As athlete salaries continue to rise, the wealth management industry is taking note. Large banks and boutique registered investment advisers alike are leaning in; JPMorganChase recently debuted a star-studded athlete council to advise on its offerings, while wealth management firm Wealthspire just launched a dedicated sports and entertainment division.
Now, a new AI-powered platform, Prosperity AI, aims to provide a wealth management resource designed specifically for athletes.
NBA veteran Mason Plumlee has made more than $85 million across his 13-year career, and he explained that athlete finances often look more similar to a midsize business than a typical corporate employee.
“Professional athletes have incredibly complex financial lives,” said Plumlee, who also serves as the NBPA’s secretary-treasurer. “And the technology built specifically for them hasn’t fit.” That need for specialized wealth management tools is partly why Plumlee is now an adviser to Prosperity AI.
Prosperity was founded last year by Mayer Reich, a serial entrepreneur and former VP of marketing for investment research firm Seeking Alpha. He’d initially built a broad, consumer-facing wealth management platform until an early user, former NFL offensive lineman Justin Pugh, suggested the tool could instead be tailored specifically to athletes.
Prosperity offers sport-specific editions for players across MLB, MLS, the NBA, NHL and NFL, as well as the ATP and PGA Tour. The platform is fundamentally an informational dashboard. It ingests all elements of an athlete’s financial profile — financial accounts, team contracts, endorsement deals, peer-to-peer payments and more — and then layers on functionalities that range from basic budgeting goals and retirement planning to state-by-state income tax breakdowns, CBA-related benefits and even reviews of potential alternative investments. Rather than replace financial managers or investment advisers, Reich aims to complement them.
“We’re an analytics tool for their money. We’re not fiduciaries of capital, we’re not moving money, we’re not giving financial advice,” Reich said. “What we’re doing is consolidating all their investment and financial information into one place. … We’re just showing them holes, or better ways to look at things or diligence questions they should be asking.”
The platform now has more than 300 athletes, with membership built entirely through word of mouth. An individual athlete subscription is $3,000 per year, or a team account — intended to be used by agents and financial advisers — is $7,200 annually. Reich said the latter has been more popular, driving average revenue per user to nearly $6,000 annually. Reich projects revenue of $8 million to $10 million next year, and said Prosperity is already profitable thanks to its relatively low overhead; the platform was built almost entirely by a team of AI agents. AI tokens represent a growing expense line, now costing the company more than $15,000 monthly.
An athlete’s financial confidant
Reich, who is based in Tel Aviv, has thus far raised less than $100,000 from a pair of young, undrafted NBA players, Los Angeles Lakers rookie AK Okereke and the Atlanta Hawks’ RayJ Dennis.
Okereke and his brother, Ike, run VC firm Mainstreet, which focuses on early-stage financial tech firms. Okereke said they fundamentally view Prosperity as a tech investment, and that the application is a seamless fit into the existing athlete wealth management ecosystem.
“It’d be different if we saw it as some sort of uphill climb to where Mayer’s going to basically have to snatch athletes out of the hands of their existing wealth partners,” said Okereke, who studied economics at Cornell. “It’s more of an additional service, and it adds direct value for the people who are already taking care of these athletes’ finances.”
Prosperity’s advisers include former NBA player Baron Davis, Plumlee, Wharton School professor emeritus Ken Shropshire and former NBA executive Kiki VanDeWeghe.
Shropshire, whose work has largely focused on athlete financial well-being and post-career transitions, said he was intrigued by the idea of a specialized tool built from the ground up with AI: “The player-specific stuff — the idea of when does your pension vest, the way your money is coming in, all of that — [existing tools] aren’t necessarily designed out of the box for that.”
Davis echoed the sentiment, adding that Prosperity is especially valuable to athletes because there’s no question of motive or bias that might exist with a human adviser.
“Prosperity solves that problem. It gives you all the information you need, and I wish I and my generation had a tool like that,” said Davis, now founder and CEO of athlete networking company Business Inside the Game. “This platform understands you — where you’re moving, where you’re spending, how you’re spending, how you’re getting paid. And it becomes kind of like that financial confidant.”
The opportunity in big banking
Reich acknowledged the potential for Prosperity to one day be a regulated fiduciary, but it’s not a goal he’s building toward. Rather, the next big step is potentially licensing Prosperity to the large banks that manage athlete wealth en masse. Those banks may also represent a potential source of capital. Reich insists he has no immediate need to fundraise — he’s turned down four VC term sheets already — but he’d potentially welcome a partner able to provide greater distribution.
“All the big wealth management banks are looking at this very, very closely. I have a relationship at UBS, Merrill, Bank of America, JPMorganChase, Morgan Stanley,” Reich said. “They have a tremendous interest in this, and they also manage most of the capital within the sports and entertainment world.”
“They could all be potential acquirers,” he added. “But again, I’m still early days. I don’t need the capital. I’m building a business and just building it, hopefully, the right way and getting distribution. … I’m now getting 15 to 20 new athletes a day on the platform, so it’s starting to bear its fruits.”
Chris Smith can be reached at crsmith@sportsbusinessjournal.com.
