Current Events > Robinhood gets rid of confetti feature amid scrutiny over gamification

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https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/31/robinhood-gets-rid-of-confetti-feature-amid-scrutiny-over-gamification.html

Robinhood is redesigning some of its app features most notably ditching its confetti animation amid scrutiny over the popular stock trading companys so-called gamification of investing. The free-stock trading pioneer, which is gearing up for its public debut, told CNBC the move is an effort to remove the distraction from its overall mission to democratize investing. In the past, we used the same confetti design to celebrate firsts with customers. Those included customers first trades, their first steps with cash management, and successful referrals of friends and family. Now, were introducing new, dynamic visual experiences that cheer on customers through the milestones in their financial journeys, Robinhood said in a blog post on Wednesday.

Robinhood, which is seen as a gateway for young investors to access the markets, has lowered the barrier to entry for millions of retail investors. The platform gained an estimated 6 million users in January and February alone, according to SimilarWeb. However, lawmakers and regulators have accused Robinhood of being reckless toward its newbie investors by making light of decisions that involve real money. Last year, Massachusetts regulators filed a complaint against Robinhood, citing the companys aggressive tactics to attract inexperienced investors, its use of gamification strategies to manipulate customers, and its failure to prevent frequent outages and disruptions on its trading platform. Robinhood told CNBC the confetti was simply about positive reinforcement to a generation of investors that has long been shut out of the public markets. Weve also heard the criticism and we think that gets distracting when the focus starts to shift to some misconceptions, and thats what starts defining what youre doing, Madhu Muthukumar, head of product management at Robinhood told CNBC. Thats also a good sign to say hey, we should talk about this. We should talk about what it is we value and not let everyone guess, he said.



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Lame

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It's not like they had stock lootboxes or anything, but I imagine they're under a LOT of pressure right now to hide all the crap that draws in uninformed investors so I can see why they did it.

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Its funny how we scrutinize an investment app but not all the predatory credit card and loan companies