5 ms·

FNB, a bank in South Africa, used to do something similar. It was called the Million a Month account. If I recall the South African Supreme Court shut it down b

FNB, a bank in South Africa, used to do something similar. It was called the Million a Month account. If I recall the South African Supreme Court shut it down because it was considered a lottery

adammoelis 6y ago
Yeah we actually studied the FNB program when we were setting out to develop Yotta. Basically, it got shut down because it got so popular in its ~2 years of operation and was taking away from the National Lottery. The difference in the U.S is that there has been legislation explicitly supporting prize-linked savings, which didn't exist in South Africa. It was more of a grey area there. A great academic read on the FNB MaMa program here: http://beniverson.org/papers/MaMa.pdf http://beniverson.org/papers/MaMa.pdf
- vdalal 6y ago
  I love the hack to lottery-fy savings. Few comments: 1. Product: It in the wide spectrum anywhere between savings account <-> lottery. In your mind, is it closer to one edge vs. other? - Per my read and based on the rate (0.2%) offered, it is closer to the lottery end 2. Web page: "Savings + rate >15-100x banks + Win $10 mil" is what could be a turn off. Depending on the answer above, fix the headline 3. math on how this works: Show ONE public account with $ (say median of all accounts on Yotta or $100 for simplicity) that you would fund and track it in realtime with APY 4. FAQ: Could be more direct. Yes, one will need a Yotta account 5. FAQ: "3rd party “A” rated insurance carrier": May help you if you can reveal who on your website & theirs too 6. FAQ: In one answer, it say 15x and in another it say 20x (Chase or Wells Fargo) 7. 7 digits = 10 ^ 7 #s: if one can get 1000 users with $250K each, is the $10 mil guaranteed? :) Edit: for readability
  - adammoelis 6y ago
    Thanks for this. 1. We don't really think of it as being closer to one vs the other. From a front-end perspective, it's closer to a lottery/sweepstakes. But from a back-end perspective it's more of a savings account with a twist. So maybe I'd say right smack in the middle of that spectrum on a blended basis. 2. Thanks for the feedback here 3. Good idea. I like that 4. Fair 5. Agreed. Will update 6. Thanks - will fix that 7. I think your math is off on this one. Numbers are 1-70 and the special number YottaBall is 1-25, so lots more combos than that.

FNB, a bank in South Africa, used to do something similar. It was called the Million a Month account. If I recall the South African Supreme Court shut it down because it was considered a lottery

adammoelis 6y ago

Yeah we actually studied the FNB program when we were setting out to develop Yotta. Basically, it got shut down because it got so popular in its ~2 years of operation and was taking away from the National Lottery. The difference in the U.S is that there has been legislation explicitly supporting prize-linked savings, which didn't exist in South Africa. It was more of a grey area there. A great academic read on the FNB MaMa program here: http://beniverson.org/papers/MaMa.pdf http://beniverson.org/papers/MaMa.pdf

vdalal 6y ago
I love the hack to lottery-fy savings. Few comments: 1. Product: It in the wide spectrum anywhere between savings account <-> lottery. In your mind, is it closer to one edge vs. other? - Per my read and based on the rate (0.2%) offered, it is closer to the lottery end 2. Web page: "Savings + rate >15-100x banks + Win $10 mil" is what could be a turn off. Depending on the answer above, fix the headline 3. math on how this works: Show ONE public account with $ (say median of all accounts on Yotta or $100 for simplicity) that you would fund and track it in realtime with APY 4. FAQ: Could be more direct. Yes, one will need a Yotta account 5. FAQ: "3rd party “A” rated insurance carrier": May help you if you can reveal who on your website & theirs too 6. FAQ: In one answer, it say 15x and in another it say 20x (Chase or Wells Fargo) 7. 7 digits = 10 ^ 7 #s: if one can get 1000 users with $250K each, is the $10 mil guaranteed? :) Edit: for readability
- adammoelis 6y ago
  Thanks for this. 1. We don't really think of it as being closer to one vs the other. From a front-end perspective, it's closer to a lottery/sweepstakes. But from a back-end perspective it's more of a savings account with a twist. So maybe I'd say right smack in the middle of that spectrum on a blended basis. 2. Thanks for the feedback here 3. Good idea. I like that 4. Fair 5. Agreed. Will update 6. Thanks - will fix that 7. I think your math is off on this one. Numbers are 1-70 and the special number YottaBall is 1-25, so lots more combos than that.