Perhaps the least surprising fact about dub, the online copy-trading platform, is that Steven Wang, its founder and CEO, is 22 years old. After all, Wang has been dabbling in the business world for a very long time — namely, since the second grade.
“We didn’t have that much money growing up,” Wang recalls. “My parents worked for Ford and GM, and we were a super stingy family, but investing was always a big thing for them and they taught me early on to earn my own money. So they opened a $200 custodial account on Scottrade under their name, but (they let me) trade.”
Initially, Wang, who grew up in Troy, didn’t exactly distinguish himself as a whiz kid investor.
“I was so bad. I lost so much money,” Wang says. “I remember this one article said to buy this penny stock. I put all my money into it and I lost like 70 percent (of my investment).
“But it taught me a lesson — you gotta do your own research and only invest in what you know. I knew Coca-Cola, because I was drinking it, and it was probably a good stock to buy. Apple, too, because everyone wanted to get the iPhone.”
By that time, Wang was in the fifth grade.
“I (went) to public school,” he says. “First, I went to Bemis Elementary, and then had one year at Boulan Park Middle School. I was a chess nerd as a kid, and a swimmer and a Boy Scout, as well.
“I was super competitive, so I was banging on neighbors’ doors and selling cookies for Boy Scouts. My parents obviously wanted me to do well in school, and that led to me going to a robotics summer camp. I learned the awesomeness of blending programming with physically building something.”
Wang’s family lived a block away from Troy High School, but that’s not where he ended up going. “I got a financial scholarship, and I was accepted at Cranbrook Schools and Detroit Country Day. I chose Cranbrook because it was close to home,” he says.
Eamon Javers, CNBC senior Washington correspondent, interviews Steven Wang, founder and CEO of dub. The digital platform allows users to copy the trades and portfolios of seasoned traders, hedge funds, influencers, and more.
The jump to the environment of a private school was a major adjustment for Wang. “My parents were making lower-middle-class salaries,” he says, “nowhere near the rich heritage of the Cranbrook kids. And they all had cool shoes I couldn’t wear, and all the things I couldn’t buy. And the middle school is all boys, so it really brings out the worst. I was dealing with bullying and going through puberty.
“So, I’ll be honest, it really took time for me to fit in, figure out what was my place in this world, and find joy and understand what I wanted to do. It was a really tough time.”
But there was one very important thing Wang figured out in school.
“After getting the bug for trading and investing, the one thing I knew was I really loved making money,” he reveals. “And that’s what gave me the inspiration for building a small business. I started buying and selling website domains in the fifth grade, off an auction platform called Flippa.”
Soon after arriving at Cranbrook Schools, Wang launched his very first company, called Realism.
“I knew I wanted to build something in virtual reality, and in my sophomore year I had a buddy who I’d met during robotics,” he says. “We paired up with the idea of building some projects in VR to see where it could take us.
“What we knew well was education, so we started thinking about all the stuff we wanted to do, but couldn’t — cool science labs on the moon, going to Spain to practice Spanish. We decided to build that stuff in VR, and we got some early traction. It was really cool. And we thought, we’ve got something real here. We could build this into a company.”
The young entrepreneurs began lining up meetings with investors to raise money for their idea.
“We were rejected by every investor we talked to in that first year,” Wang says, laughing. “No one would take a meeting. I was 15 years old at the time, coming home after school in my uniform, and we were on Google Hangouts and they were laughing me out of the room. I remember one call with a New York City investor, and the first thing he says is, ‘What are you wearing?’ He just roasted me. It was pretty traumatizing.”
Wang, center, is joined by the dub team at their headquarters in New York City. Next year, the company’s goal is to have more than 1 million customers.
Wang’s meeting with Michigan philanthropist and investment entrepreneur Michael Acheson couldn’t have been more different. Acheson was part of a group that was exploring the possibility of utilizing VR at the Cranbrook Institute of Science.
“Steven sat in this meeting with 15 adults and basically took it over like a CEO would,” Acheson says, smiling at the memory. “It was just comical that this kid knew more than anybody in the room about the topic, and he knew a lot about a lot of stuff. He was very well educated in a number of ways. I was very impressed and made it a point to stay in touch with him after that meeting.”
Before long, there was a significant breakthrough for Wang and his friend.
“We eventually got $20,000 for a three-month incubator program from the MIT Media Lab,” Wang says. “And I said, screw it. This is what I want to do. I’m gonna leave school. So I took a leave of absence at the end of my sophomore year. We did the program at MIT, and it was successful. We ended up raising a little bit more money, and I was like, let’s build it. I want to do this full time.”
From there, Wang and his partner moved into an apartment in Boston.
“It was a one-bedroom, the cheapest we could find; we were sleeping on air beds,” Wang says, with another laugh. “We built the company for another year, and utterly failed. No one bought our stuff. Public schools are really hard to sell to. But we built out some really cool technology in VR, got a patent for it, and we sold the company.
And I said, screw it. This is what I want to do. I’m gonna leave school. So I took a leave of aBsence at the end of my sophomore year (in high school).”
— steven wang
“We each walked away with a couple hundred thousand dollars. After that, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. So I thought, what have I never done before? I’ve never been to San Francisco.”
He didn’t exactly land in San Francisco, but 45 minutes south, in Cupertino at Apple’s headquarters. For years, Wang had been fascinated with the company, especially its founder.
“I remember reading Steve Jobs’ biography when he died,” Wang says. “I was in fourth or fifth grade, and Steve Jobs was my idol. It was just so cool to read that book and get his whole experience. So I applied for a job at Apple and actually got in.
“I worked as a manager on a bunch of different projects, including the Apple watch. I was living the life in Cupertino — the cool Spaceship Headquarters just opened in 2019. I saw Tim Cook once a week. He was in my section. It was so cool. I loved it.”
Wang may have enjoyed it, but only for a bit.
“I was out there for a little over a half-year,” he says. “What I realized was that I hated working for someone else. I was 17 or 18 when I was at Apple, and I was the youngest employee by far. I was a rebellious kid and I don’t think I was the easiest guy to manage. I had all these crazy ideas, and Apple is a very rigorous corporate environment, for better or worse. They’re really good at what they do, but they want you to stay in your lane.”
Once again, Wang was at a crossroads, unsure of what to do next.
“I decided if I could invest in anything, it should probably be my education, and it would buy me some time to work on something new. So I reached out to Cranbrook. They graciously let me back in for my senior year in 2019-20. Then COVID-19 hit and ruined it.”
But there was a terrific upside: Wang was accepted at Harvard University.
“I remember him telling me he really wanted to go to Stanford University, but he didn’t get in,” an incredulous Acheson says, shaking his head. “Didn’t get in? What kind of people are they putting in there if he didn’t get in?”
Wang soon found himself back in Boston, as the pandemic reached its stifling peak.
“It was a nightmarish experience,” he says, “but there was also this closeness with your class, because we were all in that craziness together. And I thought if I couldn’t make friends and couldn’t meet people in person, the best way to experience life was to bring everyone to me. So I rented an off-campus apartment and hosted these crazy socially distanced parties. We made some good income running the parties.”
In between hosting parties, Wang was a partner at Dorm Room Fund, part of a team focused on making investments in student-run startups, and he began to sense a sea change in how investors were behaving with their money.
In addition to following seasoned professionals, dub, which is located half a block from the New York Stock Exchange, allows users to create their own portfolios and compete against others.
“I saw this incredible new wave of investors,” he says. “Millions of people were investing for the first time, and it was mindless, almost. It was no longer about sitting in front of screens and picking stocks. It was about following people and ideas. It was about FOMO (fear of missing out), the clout, the feeling, and the movement.
“And I was like, this is incredible. It was nothing like I’d seen in my entire life. And I realized, this is how the younger generation invests. This is why the influencer economy and the creator economy is so big. People want to follow someone else. And I was like, how do we productize this?”
The first step in seeking an answer to that question was familiar. Wang dropped out of school again and turned his attention to creating the business he envisioned.
“In every area of our life, we trust experts like lawyers and doctors to help us with difficult things. But most people want to invest themselves, and they’re not good at that,” he maintains. “We should be trusting the experts when it comes to our own money, but it’s difficult, and terribly expensive.
“You need to be worth a lot of money to get a Goldman Sachs trader to invest in a hedge fund, right? So I was thinking, how do we build a platform that brings Main Street to Wall Street? Where instead of trading stocks, you can just copy and follow exactly what someone else is doing, someone who you trust.”
The headquarters for dub is in the heart of New York City’s financial district. “We’re half a block from the New York Stock Exchange,” Wang says. “I can see it from my window.”
So far, Wang has raised $17 million from investors like Dan Gilbert’s Detroit Venture Partners, Uber, Robinhood, and others, as well as his old friend and mentor, Michael Acheson.
“We’re likely on target for another big fundraising round, so we’re very excited about that,” Wang says. “We’ve been growing like wildfire. It’s been crazy to see the demand pick up every single week. By this time next year, I want to be at a million-plus customers. Charles Schwab was the first product that brought retail investing to the forefront. Robinhood was No. 2 in 2010, with commission-free trading. I want dub to be No. 3.”
It’s only when Wang is asked to reflect on his early years growing up in Troy that something odd occurs. What was a nonstop stream of steady, even frenetic, chatter comes to a screeching halt. “Give me a second, I need to think about that,” and he tilts his head back and stares silently upward.
“I’m a history nerd,” Wang finally says. “I think the (2014) bankruptcy is top of mind when people think about Detroit. But they fail to realize the hundreds of years of industrial history, and really the birthplace and definition of the blue collar worker and the mindset, mentality, and lineage that we had, grinding it all out, the factories working 24/7 to create the engines that power the rest of the world.
“Growing up in Detroit, (I learned) about this mindset, and saw it lived and embodied in the people I met, people who aren’t showy, who really care. I think there’s an innate passion to what we do, and a resiliency that’s carried from generation to generation. So I think it really empowered me to do what I do today, right?
“I feel incredibly blessed to have been born there,” Wang continues. “I’d be honored to go back and really reinvest in the Detroit community. Nothing would make me happier than to support the people that got me to where I am today.”
