The inbestMe robo-advisor platform was reviewed by our team. We analyzed its pros, cons, investment strategies, and more!
Visit WebsiteHello there!
Robo-advisors are becoming a popular choice for investors looking for low-cost wealth management platforms. In this short article, we will be providing an unbiased review of Inbestme, a Spanish automated investment platform.
If you don’t know what a Robo-advisor is yet, you might find it helpful to read our Introduction To Robo-Advisors to get an overview of this innovation and its main features.
Simply put, InbestMe is an automated investing service that allows you to build a customized portfolio based on your financial objectives and your risk tolerance. It is suitable for anyone looking for passive investment strategies, where they buy and hold a mix of assets for a relatively long period of time.
That's inbestMe review in a nutshell. If you want to find out what our research team has to say after carefully analyzing inbestMe, keep reading.
Founded by Jordi Mercader in 2017, inbestMe aims to deliver higher profitability with fewer commissions than other traditional wealth management firms. In 2019, it raised a total of €1.3M in funding through one seed round.
Opening an account with inbestMe is fast and easy, and you complete the full process online. The steps are straight-forward, and it takes you only three steps to get started:
You can access the platform through their website or the mobile application, available on iOS and Android.
Both interfaces are simple and give you access to your investment dashboard, where you can check your investment performance across different plans.
After answering the questions, inbestMe suggests a portfolio based on your risk profile and your financial goals (as shown in the below image).
Anyone can do this simulation as it is totally free.
The questions they ask include your employment status, your yearly income, what you think about maximum losses, and some other metrics they use to assess your profile's risk ability as well as your risk perception.
InbestMe offers several products adapted to various investor profiles, and you have a certain margin to adjust the portfolio to fit your preferences and risk profile.
The portfolios available on InbestMe are divided into three categories: Pension plans, ETFs, and Index Funds. Be aware that only Spanish investors are able to open pension plan and index fund portfolios.
As a refresher, pension plans, also known as retirement plans, help you set aside a portion of your monthly savings to build a portfolio that will support you financially in your retirement phase. ETFs and index funds are pools of securities that track an underlying sector or index.
You have four available ETF investment styles: inbestMe ETF, inbestMe ETFs Dynamic, inbestMe ETFs Value, and a Socially Responsible Investing ETF.
The inbestMe ETF invests in some listed index funds that replicate the performance of the world's best indexes. You can start investing in this portfolio with a minimum of €/$5,000.
InbestMe ETF portfolios are made up of between 8 and 13 ETFs, depending on the investor's profile. And your Portfolio might include the below ETFs:
.png)
On the other hand, the inbestMe ETFs Dynamic is more actively managed and combines long-term strategies with short-term tactics, having a clear goal: reducing volatility and benefiting from bull market trends. As such, the adjustments to your portfolio will be more periodic for one part of the portfolio, while the other part will be managed based on the same strategic plan as the inbestMe ETF. The minimum amount to invest in this strategy is €/$10,000.
Your portfolio might be allocated to the following ETFs:
The third portfolio is inbestMe ETFs Value, a portfolio having a bias towards Value ETFs, and is made up of between 6 and 13 ETFs. The minimum amount to start investing in this strategy is €/$15,000.
Your portfolio might be composed of the below ETFs:
The inbestMe Index Funds invest for the long term in a highly diversified index fund portfolio and will give you access to iSharesClass D institutional classes and Vanguard. They are managed passively with an annual review and automatic rebalancing. You can start investing with just€/$1,000.
Your portfolio will comprise up to 16 funds from 4 different managers—Vanguard, iShares, Amundi, and Deutsche Bank.
For portfolios of less than €5,000, two of the four following funds are combined:
For portfolios with more than €5,000, inbestMe uses up to 16 funds to create the portfolio:
.png)
InbestMe Pension Plan is a portfolio combining a fixed income and a pure equity plan. When combining both and varying the amount invested in equity and fixed income, inbestMe offers up to 11 different pension plan portfolios. You can start a pension plan with inbestMe Pension Plans from just €250.
In addition to the above three portfolios, you have the option to choose Socially Responsible Investing when selecting your plan, whether you want to invest in Index Funds, ETFs, or Pension Plans.
For your investment to have a social impact, InbestMe creates portfolios with a high level of sustainability score while offering the best benefits already mentioned for each category (Pension plans,ETFs, and index Funds).
Finally, InbestMe offers an account tailored for spanish kids and teens below 18, where the mother, father, or legal guardian will be the authorized person until the account holder reaches 18. The portfolio can start at €1,000.
The portfolio of less than €5,000 will consist of two globally diversified funds and will be the combination of four possible funds according to the selected profile.
On the other hand, the portfolio of more than €5,000 will be composed of up to 16 funds with global ultra-diversification.
If you have more than €/$100,000, you will have direct access to inbestMe Plus. You will enjoy all the advantages of the regular inbestMe account in addition to access to a personal manager who will assist you personally, with no added cost.
InbestMe has a variable pricing structure that fluctuates depending on how much money you put into each portfolio. As the amount invested increases, the percentage of the fees paid will decrease.
In the below table, we summarized the fee structure of the ETF portfolios:
For inbestMe ETFs SRI, the management fees range between 0.13% and 0.41%, while the trading costs and the average built-in costs are fixed at 0.11% and 0.23%, respectively.
As for the fees charged on index funds, they are outlined in the below table:
.png)
On top of the fees mentioned, inbestMe charges a variable success fee, on the performance obtained, of 5% based on the High Water Mark performance fee calculation, but only in the inbestMe ETFs Dynamic.
For the pension plans, the average total cost is 0.96% and will vary depending on the plan profile. This commission is included in the price of the respective plan.
There are no additional fees associated with deposits or withdrawals on inbestMe. But be aware that free withdrawals are allowed only once per month, and a minimum balance depending on your portfolio strategy should be maintained.
InbestMe is regulated and supervised by the CNMV (National Securities Market Commission), the body in charge of supervising and inspecting the Spanish securities markets.
Your investments are protected up to €100,000 by FOGAIN, and depending on which Interactive Brokers account is opened (€20,000 for IB Ireland, and up to $500,000 for the IB United States).
InbestMe customer support is available through live chat during working hours from Monday to Friday, from 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Spain time. In addition, they are available by phone, or you can submit your inquiry online, and they will get back to you within 24 hours. They also have an extensive FAQ available for your help, which is really detailed and answers the main questions that come to your mind.
From our experience, we can say that the customer support service of inbestMe is very responsive. Through the live chat support, the team replies to customer inquiries in a timely manner.
InbestMe allows users to invest from almost any country in the world. However, international clients can invest only through ETFs, and you should know that currently, the platform supports only three languages: English, Spanish, and Catalan.
You can then proceed with the account opening by clicking on continue.
After creating a username, you just need to fill in the information required to finalize the process. As for the documents needed, you only need a valid passport and your tax identification number, and you might need proof of residency for some investment plans.
If you have time, we recommend taking a look at the contract, and at the terms and conditions of the platform. After accepting it, you can finalize the process.
.png)
The account can be validated in minutes once all the details are filled in, and the required documentation is uploaded. Then, you can start investing following the receipt of the funds into your account.
In conclusion, inbestMe is a very solid platform where you can start investing passively and get exposure to ETFs. After checking your investor profile and assessing your risk aversion through a quick questionnaire, they suggest a portfolio, and you can partially adjust it to fit your preferences. Their test is very user-friendly and has many visual features that make the test enjoyable. You can always take the test. It is for free.
They offer a much-diversified set of portfolios with a relatively acceptable fee. You can start investing in some plans for as little as $/€1,000. Their base currency is either € or $, and the limits and fee structure are the same for both currencies. Also, if you feel more comfortable investing responsibly, there are socially responsible investment portfolios available.
Your expected return if you invest in inbestMe will vary according to your risk profile. Theoretically, the higher the fixed income part of your portfolio, the lower the long-term return, but remember, this is not 100% guaranteed. InbestMe estimates returns of 0.9% to 7.6% per year, based on studies obtained in previous years (keep in mind that past returns do not guarantee future returns).
Did you find this review helpful? Did it answer all your questions? Let us know your feedback in the comments below, or contact us directly!
.png)
