AI for Everyone: Robinhood Will Let Retail Investors Let Bots Trade Stocks on Their Behalf

Robinhood Markets, a trading platform, has introduced AI agents built into its app that retail investors can use to analyze the market and execute trades. The operator of the popular platform for trading on the stock and cryptocurrency markets has also promised to launch trading in U.S. stocks and ETFs on weekends. This marks a partial return to a previous practice, notes Bloomberg: until 1952, New York’s financial markets held Saturday trading sessions for eight decades.

On September 29, Robinhood announced the launch of accounts in which AI bots will be able to execute trades on behalf of retail investors. Access to the service will be rolled out in the coming weeks, with customers selected at random. Attendees at the presentation in Houston received immediate access. According to Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev, retail investors will gain access to tools that “were previously available only to hedge funds, major banks, and companies using quantitative strategies,” Yahoo Finance reports.

Back in May, Robinhood allowed users to connect third-party AI assistants to their trading accounts. According to company data cited by Yahoo Finance, about 150,000 customers have opened such accounts since then. Now, the use of bots is being integrated into the brokerage’s app to simplify the service. Initially, models from Anthropic and OpenAI will be available.

Investors will be able to communicate with Robinhood’s AI assistant using standard text queries. For example, users will be able to ask it to assess how computing costs might affect specific companies and, after a series of follow-up questions, open positions in those companies’ stocks, explains The Wall Street Journal.

A client can set conditions for the AI bot to execute trades. An upcoming feature called “Loops” will allow users to repeat a sequence of operations specified by a chosen strategy, even when the investor is not using the app, according to the WSJ.

Robinhood will charge a fee for using AI models through its platform. The exception is OpenAI Luna, which will be free through the end of 2026, according to Yahoo Finance.

Robinhood also plans to transition from 24-hour trading on weekdays to a 24/7 trading schedule for a limited list of U.S. stocks and ETFs. “Breaking news doesn’t wait for the market to open,” said Steve Quirk, head of Robinhood’s brokerage business, as quoted by Bloomberg. Orders will be routed to the over-the-counter platform Bruce Markets. According to Reuters, the initiative is still under review by regulators.

Robinhood has warned that the account holder is responsible for trades made by the AI agent. The company has not yet evaluated the investment performance of these clients or compared it to the performance of strategies that do not use AI agents, according to Yahoo Finance. Reuters reports on concerns that low liquidity outside of regular trading hours could lead to less favorable execution prices.

By default, each transaction must be confirmed manually, but you can disable this setting to allow the bot to act on its own. It will only be able to use funds transferred to a separate account.

“I think very few people will transfer a significant portion of their wealth to an account managed by an AI agent and start trading right from day one,” says Abhishek Fatehpuria, Robinhood’s vice president of product management (as quoted by Yahoo). He acknowledges that the practice of entrusting a significant portion of one’s capital to AI will become more widespread in a few years.

This article was AI-translated and verified by a human editor