The design changes, announced in a blog post on Wednesday, will roll out next week as part of “dynamic new visual experiences that encourage customers to move through the stages of their financial journey,” the company said.
Robinhood currently displays confetti after a number of “firsts” for each merchant, including when they initially deposit money into the app, complete their first trade, and upgrade to a premium membership. Confetti imagery will be replaced with new graphic elements featuring comparatively calmer shapes and colors.
The company recently applied for a scholarship after a controversial start to 2021.
Robinhood sparked a firestorm in January by temporarily banning users from buying shares of GameStop (GME) and other actions pushed by an army of traders on Reddit. Robinhood blamed the controversial restrictions on a request by its clearinghouse to pay up to $ 3 billion due to market volatility.
The company was sued earlier this year by the family of a 20-year-old trader who committed suicide after seeing a negative balance of $ 730,000 on his trading account and mistakenly believing it was the sum of money he owed. The tragedy drew attention to the playful nature of the Robinhood platform, as well as the startup’s customer service policies, which it has since changed.
And last December, Massachusetts securities regulators criticized the app for the colorful confetti and other marketing techniques. The complaint accused the company of breaking state law and regulations by failing to take action to protect its customers. He also said Robinhood relentlessly bombards users with gamification strategies, including “colorful confetti raining down” on their screens after executing trades.
However, the controversies have not dented the popularity of Robinhood. Recent data from SimilarWeb shows that the app “receives more traffic than any of the traditional retail brokerages.” For example, January visits topped 50 million – about 10 million more than Charles Schwab’s website.
– Matt Egan of CNN Business contributed to this report.
