Luxembourg’s inclusive investment app Capitana discreetly moved into the post-pilot phase, opening up the platform to more users.
Launched by Startalers in October 2021, Capitana welcomed its first paying customers in December, a carefully vetted cohort of 100 engaged investors who were manually onboarded.
“Now we’ll move into a fully digital self-service kind of onboarding and will test this over the next month,” Startalers founder Galle Haag told Silicon Luxembourg.
Once her team is satisfied that the process is effective, there will be an official announcement for the launch after Easter. In any event, the app is now available in Belgium, Luxembourg and France, said Haag.
The tech entrepreneur explained that some 2,000 people made enquiries about Capitana when it first launched, potential investors which she hopes will now subscribe to the service. The platform aims to direct more retail capital into sustainable finance, i.e., “sustainable in the sense that they have lower environmental footprints when it comes to negative aspects and a positive social footprint”, says Haag.
“When women tell you they don’t have much money to invest, we don’t have the same perception […]”
Gaëlle Haag
Debunking Myths
At the same time, the app was designed to help women overcome some of the obstacles they face when it comes to investing such as lack of confidence, financial literacy, and lowering the barrier to entrance by allowing investors to start with smaller tickets. The founder also wanted to show investors how to define and pursue purpose- and value-driven investments.
Since Startalers launched in 2018, a number of financial education and awareness raising initiatives have sprung up in Europe. Haag views this evolution positively as it shows there is a market. Nevertheless, observations from the Capitana pilot showed that there are still myths to be debunked.
“When women tell you they don’t have much money to invest, we don’t have the same perception….when they think, it’s not enough to start investing, it’s actually more than enough. And a lot of younger, male investors have started with much less”, explained Haag.
The entrepreneur was also surprised to see that some of the app’s first customers also tended to have a clear idea of what specific themes they wanted to invest in and a higher than average risk profile.
