The LSE Directory / Retail brokers
M1 Finance is a Chicago-based financial technology company operating a single app that bundles investing, borrowing and cash management. Its core product lets users build or copy "Pies," which are portfolios of stocks, ETFs and fractional shares organized into visual slices with target allocations; M1 then automatically rebalances the account toward those targets as users deposit cash, rather than requiring manual trades. Alongside investing, M1 offers margin loans against a client's portfolio value and a High-Yield Cash Account operated through a partner bank, positioning the app as a consolidated money-management hub rather than a single-purpose brokerage. M1 specializes in automated, long-term, buy-and-hold investing rather than active trading; it markets itself explicitly against day trading, framing wealth building as a disciplined, long-horizon activity. This differentiates it from both traditional discount brokers, which are optimized for manual order entry, and pure robo-advisors, which typically restrict clients to pre-built model portfolios: M1's Pie system gives users granular control over exactly which securities and weights make up their own portfolio while still automating the ongoing rebalancing. The platform serves individual, joint, custodial, trust and retirement (Traditional, Roth, SEP IRA) accounts, and charges no per-trade commissions, generating revenue instead from margin interest, subscription fees, payment for order flow and interchange fees. M1 Finance was founded in 2015 by Brian Barnes, a Stanford economics graduate, and is headquartered in Chicago. It raised a $150 million Series E round in July 2021 led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, with Coatue Management also participating, which valued the company at $1.45 billion and gave it unicorn status; an earlier $75 million Series D round in 2021 was led by Coatue with Left Lane Capital and Clocktower Technology Ventures also investing. Brokerage and advisory services are provided through its affiliated entities M1 Finance LLC, a FINRA/SIPC member broker-dealer, and M1 Advisory Services LLC, an SEC-registered investment adviser; cash accounts are held through a partner bank that is FDIC insured. As of late 2025 M1 reported more than 1,000,000 users and over 12 billion dollars in assets under management. M1 has also expanded into cryptocurrency investing, offered through Bakkt, and previously issued the Owner's Rewards Card, a cash-back credit card tied to a member's portfolio holdings, though as of this research pass M1's own site notes it is no longer accepting new applications for that card.
