates third parties to create and share advertising materials
regardless of whether an individual funds an Account. Additionally, in certain instances,
Wealthfront Brokerage provides Wealthfront Advisers’ Clients compensation as a promotional
offer to open accounts at Wealthfront Brokerage.
Item 15 Custody
Wealthfront Advisers is deemed to have custody of Client assets due to its affiliation with
Wealthfront Brokerage, which maintains Client funds as a qualified custodian and primarily with
respect to cash that is not held by RBC. Additionally, Forge Trust Co. serves as custodian of
Clients’ IRA Accounts. Wealthfront Advisers provides instructions to Wealthfront Brokerage
regarding the investment of the Client’s assets (see Item 10).
Each Client can access Account documentation, including trade confirmations and/or monthly
account statements, directly from Wealthfront Brokerage by logging into their Client Account.
Each Client should carefully review this information when they are evaluating Account
performance, securities holdings, and transactions. While Wealthfront Advisers reconciles
trading information with Wealthfront Brokerage on a regular basis, a Client may experience
differences in the information displayed on the Site as compared to the Account documentation
due to pending transactions, dividends, interest, corporate actions, cash movements or
withdrawals, or other activity. Only Wealthfront Brokerage’s trading confirmations and
statements represent the official records of a Client’s Account.
Item 16 Investment Discretion
Wealthfront Advisers requires that a Client who decides to retain Wealthfront Advisers as their
investment adviser complete and execute an Advisory Client Agreement. Under the terms of the
Advisory Client Agreement, Wealthfront Advisers assumes either full discretionary or limited
discretionary trading and investment authority over the Client’s assets in accounts held with
Wealthfront Brokerage. For fully-discretionary Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers is given
discretionary authority to select the timing, quantity, and identity of securities to buy and sell for
the Client as well as enter into, amend or terminate contracts relating to the Account.
A Client should understand that subject only to Wealthfront Advisers’ fiduciary duties,
Wealthfront Advisers’ full-discretionary trading and investment authority over the Client’s assets
in an Automated Investing Account, Automated Bond Portfolio, Automated Bond Ladder, S&P
500 Direct, or Nasdaq-100 Direct held at Wealthfront Brokerage means that the timing, quantity,
and identity of securities to buy and sell on behalf of the Client is completely within Wealthfront
Advisers’ discretionary authority. While Wealthfront Advisers seeks to respond to Client
deposits, Client withdrawal requests, including without limitation requests in connection with
terminations, Client changes in risk profiles, Client changes to the portfolio allocation, and other
reasonable Client requests in a timely and reasonable manner, Wealthfront Advisers does not
represent or guarantee that Wealthfront Advisers will respond to any such Client actions or
requests immediately or in accordance with a set time schedule. Further, Wealthfront Advisers is
not responsible to Client for any failures, delays and/or interruptions in the timely or proper
execution of trades or any other trading instructions placed by Wealthfront Advisers on behalf of
Client through Wealthfront Brokerage due to any reason or no reason, including without
limitation any or all of the following, which are likely to happen from time to time: (A) any kind
of interruption of the services provided by Wealthfront Brokerage or its clearing or executing
broker-dealers or Wealthfront Advisers’ ability to communicate with Wealthfront Brokerage or
its clearing or executing broker-dealers (B) hardware or software malfunction, failure or
unavailability; (C) Wealthfront Brokerage system outages; (D) internet service failure or
unavailability; (E) the actions of any governmental, judicial or regulatory body; and/or (F) force
majeure.
For Stock Investing Accounts, Wealthfront Advisers does not have the same trading and
investment authority as other Wealthfront Accounts. The Stock Investing Account, unlike
Wealthfront’s Automated Investing Account, is not a fully discretionary account. The Client
retains general investment discretion over other matters, including the ultimate decision as to
which securities to include in the account. Wealthfront Advisers will not effect transactions in a
Client’s Stock Investing Account without the Client’s consent, except for i) determining the
specific time, price, number of shares, and units or dollar amounts appropriate to effect Client’s
request, ii) trading securities that Wealthfont Advisers or its affiliates no longer support in the
account, or iii) complying with applicable laws, regulations, or court orders. Additional
information about the Advisory Client Agreement can be found in Items 4 and 7 above.
Item 17 Voting Client Securities
Wealthfront Advisers, as a matter of policy and as a fiduciary to our clients, has responsibility for
voting proxies for portfolio securities consistent with the best economic interests of the Clients.
Our firm maintains policies and procedures as to the handling, research, voting, and reporting of
proxy voting and makes appropriate disclosures about our firm’s proxy policies and practices.
Our policy and practice includes the responsibility to monitor corporate actions, receive and vote
client proxies and disclose any potential conflicts of interest as well as making information
available to clients about the voting of proxies for their portfolio securities and maintaining
relevant and required records. Clients may request information regarding how Wealthfront
Advisers voted a Client’s proxies, and Clients may request a copy of the firm's proxy policies
and procedures by emailing support@wealthfront.com. Participants in the Securities Lending
Program should be aware that they do not retain voting rights on any securities that have been
lent. During the period in which a security is on loan, neither the Client nor Wealthfront Advisers
is able to vote proxies for those shares until the securities are returned to the Client’s Account.
Item 18 Financial Information
This Item is not applicable because Wealthfront Advisers does not require or solicit the
prepayment of any advisory fees and does not have any adverse financial condition that is
reasonably likely to impair our ability to continuously meet our contractual commitments to our
Clients.
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Palo Alto, California 94301
www.wealthfront.com
Form ADV Part 2B
Client Brochure Supplement
October 6, 2025
This Brochure Supplement provides information about certain Wealthfront Advisers employees
listed below that supplements the Wealthfront Advisers Brochure you should have received
above. Please contact Wealthfront Advisers at 844-995-8437 or support@wealthfront.com if you
did not receive Wealthfront Advisers’ Brochure or if you have any questions about the contents
of this Brochure Supplement.
Wealthfront Advisers’ automated investment advice is managed by software, based on input
provided by a team of supervised persons. This team is led by highly qualified individuals whose
experience and credentials are provided below.
Burton Malkiel, born 1932
Education
BS, Harvard University, 1953
MBA, Harvard University, 1955
Ph.D., Princeton University, 1964
Business Background
Associate, Investment Banking, Smith Barney & Co. 1958 -1960, 1964 - present
Princeton University (now Professor Emeritus) 2012 - present
Chief Investment Officer, Wealthfront Advisers LLC 2012 - present
Chief Investment Officer, AlphaShares, LLC
Disciplinary Information
None
Other Business Activity
Director: Theravance, Inc.; Genmab A/S; Vanguard Europe
Editorial Board Member, Emerging Markets Review and Applied Financial Economics
Supervision
Dr. Malkiel is supervised by David Fortunato.
Alexander Michalka, born 1984
Education
BA, University of California, Berkeley, 2006
MS / Ph.D., Columbia University, 2013
Business Background
2006 –2009 Quantitative Research, The Climate Corporation
2013 – 2019 Vice President, AQR Capital Management
2019 – present Vice President of Research, Wealthfront Advisers LLC
2019 – 2025 Portfolio Manager, Wealthfront Risk Parity Fund
Disciplinary
Information
None
Other Business Activity
None
Supervision
Dr. Michalka is supervised by David Fortunato