Q&A with Kaspar&’s Rominga Büchler
This Q&A is part of a series where I ask founders and employees of companies about their products and services and how they relate to the gender investing gap and other topics. I am either an affiliate, a customer or interested in becoming a customer with these companies. I may receive a commission for links posted, which helps me finance my blog and website. It is my hope that through these Q&As to bring these fintech companies closer to you and me and find the best ones that can help us increase our wealth while aligning with important values.
Kaspar& is a spin-off out of the University of St. Gallen and ETH Zurich. Founded in late 2020 by Jan-Philipp Schade, Lukas Pachel, Lauro Böni and Sebastian Büchler, Kaspar& has come onto the Swiss banking scene as an intriguiging three-in-one player, combining wealthtech, fintech and neobanking in a user-friendly interface. With an asset management license, regulated and authorized by the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA, in hand, Kaspar& meets the highest standards of investor protection and regulation. What’s more, Kaspar&’s unique “Round Up” program makes it easy and nearly seamless to automatically invest in your digital portfolio. You can open an account with Kaspar& online in 10 minutes and with as little as CHF1.
Rominga Büchler is Kaspar&’s formidable Community Manager, who wants to tackle financial literacy as a topic and bring it to the forefront. Rominga recognized that investing is something everybody should consider and have access to. After filling up and investing into her pillar 3a recently, she wanted to establish the habit of constantly investing in a diversified portfolio. Living on a budget as a student and only investing money which she didn’t need for the next years, led her to Kaspar&. The micro-investments with the round-up feature truly caught her eye, as well as other aspects such as being able to open multiple portfolios for different financial goals and transparency in fees convinced her. When the role of Community Manager opened, Rominga jumped on the opportunity to become part of the Kasper& team and shares the vision Kaspar&’s founders have created thus far: making investing as easily accessible for as many as possible.
>What inspired the team to create Kaspar&? What problem are you trying to solve? What makes Kaspar& stand out among competing digital investment and banking solutions here in Switzerland?
This vision was born during the time when all our founders worked within the financial industry, developing and maintaining investment strategies for large Swiss pension funds and banks. Realizing that most people in Switzerland, including relatives and friends, didn’t invest. Although the negative interest environment made it impossible to reach financial goals without investing, the desire to share their know-how with everybody was amplified.
By linking a personal Swiss bank account with the Kaspar& prepaid Mastercard, we enable anyone to top-up to the next Swiss Franc with every purchase and automatically invest the resulting difference. This way, investing doesn’t only become an integrated part one’s life, but for the first time in Switzerland, can be kicked off with micro-amounts. Kicking off to manage your financial life becomes as easy as buying a coffee — literally speaking!
Once our customers have gained confidence and trust in our solution, they can open as many individual and professionally managed investment portfolios that optimally suit their goals. (E.g. parental leave, retirement or a sabbatical).
>What does financial wellness mean to you personally and how is that integrated into Kaspar&’s services?
For me, financial wellness is related to the feeling of being able to design a life which allows me to make decisions less about money and more about time and joy. It also includes being fully independent and able to give back to my community.
>How does Kaspar& bridge the gender investing gap? What is Kaspar&’s take on gender lens investing? How are sustainability and impact investing integrated when investing with Kaspar&?
By making investing accessible to everyone, we strongly help to close the bridge between all who are not investing and those who are, breaking down the high barrier of having to invest in relatively larger amounts. In particular, this means that we create individual and personalised investment goals. Already during onboarding, an individual investment profile tailored to the experience and needs is created. With a short questionnaire, the final portfolio proposal is optimized to individual’s needs. Short term targets have a more defensive design and long term targets are more growth-focused. This enables the best possible target achievement and at the same time allows different investment strategies. If the risk appetite changes, it can be switched flexibly between three implementations. Further, we allow our customers to create an impact with their investment by letting them select any thematic focus which seems important for them, such as demography, electromobility or health care. This way, anyone can select what he or she wants to support with their own investment.
>How does Kaspar& address financial feminism and how is the user experience structured around that?
We want to make investing as easy as it can be. Not only for women, not only for men but for everyone. In Switzerland only 10–15% of young people between the ages of 25 and 45 invest. That figure is to low when we consider the fact that high interest rates are unlikely to return in the near future while inflation is clearly increasing. Hence, we want to close the general gap between all those who have access to professional investing and those who don’t. We believe that integrated micro-investments, an easy-to-use app and an initial investment level of only one Swiss Franc really foster a closure of this gap.
>What’s on the horizon for Kaspar&? Can you share your roadmap with us?
On one hand we are improving the usability of our app by including services like Google and Apple Pay and on the other hand we are adding new services. These can reach from micro-donations to dedicated retirement services up to new insurance solutions which can be easily accessed in the Kaspar& app. Of course, there is even more to come so make sure to stay tuned!
Thank you, Rominga, for answering these questions! I am looking forward to following Kaspar&’s progress!
What did you think of this Q&A? Is there a different way I should structure these Q&As? What other questions could I ask that would be relevant to you?
