eToro Overview
Good as advertised, eToro is one of the more popular brands in the brokerage industry with a market-leading social trading platform offering. This platform allows its traders to copy the trade of investors across over 2300 financial instruments.
Discover more features and trading advantages with eToro by gleaning this broker review.
eToro Background & Safety
A global fintech leader, eToro was established with the mission to make trading accessible to anyone, anywhere, and reduce dependency on traditional financial institutions. The firm was established in 2007 and launched its proprietary trading platform Visual FX Trading Platform.
In 2012, eToro introduced its mobile trading app and encapsulated its programs including WebTrader and OpenBook. In 2018, eToro launched its US cryptocurrency trading platform. The trading brand has three entities in eToro (Europe) Ltd, eToro (UK) Ltd, and eToro AUS Capital Pty Ltd. All these entities are affiliated with regulating bodies in their respective jurisdictions.
eToro (Europe) Ltd is authorized and regulated by the Cyprus Securities Exchange Commission (CySEC); eToro (UK) Ltd, is authorized and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), and; eToro AUS Capital Pty Ltd. is authorized by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). Though eToro does not operate a bank and is not publicly traded, with its multiple regulatory certifications, it has reputable regulatory credentials and is one of the respected brands in the trading industry.
On rare occasions in which market conditions cause your Equity to go negative, eToro will absorb the loss and reset your Equity to zero through its Negative Balance Protection policy.
The broker is best known for its patented social trading platform and cryptocurrency trading. It continues to revolutionize the fintech industry with its cutting-edge trading solutions. It birthed the world’s first social trading platform by innovating the CopyTrader platform. This platform was highly recognized by the industry and won Finovate Europe Best of Show for 2011.
eToro Features & Fees
Market Coverage
eToro provides traders access to a wide range of trading instruments covering forex (with over 47 currency pairs), commodities (31 instruments), stocks, cryptocurrencies (94 cryptocurrencies), and ETFs (151 available). eToro also offers CFD trading across asset classes (over 2300 instruments to choose from). In sum, eToro offers a total of 2361 tradable symbols.
Account Types
With eToro, traders are classified between retails clients and professional traders. Depending on their classification, traders are provided a live trading account that fits their trading background through a set of trading features and conditions.
For retail clients, they are given access to all the broker’s trading assets and can trade both manually or via Copy Trade. While their leverage is restricted, they do receive certain protections such as coverage by the Investor Compensation Fund and recourse to the Financial Ombudsman Service. They are also entitled to negative balance protection and margin closeout restrictions.
Meanwhile, only clients who meet certain criteria can opt to change their status from Retail Client to Professional Client and access an account tailored for professional traders. Traders need to apply for professional status via the broker’s official site.
eToro also offers demo accounts for CFD trading and top markets trading. It is funded with virtual money up to $100,000 to experience trading without risk.
In terms of fees, traders can open a trading account for free. For stocks trading, eToro has no commission fee. The broker also has no management fees. However, the broker charges nontrading fees including an inactivity fee and conversion fee (for non-USD deposits).
Funding Methods
eToro provides traders with an array of funding options accepting transactions through VISA, Mastercard, PayPal, Skrill, Neteller, UnionPay, WebMoney, and Yandex.
eToro charges no deposit fees, but they have currency conversion fees for non-USD deposits. Withdrawals incur a low fee of $5 and there are no clearance fees.
Promotions
The Popular Investor program is unique to eToro. It is a platform that enables successful investors to build up their business by sharing their expertise and expanding their AUM on the eToro platform. To become a Popular Investor, you need to create an eToro account, deposit funds, trade, maintain a low-risk score, update your profile, abide by the leverage restrictions, and accomplish the application form available on its site.
eToro Trading Platforms & Tools
Trading Platform
The eToro trading platform and app is a multi-asset platform equipped with advanced trading features, such as leverage and short (SELL) orders. Some other notable features of the trading app include Tipranks Research Tab, one-click trading, Stop Loss and Take Profit, Trailing Stop Loss, procharts, and offline trading.
eToro’s mobile trading app is available for download on Google Play and The App Store.
For social trading, eToro has developed platforms in CopyTrader and CopyPortfolios.
Trading Tools
eToro houses an extensive education section for its traders. It is comprised of different materials and resources such as News and Analysis, Podcast, Daily Market Review, Video Tutorials, and Trading School.
Bottom Line
eToro is a good fit for traders who want to utilize its copy trading facility in order to gain trading experience and even for veteran traders who want to be rewarded for sharing their ideas with other traders. Beginning traders will also benefit from its user-friendly trading app.
