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Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management
Ross Gerber's Santa Monica wealth manager runs concentrated tech and crypto portfolios for private clients and sub-advises the Gerber Kawasaki ETF.
Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management
Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management was founded in Santa Monica in 2010 by Ross Gerber and Danilo Kawasaki. The firm emerged from Gerber's earlier brokerage work at a regional firm, where he developed a concentrated focus on technology and consumer brands. From inception, the co-founders positioned the firm as an alternative to traditional wirehouse advisors — one that would weigh heavily into Tesla, Apple, and similar growth names at a time when most retail-facing wealth managers were anchored to diversified mutual funds. The firm runs concentrated equity portfolios for individual and family clients, with an investment posture that is distinctly long-biased, large-cap, and tech-heavy. Asset classes include publicly traded equities, ETFs, and, more recently, spot Bitcoin ETFs, which the firm has added to client models. Gerber Kawasaki does not operate as a fund-of-funds; it constructs direct portfolios and also serves as a sub-advisor to an ETF, the AdvisorShares Gerber Kawasaki ETF (GK), which holds names including Tesla, Microsoft, and Nvidia. While California-headquartered, its client base is national, drawn in part by the principals' extensive broadcast and social-media presence — Gerber is a regular CNBC contributor and a prominent financial-voice on X (formerly Twitter), often disclosing firm positions in real time. Gerber Kawasaki has publicly disclosed over $2 billion in client assets, with a team size that has grown alongside the firm's media profile. While a headcount is not fixed in public filings, the firm operates primarily from its Santa Monica headquarters. Recent operational activity includes the launch of the Gerber Kawasaki ETF in 2021 and the firm's early and vocal adoption of spot Bitcoin ETFs in early 2024 as a core allocation for suitable clients. The principals have also been active in advocating for shareholder rights, with Gerber mounting public pressure campaigns targeting the governance of Tesla's board — a posture that blurs the line between investment manager and activist. Gerber Kawasaki's structural differentiator is its hybrid identity as a registered investment adviser that functions as a media company. Client portfolios anchor the operation, but the firm's ability to attract assets is amplified by a broadcast-first philosophy: Gerber's Twitter following and television appearances create a funnel that few RIAs of comparable AUM replicate. This model carries concentration risk, as the firm's brand and asset base are tightly coupled to the public persona of its CEO and the performance of a narrow band of large-cap tech stocks.
General information
Firm type
Multi Family Office
Year founded
2010
AUM
$1B - $5B (Altss estimate)
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
Santa Monica
Corporate office
Santa Monica, CA, United States
Principals
Ross Gerber
CEO & Co-Founder
Danilo Kawasaki
President & Co-Founder
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who makes investment decisions at Gerber Kawasaki?
Co-founder and CEO Ross Gerber serves as the firm's chief investment officer and public face of the investment committee. His partner Danilo Kawasaki — a Brazilian-born former professional tennis player — serves as President and shares portfolio-construction duties. The team's internal research process is not publicly detailed, but Gerber's real-time commentary on X and CNBC indicates that top-down sector conviction and bottom-up, concentrated stock selection drive the central portfolio models.
How does Gerber Kawasaki source its clients?
Client acquisition is driven by a high-profile media presence rather than a traditional referral network or custodial-platform shelf space. Ross Gerber appears regularly on CNBC's Halftime Report and maintains a large following on X, where he openly discusses firm positions. This earned-media funnel attracts self-directed investors seeking an advisor with an active, tech-centric posture rather than a passive allocation model.
Does Gerber Kawasaki run a hedge fund or only private wealth accounts?
Gerber Kawasaki is primarily a private wealth manager — formally a registered investment adviser — managing separate accounts for individuals and families. It is not a hedge fund, though its concentrated, conviction-driven portfolios can resemble one in composition. In 2021, the firm extended its strategy into a publicly traded ETF (ticker GK) through a sub-advisory relationship with AdvisorShares, giving non-clients a way to access its equity model.
What is the Gerber Kawasaki ETF, and how does it differ from the firm's private client portfolios?
The AdvisorShares Gerber Kawasaki ETF (GK), launched in 2021, is an actively managed ETF sub-advised by Gerber Kawasaki. It holds a concentrated basket of growth-oriented companies — top positions have included Tesla, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Amazon. While the ETF mirrors the firm's core equity philosophy, private client accounts may carry additional individual-stock concentrations, direct bond holdings, and now spot Bitcoin ETF allocations that are not necessarily replicated in GK.
How does the firm approach digital assets?
Gerber Kawasaki became an early institutional adopter of spot Bitcoin ETFs in January 2024, assigning a model-portfolio weight to the asset class as soon as the vehicles received SEC approval (per CNBC, January 2024). Ross Gerber has publicly stated that the firm views Bitcoin as an uncorrelated store of value suitable for long-term portfolios; prior to the ETF launch, the firm did not disclose direct cryptocurrency positions.
What is Ross Gerber's record as a shareholder activist?
Ross Gerber has been publicly engaged in shareholder activism, most visibly targeting Tesla's board of directors over governance practices and board independence. In 2023, he campaigned for a board seat, leveraging his firm's concentrated Tesla position and large media following to pressure management. While the campaign did not result in a seat, it established Gerber Kawasaki as one of the few RIAs willing to take public, adversarial governance stances alongside a client-facing wealth practice.
Is Gerber Kawasaki a single-family office or a multi-family office?
Gerber Kawasaki is structured as a multi-family office, registered investment adviser, and wealth manager that serves multiple individual and family clients. It does not originate from a single family's commercial wealth — the firm was built by its two co-founders from inception as a commercial wealth-management enterprise, not as an internal vehicle for their own capital.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
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