Brokerages · Brokerage (subscription-fee micro-investing + banking) · Structural / no discrete incident
Stash
Headline
Stash markets itself to first-time, beginner investors — but charges a FLAT monthly fee regardless of balance, which independent reviewers calculate works out to roughly 10.8% ANNUALLY on a $1,000 account, compared to…
Not independently verified. Verification status: Unverified - heuristic first draft. Publish state: draft unverified.
Stash markets itself to first-time, beginner investors — but charges a FLAT monthly fee regardless of balance, which independent reviewers calculate works out to roughly 10.8% ANNUALLY on a $1,000 account, compared to about 0.25%/year at a percentage-fee competitor like Betterment for the exact same balance. The customers Stash is explicitly trying to attract — people just starting out with small amounts — are the ones paying the highest effective rate.
- Severity
- Evidence tierUnassigned
- Claims confirmed
- Last verified2026-08-04
Primary source. None recorded — Unverified - heuristic first draft.
Terms
Arbitration
Terms of Use confirm the electronic Account Contracts (Terms, Advisory Agreement, ESIGN Agreement, Privacy Policy) 'can be admitted as evidence or otherwise used in arbitration' — confirming binding arbitration applies, though full clause text not captured this pass; investment products offered through Apex Clearing (same custodian as tastytrade/Ally Invest/M1 Finance in this tab), covered up to $500,000 via SIPC.
Data sharing
Stash shares customer 'Subscription Data' (legal name, address, phone, email, billing info) with THIRD PARTIES for identity verification and billing purposes as a standard part of its subscription process; payment processing is handled by a named third party (Tabapay) with its own separate privacy policy customers are bound by when paying via card.
Fees and billing
CONCRETE, FLAG-WORTHY FEE STRUCTURE ISSUE: Stash charges a FLAT MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION FEE (currently a single 'Stash Plan' at $12/month, or $108/year if billed annually) rather than a percentage-of-assets fee — which independent reviewers calculate can amount to roughly 10.8% ANNUALLY in fees on a $1,000 balance (vs. ~0.25%/year at Betterment for the same balance). This flat-fee model disproportionately penalizes customers with SMALLER account balances, which is a real equity concern for a company positioning itself (per its marketing) as beginner/first-time-investor-friendly. Also charges a 0.25% annual AUM advisory fee on top of the subscription for 'Smart Portfolio' balances ≥$1,000, (earlier reviews also cited crypto-transaction fees via Apex Crypto; Stash's current pricing page does not mention crypto).
Contacts
Privacy contact. Not recorded.
Legal notice. Not verified this pass. If publicly traded: SEC Form 10-K cover page gives the official corporate address; the Secretary of State business-entity search in the state of incorporation gives the registered agent, which must accept service. If private: the state registered agent is usually the only reliable route.
Mailing address. Not recorded.
Evidence
No claims have been itemized for this row yet.
No sources are on file for this row yet.
Source vault
Link status: Candidate - not yet fetched
| Document | Last fetch | |
|---|---|---|
| Privacy policy stash.com/privacy (referenced, not individually located as direct URL this pass) | Not fetched yet | NOT CONFIRMED |
| Terms of service stash.com/termsofuse | Not fetched yet | NO (HTML only) |
| Website No URL recorded | Not fetched yet | — |
| Primary source No URL recorded Verification: Unverified - heuristic first draft | Not fetched yet | — |
Enforcement
No enforcement actions are linked to this row.
State statute
No HQ state on file, so no state statute applies by headquarters.