Remember when everyone was getting stimulus checks and throwing money at the stock market? That's when Chris Josephs helped launch an investing app called Iris, which let you follow your friends' trades. It was a social thing. But here's what they quickly figured out: most people don't really want to follow their friends' questionable stock picks. They want to follow the people who might actually know something.

"We quickly realized though that the majority of people didn't want to follow their friends, they just wanted to follow the best people," Josephs said.

And who might those "best people" be? Well, if you were on social media in the early 2020s, you saw the same viral posts everyone else did: oddly timed stock trades by members of Congress. Josephs, who was in charge of marketing for Iris at the time, took note. He recalls specific examples, like Nancy Pelosi buying Tesla Inc. (TSLA) stock before the Infrastructure Bill came out and scooping up NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) shares ahead of the CHIPS Act.

So, in 2023, they pivoted. Iris became Autopilot, and they built "the first way to trade alongside Nancy Pelosi." Today, the company has over $1.3 billion in assets. Customers can set their portfolios to automatically mirror the trades of Pelosi (D-Calif.), Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), and other politicians. It turns out, a lot of people are very interested in what Congress is buying.

Why We Can't Look Away From Congressional Trades

Josephs has a theory about the public's fascination, and it comes in three stages. First, there's the shock. "The initial shock of learning that they are allowed to buy and sell stocks," he said. For many, it's news that this is even legal.

Then comes stage two: frustration. "It's like, wait a second, not only are they doing this right in front of us, which I didn't know they were allowed to do, they also are doing a lot of it with conflicts of interest," Josephs explained. He points to Pelosi's well-timed trades, or members buying defense stocks while sitting on armed services committees.

The third stage is where Autopilot lives. "I think, which we're in now, is essentially just kind of like throwing your hands up, being like, screw it, you know, if they're going to keep trading in front of us, we're going to join them."

It's a bit of a cynical, if pragmatic, view. But Josephs is clear that Autopilot's success, fueled by this sentiment, doesn't mean he supports the system. "While Autopilot is benefiting from interest in Congress trading, Josephs said the ultimate goal is to get politicians banned from trading." He finds the frequent violations of the STOCK Act—which requires trades to be reported within 45 days—particularly galling. "It's pretty reasonable and they should be the ones not breaking the law. Yet so many of them do it." The paltry $200 fine for violations doesn't help.

More Than Just Politics: Memes and AI Portfolios

While tracking politicians is the headline act, it's not the whole show. Josephs says these political portfolios make up about 40% to 45% of customer assets on Autopilot. The rest is split between two other categories: meme portfolios (15%) and user-created portfolios (40%).

The meme section includes crowd-pleasers like the Inverse Cramer ETF. The user-created portfolios are where things get really interesting. Josephs highlights portfolios developed by a Wharton professor using AI. "He created prompts to essentially have AI pick stocks for him," Josephs said. This includes a "Grok" portfolio and others that use Claude and ChatGPT to select stocks. "We'll see which AI language learning model does the best at picking stocks," he added.

Other user creations include a "World War III" portfolio. Josephs is also excited to see more portfolios from Twitter personalities, YouTubers, and aspiring fund managers taking shape on the platform.

How Autopilot Stacks Up Against Congressional ETFs

You might be thinking this sounds a bit like those congressional trading ETFs that popped up, like the Unusual Whales Subversive Democratic Trading ETF (NANC) and the Unusual Whales Subversive Republican Trading ETF (GOP). Josephs says there's a key difference. Those ETFs offer broad exposure to the trading activity of many politicians in a party. Autopilot, however, lets you target your strategy. Want to follow just one specific representative or senator? You can do that.

Autopilot also partners with brokerages to allow direct integration into customers' existing brokerage portfolios, making the copy-trading process seamless. From a simple idea born from viral social media posts, Autopilot has built a billion-dollar business by tapping into a unique mix of public skepticism, curiosity, and the desire to maybe, just maybe, get a piece of the action.