eToro Signals Tokenized Future With Acquisition of Smart Contract Infrastructure Provider Firmo

- Acquisition brings eToro one step closer to becoming the first truly global service provider allowing people to trade, invest and save –

LONDON, March 25, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Global multi-asset investment platform eToro has today announced that it has acquired Firmo, for an undisclosed amount. Firmo enables smart contracts for derivatives to be securely enabled on any major blockchain.

Commenting on the news Yoni Assia, Co-founder and CEO of eToro, said: "The acquisition of Firmo will enable eToro to accelerate the growth of our tokenized assets offering. Blockchain and the tokenization of assets will play a major role in the future of finance. We believe that in time all investible assets will be tokenized and that we will see the greatest transfer of wealth ever onto the blockchain."

eToro was founded in 2007 with the vision of opening up the global markets so that everyone can trade and invest in a simple and transparent way. While this core vision remains the same, new technology namely blockchain, means that the eToro business has, and will continue to, evolve.

Yoni Assia continued: "While our expansion has been largely organic to date, as the eToro business continues to grow we are on the lookout to acquire businesses which will help us stay at the forefront of fintech innovation. We believe that the market is particularly exciting at the moment."

The Firmo team will act as an internal innovation unit tasked with bringing to life the goal of tokenizing all assets on eToro. This will involve research and development of infrastructure for the representation of assets and the execution of trade processes on blockchain infrastructure.

Dr. Omri Ross, CEO and Founder of Firmo , said: "The advent of crypto and the blockchain technology that underpins it has driven an explosion in financial innovation, however, a number of challenges are preventing mass adoption and integration into legacy infrastructure. Our goal is to enable our users to trade any asset globally with instant settlement by tokenizing assets and executing all essential trade processes on the blockchain."

Firmo's underlying technology provides a platform to securely deploy financial contracts and can work with any blockchain. They have developed a formally verified, domain-specific contract language 'FirmoLang' which, with the support of Firmo's compiler can be translated onto a number of blockchain platforms such as Ethereum, EOS or NEO.

Yoni Assia said: "The Firmo team has done ground-breaking work in developing practical applications for blockchain technology which will facilitate friction-less global trading. The adoption of smart contracts on the blockchain increases trust and transparency in financial services. We are incredibly proud and excited that they will be joining the eToro family. We believe that together we have a very bright future and look forward to pursuing our shared goal to become the first truly global service provider allowing people to trade, invest and save."

Notes to editors:

About eToro

eToro was founded in 2007 with the vision of opening up the global markets so that everyone can trade and invest in a simple and transparent way. The eToro Group consists of the eToro platform, our multi-asset trading and investment venue, and eToroX, which manages our crypto wallet and forthcoming exchange.

The eToro platform enables people to invest in the assets they want, from stocks and commodities to cryptoassets. We are a global community of more than ten million registered users who share their investment strategies; and anyone can follow the approaches of those who have been the most successful. Due to the simplicity of the platform users can easily buy, hold and sell assets, monitor their portfolio in real time, and transact whenever they want.

As technology has evolved, so has our business. In 2018, we created eToroX, our digital asset subsidiary. eToroX provides the infrastructure, in the form of a crypto wallet and the forthcoming exchange, that supports our commitment to facilitating the evolution of tokenized assets. We believe that leveraging blockchain technology will enable us to become the first truly global service provider allowing everyone to trade, invest and save.

Disclaimer:

eToro is regulated in Europe by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority in the UK.

eToroX is incorporated in Gibraltar with company number 116348 and its registered office is at 57/63 Line Wall Road, Gibraltar. It's distributed ledger technology (DLT) provider licence was granted by the Gibraltar Financial Services Commission in December 2018 (licence number FSC1333B).

eToro is a multi-asset platform which offers both investing in stocks and cryptoassets, as well as trading CFDs.

CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 76% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work, and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Cryptoassets are volatile instruments which can fluctuate widely in a very short timeframe and therefore are not appropriate for all investors. Other than via CFDs, trading cryptoassets is unregulated and therefore is not supervised by any regulatory framework. Your capital is at risk.