I often hear from companies claiming to be doing something unique but it is rarely true. Soon, the lifestyle fintech app, actually is doing something different.
Soon helps people build wealth through a combination of micro-investing, which many services do, but also micro-divesting, which only they do. Using a patent-pending Cash Flow Algorithm, the Soon Smart Debit Account uses a person’s existing cash flow to theoretically deliver gains every time the user spends money, with those savings applied to their financial goals.
When someone signs up for Soon’s Smart Debit Account they establish a portfolio guided by their level of risk tolerance. Their funds are invested in a combination of precious metals, stocks and cryptocurrencies. Every time they buy something, a sliver of the best performing asset class is sold to pay the bill, with any remaining profit from the sale available for the next purchase or put aside for a financial goal.
Cofounder and CEO Chris Lovato was ready to throw in the towel on the whole idea a year ago. In 2019 he left a well-paying software development job and went a year without a salary working on Soon. Come March 2020, investors were lined up but the economy shut down and the money dried up. Mr. Lovato then met with his last potential investor and they too said no. He thought that was it.
Mr. Lovato went home and began to wonder what was next. Then the phone rang. An angel investor named Scott Paul offered to invest and over time brought other angels into the fold. Now the Utah-based Soon is twice oversubscribed and turns potential investors away.
The philosophy behind Soon is as interesting as its premise. Mr. Lovato once worked to have Utah’s Legal Tender Act passed. The first of its kind in the United States, the act allows gold and silver coins issued by the United States Mint to be used as money in Utah. It was the first legal alternative currency.
