DEADBATCH W24FINTECH / ROBO-ADVISOR

Double Finance

"0% expense ratio" robo-advisor. Hit $10M AUM in Dec 2024, shut down twelve months later. YC slug then recycled for the founder's next pivot — with Garry Tan as primary partner.

Undisclosed (YC + post-Demo Day)

Capital Raised

1 YRS

Lifespan

$10M+ in client AUM wound down or transferred

Body Count

AUTOPSY REPORT

Double pitched itself as a Wealthfront/Betterment killer offering direct indexing for $1/month. Founder JJ Maxwell (ex-Liftoff Influence) and growth lead Mark Wai (ex-Tesla, ex-Facebook). after crossing $10M AUM in December 2024, the company quietly shut down a year later — and the YC slug `double-2` was repurposed for Maxwell's next venture (an AI ad-generation startup called Polished) with Garry Tan named primary YC partner . Maxwell wrote a "Lessons from Building (and Closing) Double Finance" HN post (item 46213345). The slug-recycling-into-pivot pattern is itself a Tan-era artifact: the same YC company URL now points at a different product with different unit economics, while clients had to be wound down or transferred. Robo-advising joined the long list of consumer fintech categories that didn't pencil at venture scale.

DAMAGE: $10M+ in client AUM wound down or transferred

TIMELINE

2024-01Joins YC W24 (Maxwell, Wai)

2024-08Show HN: "Double – Design and invest in your own stock index"

2024-12Launch HN: "Double (YC W24) – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios"

2024-12Crosses $10M AUM

2025-12"We Shut Down Double Finance (YC W24)" — HN post by Maxwell

2026Same YC slug rebooted as Polished (AI ad gen); Garry Tan named primary partner

SOURCES

→ HN: "We Shut Down Double Finance (YC W24)"→ HN: "Lessons from Building (and Closing) Double Finance"→ HN: Launch HN: Double – Index Investing with 0% Expense Ratios → YC directory: double-2 (now Polished)

← Wuri Soham Parekh — The Multi-Employed Engineer →

Satirical project. Not affiliated with Y Combinator. All information from public records.