London-headquartered fintech Sidekick has raised £3.3m in a pre-seed round for its investment management app.
Sidekick will use the pre-seed raise for developing its platform, growing its asset management team, and gain regulatory approvals. Both stocks and cryptoassets will be available for trading on the app.
“Most retail investors have two options to build wealth: settle for passive portfolios or try to time the market and pick stocks and crypto themselves without access to the training, tools and information needed to do this effectively,” said Sidekick CEO and co-founder, Matthew Ford.
Before Sidekick, Ford founded the mobile banking platform Pariti, which he sold to Tandem Bank in 2018.
The company said it plans to offer products and services that are usually restricted to high-net-worth individuals such as borrowing against assets and in-house investment professionals to manage portfolios.
Octopus Ventures, Seedcamp and Semantic led the Sidekick pre-seed. The round also featured participation from a group of angels including the co-founder of Gumtree, co-founder of Tandem and co-founder of Credit Kudos.
Nick Sando, principal, Octopus Ventures said: “High-Net Worths can access alternative assets whose higher-risk adjusted return profile can create significant compounding effects on wealth over time, but retail investors are largely prohibited from these due to high cheque sizes and the lack of digital tools to power and distribute these services.”
The startup is currently seeking FCA approval.