The majority of them are aware that they should be investing, yet they do not know where to start. Public.com was constructed particularly for that individual. The platform was co-founded in 2019 by Leif Abraham and Jannick Malling; it is on a mission to democratize financial knowledge and make investing social, accessible, and truly approachable by each and every American, irrespective of their financial experience or background.
The Problem They Identified
Financial illiteracy was the greatest obstacle to investing than commission fees. The very nature of Public.com was designed to be educational, followed by a trading platform.
Community Over Competition
Instead of ranking top performers, Public created a social feed that promotes open communication between the investors. A variety of viewpoints among healthcare practitioners, marketers, and engineers provides more financial education than any textbook ever has.
Fractional Shares Turned Things Around
The purchase of 5 dollars of Amazon stock, as opposed to the thousands of dollars, eliminated the largest psychological hurdle that prevented thousands of ordinary Americans who would never have launched an investing enterprise of any kind at all.
One million members in eighteen months
Within a year and a half since its inception, Public had hit one million community members, a fact that confirms that there was never a lack of enthusiasm regarding people wanting to access the available financial education; the only difference was that it needed the right platform to be unlocked.
No Payment for Order Flow
In February 2021, Public was among the first brokers to fully abolish payment for order flow – a venture that puts the trust of its members above a very lucrative and controversial source of industry revenue.
Will Smith Had Faith in the Vision
The public also raised fifteen million dollars in Series B financing featuring Will Smith, JJ Watt, and Casey Neistat, the celebrities who realized that the democratization of financial knowledge could be considered one of the key cultural elements that people ought to understand.
Expanding Beyond Stocks
Cryptos this year, bonds the following year, options the following year, and direct indexing the next year. Public continued expanding its platform so that members could launch truly diversified portfolios without having to leave the app.
The Vision of the Agentic Brokerage
In November 2025, Public Fund introduced its Agentic Brokerage – an AI-based brokerage in which the customer can make their own indexes, with simple (plain) language instructions, and ultimately be able to manage their entire portfolio with no effort.
Four hundred and twenty-one million dollars raised
The company has attracted more than four hundred and twenty-one million dollars in ten rounds of financing provided by such investors as Accel, Tiger Global, and Greycroft, an epitome of the outstandingly high growth and strong vision of the platform.
Education Is the Product
The greatest piece of wisdom that Public has to offer is the easiest one – when individuals realize they need to invest, they will invest. The platform does not have the feature of financial education. The whole point of it is that.
