FX week in review: Results from Plus500, Trading 212 and Capital.com, exec changes at Exness, ActivTrades, GMI
How did leading FCA licensed brokers Plus500, Trading 212 and Capital.com perform with the release of their latest financial results?
Who was installed as the new CEO of London based institutional FX broker GMI UK?
Who was hired (from outside the company, and the FX/CFDs sector) as the new CMO of industry-leading broker Exness?
Who is ActivTrades’ new Chairman?
Answers to these questions, and a whole lot more, appeared first or exclusively this past week at FNG. Some of the most read and commented-on FX industry news stories to appear over the past seven days on FNG included:
Trading 212 UK doubles profit in 2021 as Revenues hit £94M. London and Bulgaria based online broker Trading 212 has apparently continued its stellar growth from 2020 into 2021, with the company’s FCA licensed arm, Trading 212 UK Limited, reporting Revenue growth of 73% from £54.3 million in 2020 to £94.1 million (USD $122 million) in 2021. Net profit for Trading 212 UK came in at £45.3 million, more than double 2020’s £21.9 million. In terms of the overall group, the UK arm represented 44% of overall parent company Trading 212 Group Limited’s revenues in 2020 (£124 million). So if that ratio roughly holds for 2021, it would mean that the overall Trading 212 Group brought in about £214 million in revenue in 2021. But, we’ll have to wait for the parent company to report, which it hasn’t yet done.
Plus500 reports solid revenues, EBITDA in Q1 2022. CFDs broker Plus500 Ltd (LON:PLUS) today provided a trading update for the first quarter of 2022, with all key operational and financial metrics ahead of the final quarter of 2021. The performance was driven by the consistent strength and increasing scale of Plus500’s technology to enable customers’ trading activities across a wide range of geographic markets, products and financial instruments. Revenue in Q1 2022 was $270.9m (Q4 2021: $161.1m, Q1 2021: $203.2m).
Capital.com reports $90B in monthly trading volumes in Q1-2022, up 36%. FCA, ASIC, and CySEC licensed online brokerage group Capital.com has announced its results for the first quarter ended 31 March 2022. In this period, a total of USD 270bn was traded on the platform, up by 36% from the previous quarter – meaning average monthly client trading volumes of $90 billion. Over the same period, the platform’s user base grew by 27% with over 1 million new accounts created in Q1 2022. There are now more than five million people who have set up a user account with Capital.com. More than 345,000 traders have carried out trades, and more than 78,000 of these are active monthly.
UAE regulator grants OTC license to global broker Equiti Group. Equiti Group has announced that it has become one of the first global brokers to be granted an OTC Derivatives and Foreign Exchange Spot Markets license by the UAE Securities and Commodities Authority (SCA). Equiti Securities Currencies Brokers LLC is a subsidiary of the Equiti Group, a world-class provider of multi-asset financial products and online trading technology. This newly introduced activity is for licensing Over-The-Counter (OTC) Derivatives and Foreign Exchange Spot Markets under Category One of SCA’s Regulations Manual of the Financial Activities – or ‘licensing rulebook’.
Top FX industry executive moves reported at FNG this week included:
❑ Exclusive: Zaid Alkhatib to replace Ashraf Ebid as CEO of GMI UK.
❑ Exclusive: Exness hires PokerStars exec Alfonso Cardalda as its new CMO.
❑ Exclusive: StoneX exec Ana Cavero joins Skilling as Head of Product.
❑ Exclusive: ActivTrades Chairman John Reed resigns.
❑ Exclusive: Trading 212 Chairman Andrew Bole joins board of Britannia Global.
❑ Joe (JJ) Kinahan joins tastytrade as VP and Chief Market Strategist.