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Match-Trade Names New Platform Head to Push Prop Trading and Prediction Markets
Match-Trade
Technologies has put Serhii Poplavskyi in charge of its Match-Trader platform,
handing a long-time brokerage executive the job of pushing the software deeper
into prop trading and into the prediction markets the vendor began selling to
brokers earlier this year.Poplavskyi
arrives with more than 15 years across the brokerage and commercial sides of
the industry, and the company said it wanted someone who could turn what
brokers and prop firms actually need into platform decisions. His mandate
runs from scaling adoption to lifting the platform's charting and expanding its
CRM, while building on the momentum from the prediction markets product Match-Trade rolled out for brokers
in April.A Broker-Side Hire, Not a
Pure Tech OnePoplavskyi
spent more than a decade at FIBO Group, where he ran the firm's Ukraine office
before leading its expansion into Latin America from a hub in Costa Rica. More
recently he served as sales director at D Prime. That background leans
commercial rather than engineering, which fits the reason the company gave for
the hire.The choice
signals where Match-Trade thinks the competition is now decided. Execution and
charting are table stakes, the firm's pitch goes, and the harder problem is
fitting a platform to how a brokerage actually runs.Platform Vendors Jostle as
MetaTrader Loosens Its GripMatch-Trader
competes in a field that has grown more crowded since 2024, when MetaQuotes
raised MetaTrader licensing fees and kept restricting third-party integrations.
Rivals have
used the opening. FinanceMagnates.com's rundown of top broker platforms for 2026 lists Match-Trader next to
MetaTrader 5, Spotware's cTrader and Devexperts' DXtrade.Match-Trade has been gaining ground in that
race. The company reported a 290% jump in server
clients between
January 2024 and 2025, and chief executive Michal Karczewski said the platform signed more than 160 brokers and
prop firms in 2025,
with 1.8 million trader accounts registered.The
platform can run standalone, sit behind a broker's own front end, or bolt on as
an add-on environment, and it pairs built-in charts with a TradingView integration. Rivals keep
adding features of their own, with Spotware recently opening cTrader to AI agents.Charting, CRM and
Prediction Markets Top the ListPoplavskyi's
stated priorities are upgrading Match-Trader charting to what the company calls
an industry-leading standard, strengthening its CRM, and pushing further into
integrations and automation. He also
wants to extend the firm's early move into event-based trading."In
2026, execution speed and advanced charting tools are simply the expected
baseline," Poplavskyi said, arguing that flexibility and scalability now
separate one platform from another.The
prediction markets piece puts Match-Trade in a fast-filling lane. Leverate and Devexperts have both launched
broker-facing event-trading products, and the sector posted a record single-day
volume of $701.7 million in January 2026. Global
prediction market volume crossed $44 billion in 2025, according to industry
estimates.A Bet on Long-Term Broker
RelationshipsPoplavskyi
expects the lines between brokerage, prop trading and newer market formats to
blur, with brokers leaning toward AI-driven workflows and modular
infrastructure. He also
said brokers increasingly want deeper technology partnerships rather than plain
software supply, a shift Match-Trade is positioning itself to serve.His
longer-term aim, he said, is to help clients grow faster and stay competitive
however the market moves, and to have them treat the vendor as a partner that
evolves alongside them.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
FXTF Becomes First Japanese Broker to Connect With TradingView
FXTF has
linked its trading systems to TradingView in what the charting platform says is
the first integration of a locally licensed Japanese forex and CFD broker. The
connection lets clients in Japan place forex, commodity and crypto CFD orders
without leaving their charts, TradingView said in announcing the deal.FXTF, which
operates under the Goldenway Japan name and holds a license from Japan's
Financial Services Agency, was founded in 2006 and runs more than 280,000
client accounts out of Tokyo. TradingView
said the integration covers the broker's 29 currency pairs, a short list of
commodity CFDs on gold, silver, crude oil and natural gas, plus crypto CFDs on
bitcoin and ether.A Domestic First in a
Market Built on In-House PlatformsJapan runs
one of the largest retail forex businesses in the world, and most of it flows
through software the brokers build themselves. The biggest
domestic names push their volume through proprietary apps rather than
third-party tools, and DMM Securities ran the highest
average monthly FX volume of any broker globally in 2025, at roughly $1.46 trillion,
according to FM Intelligence.That scale
rests on a domestic client base that has long favored homegrown interfaces and
Japanese-language support. GMO Click and DMM, the market's two anchors, have
little reason to lean on outside platforms.FXTF sits
at the smaller end of that field and has reached for external technology
before, offering MetaTrader 4 alongside its own GX platform. Adding
TradingView hands its users a charting and order-entry layer that competes with
the in-house systems the larger brokers depend on.TradingView Keeps Signing
Up BrokersTradingView
has spent the past two years wiring brokers into its platform so traders can
execute inside its charts. CMC Markets added the feature in
April 2025, and tastyfx, the US forex arm of IG,
connected in October 2024. IC Markets joined in March 2024, with Vantage and Capital.com among
earlier additions.Most of
those partners are international CFD brokers chasing a global retail audience.
FXTF's deal is narrower, aimed squarely at Japanese residents, who keep local
investor protections only when they trade through a JFSA-licensed firm.That focus
is the main thing setting it apart. Where the earlier integrations opened
TradingView to brokers serving dozens of countries, FXTF is bringing the
platform into a domestic market that foreign brokers struggle to crack without
a local license. ThinkMarkets, for one, launched FX
trading in Japan only in 2022, after buying a licensed local firm to obtain its permit.Japan's Strict Rulebook
Shapes the OfferJapan caps
retail forex leverage at 25 to 1, well below the levels offshore brokers
advertise, and bans the deposit bonuses common in other markets. Licensed
firms must segregate client money and belong to the Financial Futures
Association of Japan, with clients covered up to ¥10 million if a broker fails.Those rules
have produced a deep, slow-moving market often personified by "Mrs.
Watanabe," the shorthand for the Japanese retail traders whose USD/JPY
activity feeds into global volumes. The 25-to-1 cap has held steady
through repeated regulatory reviews rather than tightening further.FXTF said
it runs a zero-spread model that is fixed in principle, with exceptions, and
charges no trading commissions, though certain position-related fees can apply.
There is no minimum deposit.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
Crypto Firms Moved Into Football. The FCA Wants Clubs to Vet Them
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority has warned Premier League and other football clubs that partnerships with unauthorized crypto and trading firms could expose them to legal liability and, in some cases, criminal sanctions.According to Reuters, the FCA is placing greater responsibility on football clubs for the sponsors they choose. The regulator expects clubs to vet commercial partners and ensure they comply with UK financial promotion rules.The Sponsorship Loophole Might Be Closing Offshore brokers, crypto exchanges, and high-leverage platforms have used football sponsorships for years to build brand recognition and reach UK retail clients without going through standard financial promotion channels. With 70% of Premier League clubs currently holding at least one crypto or trading partnership, the sector has become a significant source of sponsorship revenue as gambling advertising is phased out. "Millions of football fans trust their club's badge," said Lucy Castledine, the FCA's director of consumer investments. "Clubs should not let unauthorised financial firms exploit that loyalty by putting potentially dodgy products in front of millions of fans."A Valuable Sponsorship Market Comes Under Pressure
In February 2025, Luke Jackson, sports and technology director at law firm Walker Morris, told Reuters that crypto companies were among the sectors best positioned to benefit from the Premier League’s planned ban on front-of-shirt gambling sponsorships from the 2026/27 season.
Much of that shift has already happened. More than half of Premier League clubs now have at least one crypto partnership, while companies including Crypto.com, Gate.io, and Kraken have secured sponsorship agreements across European football.
The commercial incentives are significant. Sponsorship and partnership agreements have become one of the largest revenue sources for major clubs. According to Deloitte, Manchester City generated €408 million in commercial revenue in 2025, exceeding its €332 million in broadcast revenue.
What This Means for BrokersFor FCA-authorised firms, the crackdown may work in their favour, reducing competition for sponsorship inventory as unregulated offshore rivals face growing pressure. The FCA’s warning suggests that access to football sponsorships may increasingly depend on regulatory status as well as marketing budgets.
This article was written by Tanya Chepkova at www.financemagnates.com.
“Long-Term Opportunities across GCC”: Edgewater Markets Pushes Dubai Expansion
Edgewater Markets, which offers liquidity and execution solutions for forex trading, is expanding its presence in Dubai as it sees “significant long-term opportunities across the GCC, wider MENA and Western Asian regions.”The Company Ramped Up Local HiringThe company has ramped up its hiring in Dubai, as it is investing in its presence in the region through people and office facilities.“Dubai is an important location for Edgewater Markets Group given its strategic position between Europe and Asia, together with its growing importance as an international financial centre,” said Richard Elston, who joined the company earlier this year as a Strategy Consultant.His responsibility within the company is specifically to support the establishment of its Dubai operations.Read more: After a Decade at CMC Markets, Richard Elston Joins Edgewater Affiliate EWMP“For more than 17 years, the group has operated across international markets, supporting institutional market participants through multi-asset liquidity, market infrastructure and institutional connectivity. As part of our continued growth strategy, we are strengthening our presence in Dubai and expanding the team and relationships that will support the next stage of the business.”Launched in 2009 in New York, Edgewater opened offices in London and Singapore in the following two years and now operates globally from several locations.“We see significant long-term opportunities across the GCC, wider MENA and Western Asian regions and believe Dubai is a natural location from which to further develop our international footprint,” Elston continued.Indeed, the move also makes sense, as several trading industry brands are now setting up operations in the UAE, particularly in Dubai.Closer to the ClientsThe regulator in the country is offering a tiered operational licence to fully licensed service providers, including contracts for differences (CFD) brokers, giving them operational legitimacy in the country.Most brokers have obtained an introducing broker-equivalent licence from Dubai’s regulator, while only a few big names have secured full brokerage status. The reason is obvious: the entry-level Category 5 licence is much cheaper and has minimal operational requirements compared to the Category 1 licence.It remains unclear whether Edgewater will also seek a Dubai licence, but it is very likely, depending on the services it offers.
This article was written by Arnab Shome at www.financemagnates.com.
Moneta Markets Launches SpaceX CFD Trading
Dubai, UAE, 28 May 2026 – Moneta Markets has announced the launch of SpaceX CFD trading, with SPCXUSD now available to clients on MetaTrader 5 and the Moneta Markets AppTrader platform.SpaceX is one of the world’s most closely followed technology and space exploration companies. Through SPCXUSD CFDs, Moneta Markets clients can trade price movements linked to SpaceX, taking either long or short positions as market sentiment shifts around company developments, launches, milestones and broader interest in the space and technology sectors.The launch comes as SpaceX continues to attract significant attention from global markets. Recent reports have indicated that the company could target a valuation of around USD 1.75 trillion in a potential public listing. Reuters has also reported that SpaceX generated approximately USD 15 billion to USD 16 billion in revenue in 2025, with around USD 8 billion in EBITDA, supported largely by the continued growth of its Starlink satellite internet business.“SpaceX is one of the most closely watched companies in the world,” said Moneta Markets Founder and CEO, David Bily. “From reusable rockets to Starlink, it continues to push boundaries in industries that attract enormous global interest. That makes SpaceX a compelling market story for traders. With the launch of SPCXUSD, our clients can now access price movements linked to SpaceX through a CFD, with the ability to trade both long and short.”SPCXUSD is available now on MetaTrader 5 and AppTrader.Clients can learn more or start trading SpaceX CFDs by visiting monetamarkets.com.About Moneta MarketsMoneta Markets is a global CFD broker offering access to a wide range of global markets, including foreign exchange, indices, commodities, share CFDs, cryptocurrencies, bonds and ETFs through its MT4, MT5, ProTrader and AppTrader platforms. The brand is committed to delivering advanced trading technology, competitive trading conditions and high-quality client support across a secure, multi-regulated environment.
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
SEC Draft Plan Would Curb Enforcement Reach and Cement Atkins's Crypto Turn
The US
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has put its turn under Chairman Paul
Atkins into writing, publishing a draft strategic plan that would narrow the
agency's enforcement reach, build rules for crypto, and widen access to private
markets. The
regulator released the document this week and set a July 2 deadline for public
comment, according to the SEC.The plan
organizes the agency's work around three goals, and it reads as a formal
version of the priorities Atkins has pushed since he took over the commission in April
2025. At its
center sits a return to what the SEC calls its core three-part mission,
protecting investors, keeping markets fair and efficient, and helping companies
raise capital. Atkins said the agency "will not stray from this core
three-part mission."Enforcement Reach Pulled
Back to Fraud and ManipulationOne goal
would shift the SEC's enforcement approach back to what the document describes
as Congress's original intent, policing fraud and manipulation rather than
stretching its authority through one-off actions. The plan also calls for
periodic, backward-looking reviews of existing rules.That
language formalizes a change that has been underway for more than a year. The agency
dismissed seven crypto enforcement actions between February and May 2025, including
cases against Coinbase, Binance, and the current Commission has cast its
predecessor's work as a misallocation of resources.Atkins has
separately argued the prior SEC would shoot first and ask questions later. The numbers
track the rhetoric. Although the SEC logged 456 enforcement actions in
fiscal 2025, much
of the story was what it walked away from, and one outside analysis found
enforcement actions against public companies fell about 30% in fiscal 2025
compared with the prior year. A Formal Rulebook for
Crypto and TokenizationThe draft
lists, as a specific objective, giving digital assets and distributed ledger
technology a firm regulatory footing through what it calls a rational,
coherent, and principled approach. Atkins has
used nearly identical wording before, so the goal reads as a codification of an
existing priority rather than a new one.Here too,
the agency has already been moving. The SEC defined its crypto rules in March
2026, an approach
that pushed more compliance
responsibility onto brokers by tying a token's status to how it is marketed and used. It has also
clarified the treatment of tokenized
stocks, and Atkins
has backed "super-app" trading
platforms that
combine trading, lending, and staking.Private Markets and
Retirement Accounts in the CrosshairsThe same
goal would expand access to private markets and open new capital-raising
pathways, language that points to one of the more contested items on the
chairman's agenda. Atkins has
asked staff to revisit accredited-investor rules written 23 years ago, noting
that private markets grew from $11.6 trillion to $30.8 trillion over the past
decade. That effort
overlaps with a White House push. President
Donald Trump signed an executive order in August 2025 directing regulators
to clear the path for 401(k) participants to allocate part of their portfolios
to private equity, real estate, digital assets, and other alternatives. Not
everyone is on board. Senator
Elizabeth Warren has warned that loosening the rules risks exposing many
more investors to the heightened risks that come with private offerings, a
counterweight that is likely to surface in the comment file. iEDGAR and Legacy Systems
Face a Technology OverhaulThe third
goal targets the agency's own plumbing. The SEC says a review of legacy
systems, including its EDGAR filing platform, plus newer infrastructure will
improve data integrity and cut operational risk, according to the document. It adds
that the responsible use of artificial intelligence and blockchain could
sharpen oversight and lower costs, a claim the plan does not quantify.The public
can weigh in through July 2, with submissions referencing file number DSP-3 by
the agency's online form, email, or mail. The SEC says it built the draft using
input from meetings with members of Congress, investors, businesses, market
participants, and academics. Final
adoption, and how far the agency follows through, will depend in part on what
those comments say.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
easyMarkets Launches New MT5 Trading Experiences Designed Around Different Trading Styles
Limassol, Cyprus – May 2026, easyMarkets has announced the launch of its new MT5 trading experiences, introducing three account types designed to provide traders with greater flexibility, personalised support, and access to tailored trading benefits.Launched under the campaign theme “Your Trading. Your Level.”, the new offering aims to create a more customised trading experience by allowing clients to choose the account type that best aligns with their trading style, experience level, and goals.The new MT5 account experiences include:Basic: designed for traders taking their first steps into online trading Standard: built for active traders looking for additional trading tools and rewards VIP: created for experienced traders seeking premium support and enhanced market insights Each account type provides access to the MT5 platform alongside a range of trading features and benefits tailored to different trading needs, including cashback opportunities, subscriptions, dedicated support, and market analysis tools.Speaking about the launch, Koula Lamprou CEO or easyMarkets, said:“At easyMarkets, we understand that every trader approaches the markets differently. Some are just getting started, while others are looking for more advanced tools, deeper insights, and additional support as they develop their trading strategies.Our new MT5 trading experiences are designed to give traders more choice and flexibility, while creating a trading environment that feels more relevant to their individual goals and level of experience.”All account types provide access to the MT5 platform alongside features including floating spreads from 0.6 pips, dynamic leverage up to 1:2000, Trading Central indicators, daily market analysis and dedicated support.According to easyMarkets, the launch reflects the company’s continued focus on developing trader-centric solutions that combine accessibility, flexibility, and platform functionality within one trading environment.Traders can explore the new MT5 account types and compare the different trading experiences by visiting: https://bit.ly/mt5_account_types About easyMarkets easyMarkets, founded in 2001, is an award-winning global broker. One of the first to offer an online experience with innovative risk management tools, including Guaranteed Stop Loss with No Slippage* and easyTrade. easyMarkets provides its sizeable clientele with a streamlined, accessible, and flexible trading experience. Offering over 275 tradeable instruments, tight fixed spreads, and 24/5 dedicated support to traders around the world, easyMarkets continues to revolutionize the trading sector by providing unparalleled security and safeguards for client funds and consistently prioritizing client commitment and satisfaction
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
eToro US Head Steps Down After Two-Year Tenure as Alain Tennekoon Takes Over
Andrew McCormick, Head
of US operations at eToro, has stepped down from his role. He announced the
departure on LinkedIn. In his post, he wrote: “My time here has come to an end
but I’ll forever be thankful for an unforgettable adventure.”eToro said that Alain
Tennekoon, Head of Operations and Service for eToro’s US business, will assume
McCormick’s responsibilities.eToro US Head McCormick Steps DownCommenting on his departure,
the company said: “We thank McCormick for his contributions to eToro’s U.S.
business and wish him the very best in his new role.”McCormick took on the role of Head of eToro
US after Lule
Demmissie stepped down as CEO of the company’s US operations. He served in
the position for around two years. He was promoted into the role following his
previous position as US Senior Counsel, which he held for more than two years
at the firm.He also reflected on
his time at the company, saying “The work was challenging” and adding that he
was “blessed to have spent the past 4.5 years with a team full of passion,
integrity, and kindness.” He said he was “grateful for the lessons learned” and
for “the work we did to help investors.”Morgan Stanley to eToro Career PathPrior to joining
eToro, he worked at Morgan Stanley as Vice President, Regulatory Enforcement
and Litigation Counsel for around one year and four months. In that role, he
handled regulatory investigations following Morgan Stanley’s acquisition of
E*TRADE.Before that, he spent
around four years at E*TRADE. He first served as Director and Associate General
Counsel for just over one year, and earlier as Assistant General Counsel for
nearly three years. In these roles, he worked on regulatory investigations and
advised product, operations, technology, AML, marketing, and compliance teams.He began his legal
career at Eversheds Sutherland, where he worked as a Litigation and Enforcement
Associate for more than six years.eToro Expands Crypto Trading in New YorkMeanwhile, eToro
has expanded its crypto trading services to residents of New York, allowing
users to buy and sell digital assets alongside stocks, ETFs, and options on its
platform. The move extends the company’s crypto
offering to 48 U.S. states and follows approval from New York financial
regulators. The company secured both the New York State BitLicense and Money
Transmitter License after years of engagement with state authorities, enabling
it to operate within one of the most tightly regulated U.S. markets.
This article was written by Tareq Sikder at www.financemagnates.com.
XTB Lets Polish Investors Pick Which Shares to Sell, Bypassing FIFO Tax Rule
XTB has
started letting Polish clients decide exactly which shares or ETFs they sell,
instead of pushing every disposal through the first-in, first-out method, or
FIFO, that has long governed how the country's brokers calculate taxable gains.
The feature
went live on May 29, and the company says it is the first brokerage in Poland
to offer it.The pitch
is tax. By choosing the lot they sell, investors get a say in the size of the
gain they realize, and therefore the bill they hand to the tax office.How FIFO Inflates the Tax
BillPoland
taxes capital gains at a flat 19%, the levy known locally as “the Belka tax,” after
Marek Belka, the finance minister who introduced it in 2002. When an investor
buys the same stock in several tranches at different prices and later sells
part of the holding, the cost basis assigned to that sale decides how large the
taxable gain is.Under FIFO,
the earliest purchases are treated as sold first. On a position that has
climbed over time, those are usually the cheapest shares, which maximizes the
recorded gain and the tax due.XTB, like other domestic brokers, had been
applying the rule automatically.Polish law
does let investors identify the actual purchase price of the shares they sell,
so FIFO is a default rather than the only path. Brokers have stuck with it
partly because exchange-listed shares are dematerialized, which makes it hard
to pin down which specific shares left an account. XTB now
lets clients make that call themselves, or keep FIFO if they prefer.Routine Abroad, New for
WarsawChoosing
tax lots is standard fare in more developed brokerage markets. Interactive
Brokers has long run a tool it calls the Tax Optimizer, which lets clients
override FIFO with last-in first-out, highest-cost, or manually selected lots
across its desktop, mobile, and web platforms. In the
United States, the IRS permits this so-called specific identification as long
as the investor flags the chosen lot at the time of sale.Automated
versions have been around for years too. The robo-advisers Betterment and
Wealthfront built tax-loss harvesting, which sells losing lots to offset gains
elsewhere, into their platforms more than a decade ago, with Betterment
launching its tool in 2014.However, not
every market allows the move. Germany makes FIFO mandatory for securities under
its flat withholding tax, leaving investors no room to pick lots, while the
United Kingdom pools shares of the same class together and applies a 30-day
matching rule meant to stop investors gaming disposals. Poland's
FIFO default has sat closer to the German model, which is what makes XTB's
change notable at home even as it catches up to tools traders elsewhere take
for granted. XTB's
version is also narrower than Interactive Brokers' menu, offering a choice
between manual selection and FIFO rather than a suite of algorithms, and it
works only inside an XTB account. The broker
has spent the past year extending its options product across
Europe and adding
spot crypto, so a tax feature fits a wider effort to broaden what the platform
does.What It Changes for
InvestorsFor active
investors, the tool has real bite. Someone sitting on gains can close a
higher-cost lot to book a loss that offsets earlier profits, or hang on to the
cheapest shares to push that tax into a later year. For a buy-and-hold saver
who rarely trims positions, it changes little.Omar
Arnaout, XTB's chief executive, tied the launch to client demand.
"Investors have been asking us about the ability to manage individual
positions for a long time," he said, adding that the company moved ahead
"after external tax consultations" confirmed the approach was
workable. He also
described XTB as "setting standards for the entire sector," a framing
the company applied to its own product.XTB paired
the announcement with a claim that more
than one in three investors in Poland now holds an account with it, which
is confirmed by the latest KDPW data.XTB has
been drawing new traders onto the
platform at pace,
counting more than 2.16 million clients globally at the end of 2025. The tax
feature also has limits worth noting: it optimizes only within a single XTB
account, since each broker issues its own annual tax statement, and FIFO stays
in place as the fallback.A Product Push Backed by
Heavy MarketingXTB rolled
out the change during an unusually strong stretch of results. The Warsaw-listed
broker reported first-quarter net profit of
PLN 535 million, up
176% from a year earlier, on operating income of PLN 1.09 billion.That growth
has been bought, in part, with marketing. XTB lifted its marketing spend by close
to 70% in 2025 to
PLN 584.9 million and added 864,000 accounts during the year, a 73% jump. It
has also kept regulators busy at home, absorbing a record fine from
Poland's KNF that
investors largely shrugged off.The wider
point is that all the maneuvering around FIFO stems from how Poland's capital
gains levy was built. The tax arrived as a temporary measure more than two
decades ago and has outlasted repeated talk of reform. Until the
finance ministry reworks it, brokers competing for Polish savers are left to
engineer their own workarounds, and XTB has now turned one of them into a
selling point.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
Virtu Financial Ireland Gets MiCA Approval and CASP License for EU Crypto Services
Virtu Financial Inc
said its Irish subsidiary has received regulatory approval under the European
Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets framework, allowing it to operate crypto-asset
services across all 27 EU member states.The authorization was
granted to Virtu Financial Ireland Limited. It enables the firm to provide
regulated digital asset services, including trading and liquidity provision,
under a single EU-wide framework. The approval covers institutional and
professional clients across the bloc.CASP License Supports Virtu ExpansionThe MiCA framework
sets out unified rules for crypto-asset service providers in the European
Union. It is designed to provide legal clarity and "regulatory consistency" across the region’s digital asset market.Virtu described the
approval as a key milestone in its digital asset strategy. It said the license
supports its expansion in regulated crypto markets.“Obtaining our CASP
license is a testament to Virtu's long-standing commitment to operating within
robust regulatory frameworks and providing our clients with transparency and
liquidity,” said Scotte Moegling, Head of Business Development for Digital Assets
at Virtu Financial.He added that “the
EU's MiCA framework provides clear rules of engagement for digital asset
markets,” and said the firm is positioned to support institutional clients
across Europe under the new rules.Crypto Firms Expand Under MiCAIn broader context,
several crypto firms have also secured MiCA authorisations across Europe. Kraken
received a Markets in Crypto-Assets licence from the Central Bank of Ireland.
The approval allows the exchange to operate under the EU-wide regulatory
framework for crypto-asset service providers. "The company has also reported
higher euro-denominated spot trading, which it said now accounts for 17.5% of
total volume.Other exchanges have
also obtained MiCA approvals across the bloc. Crypto.com and OKX received
authorisations via Malta, while Coinbase and Bitstamp were
approved by regulators in Luxembourg. Bitpanda has secured MiCA licences in
multiple jurisdictions, including Austria.
This article was written by Tareq Sikder at www.financemagnates.com.
Prediction markets go institutional as Galaxy Digital moves event trading to the OTC swap market
Galaxy Digital has launched a swap dealer arm to give institutional clients bilateral access to event-driven contracts, a structure that bypasses public prediction exchanges entirely.
The headline transaction is a $10 million OTC event swap between Galaxy and crypto hedge fund Arca, tied to the passage of a major U.S. crypto bill. That single trade is nearly five times larger than the comparable contract listed on Kalshi.Crypto finance conglomerate Galaxy Digital has launched a trading desk to offer large investors better access to prediction markets https://t.co/jEltvdimjT— Bloomberg (@business) June 2, 2026
Why Institutional Volume is Moving Off-Exchange
Kalshi's annualized volume recently tripled to $178 billion, yet liquidity on non-sports events remains shallow. Macro hedge funds and family offices that want meaningful exposure face a structural problem: order books on platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket aren't deep enough to absorb large trades without moving the price. OTC dealers can warehouse that risk.
Privacy is a separate consideration. A block trade executed on a blockchain-based platform like Polymarket leaves a public record tied to a wallet address, which can expose a fund's positioning. Bilateral OTC execution carries no such disclosure risk.
The third factor is legal infrastructure. ISDA Master Agreements let institutional clients book event risk within the frameworks they already use - same documentation, same counterparty relationships - rather than connecting to new and often offshore platforms. That reduces both operational and regulatory friction.
"Prediction markets are currently not a sophisticated institutional market with enough liquidity for a fund of our size," said Jeff Dorman, CIO of Arca. "By utilizing the OTC market with Galaxy, we were able to execute a trade that best suits our fund strategy."
Institutional Infrastructure Around Prediction Markets
Galaxy's move sits within a broader shift in how intermediaries are positioning around prediction market growth. Wintermute has begun posting continuous two-sided liquidity on public prediction platforms to tighten spreads. Marex has packaged prediction market outcomes into principal-protected structured notes for high-net-worth clients. The Coalition for Prediction Markets, meanwhile, is lobbying in Washington to establish a federal regulatory framework for the sector.
For larger investors, OTC dealers currently offer something prediction market exchanges often cannot: privacy, execution capacity, and familiar derivatives infrastructure
This article was written by Tanya Chepkova at www.financemagnates.com.
Announcing the Winners of The Trading Awards Africa 2026
The wait is over, and the traders have spoken. The Trading Awards exists to measure one thing: the collective trust of the active trading community. Unlike other industry recognitions, these results are not decided behind closed doors. They are determined entirely by the people who rely on these platforms with real capital on the line. Earning a win here means a brand has consistently delivered on execution, reliability, and support.This year’s public voting round saw incredible engagement, and the final results highlight the brokers and fintech providers setting the standard across the African market.The Trading Awards Africa 2026 WinnersTD MARKETS: Most Transparent Broker, Best ECN/STP BrokerTD MARKETS EXCHANGE: Best Crypto Payments SolutionWELTRADE: Best Synthetic Indices Broker, Best IB/Affiliate ProgrammeSWYFT MARKETS: Best Multi-Platform Broker, Best Emerging BrokerHFM: Best Customer Experience, Best Trading ConditionsTENTRADE: Fastest Growing BrokerJUSTMARKETS: Most Innovative BrokeriFX BROKERS: Best Customer Service, Best CFD BrokerXM: Most Trusted BrokerEXNESS: Most Reliable Broker, Best Multi-Asset BrokerThank you to every trader who took the time to vote and to every brand that participated in this year's awards. The level of engagement confirms exactly why this industry remains so dynamic. Congratulations to all the winners on a well-deserved result.Learn more about the awards and the winners at thetradingawards.com
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
AFC-LIVE Launches New Digital Platform to Expand Access to Global Markets
After five decades in financial markets, AFC-LIVE is entering a new phase of growth with the launch of its new website, a platform designed to make global investing more accessible across the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia.For new audiences, the website introduces AFC-LIVE as a trusted, full-service financial partner. For existing clients, particularly in Lebanon, it reflects a clear step forward: a company evolving its offering while staying grounded in experience.Built for Today’s InvestorThe new AFC-LIVE platform is structured around a simple objective: clarity.Investors can now access a complete view of the company’s services, from trading and investment tools to account options and client support, all within a streamlined, intuitive interface.The launch supports AFC-LIVE’s regional expansion strategy, with a focus on key markets including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, and Iraq, where demand for credible financial access continues to grow.Experience That MattersFifty years in financial markets is not just a milestone. It is a track record built through volatility, economic cycles, and shifting investor expectations.That experience informs how AFC-LIVE operates today, from risk management to client support and long-term service delivery. In a region where trust in financial institutions is critical, this foundation remains a key differentiator.More Than a WebsiteThe new platform is not a cosmetic update. It is the cornerstone of AFC-LIVE’s communication and growth strategy.It serves as:A first point of contact for new investors across the region A central hub for services, insights, and market access A foundation for future content, education, and engagement By creating a consistent and credible digital presence, AFC-LIVE strengthens its ability to scale across diverse markets while maintaining clarity in its offering.Access, Backed by ExperienceAccess to global markets has never been easier. Choosing the right partner has never been more important.AFC-LIVE combines decades of market experience with a modern, investor-focused platform, offering both the infrastructure and guidance needed to navigate today’s financial landscape.Investors and partners across the region are invited to explore the new platform at Visit AFC-LIVE
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
Why My XRP Price Prediction Sees a 60% Drop to $0.54
XRP fell to
$1.25 on Tuesday, June 2, 2026, its lowest level since February, as a 2.5%
decline pushed the token back to the floor of the range that has contained it
for four months. Bitcoin's slide below $70,000 the same day, its first since
early April, dragged the broader crypto market lower. My XRP
price prediction has not moved through any of this. I remain a structural bear
with a long-term downside target at $0.54, almost 60% below the current price.Follow
me on X for real-time market analysis: @ChmielDkXRP/USDT Technical Analysis:
Bearish PreassureMy chart
shows XRP testing the lower boundary of a tight consolidation that has held
since February, between $1.51-$1.70 on top and $1.26-$1.30 at the base. That is
the same structure I mapped in March. The upper
edge has rejected price four separate times. The lower edge is now under attack
for the third time in four months, and Tuesday's $1.25 intraday low printed
just beneath it.If that
floor breaks, the path opens directly toward $1.11-$1.13, this year's low and
the weakest level since November 2024. A daily close below $1.13 is the
confirmation I am watching for the next leg down. A bounce that cannot reclaim
$1.30 on a closing basis would simply set up a fourth, and probably final, test
of the floor.Having
tracked XRP since the 2020 SEC suit, I have watched this token turn four years
of regulatory wins into almost nothing on the chart, a record I keep on my analyst page. The 200-day exponential moving average sits
far above price at $1.65, reinforced by the April 2025 lows. As long as XRP
trades below it, my structural read stays bearish.My
long-term target remains $0.54, the late-2024 lows and roughly 57% below
Tuesday's level, unchanged since my March downside scenario. The upside is blocked by a dense
resistance ladder: $1.80 at the December 2025 lows, the $2.00 psychological
level, $2.35 at the January 2026 highs, and $2.66 at the May 2025 highs. Only a
break back above $1.65 would negate the bearish structure, and I am not looking
past that ladder yet.The $0.54
target is not arbitrary. It marks the convergence of the 100% Fibonacci
extension of the July-to-October 2025 decline with the price shelf left at the
late-2024 lows. A confirmed break of $1.13 would project the full height of the
four-month range down into that zone. Support also tends to weaken on the third
test, which is exactly where XRP sits now.Why XRP Is Falling Now?The selling
started with Bitcoin. BTC dropped below $70,000 on Tuesday for the first time
since early April, after Strategy disclosed its first Bitcoin sale in four
years, 32 coins for $2.5 million to fund preferred-stock dividends. US spot
Bitcoin ETFs bled $2.43 billion in May, the largest monthly outflow of 2026,
while renewed US-Iran tensions and higher oil prices weighed on risk assets. As
I wrote in my Bitcoin analysis, BTC itself risks a 40% drop toward
$45,000, and XRP rarely escapes that gravity.XRP's own
problem is that good news has stopped working. The CLARITY Act cleared the
Senate Banking Committee on May 14, yet the token has closed lower on most
sessions since, and the post-vote rally has fully unwound, as my May coverage tracked. May brought
$118.29 million of XRP ETF inflows, the strongest month of 2026, and XRP still
fell 6.19% over the period. June seasonality makes it worse, with a median
return of -8.49% since 2014 and only three green Junes in more than a decade.The
pressure on XRP comes from four sources:Bitcoin below $70,000, its first break of the level
since early April, pulling the whole complex down$2.43 billion in May US spot Bitcoin ETF
outflows, the largest monthly exit of 2026Faded CLARITY Act momentum, with XRP lower on most
sessions since the May 14 committee voteJune seasonality running at a -8.49% median
return since 2014XRP Price Predictions:
Where I Differ?The bullish
case on XRP rests almost entirely on institutional flows that have not yet
shown up in price. Standard Chartered's Geoffrey Kendrick keeps an $8 target
for end-2026, the most bullish credible call, but it assumes $10 billion in ETF
inflows, and May's $118 million pace does not validate that math. Bitrue
Research Labs sees $2.25-$2.50, which first requires clearing the $1.51-$1.70
ceiling that has rejected price four times. The Motley Fool's $3.00
"realistic" target ignores that XRP has fallen on most sessions since
its biggest 2026 regulatory win.On the
downside, Changelly's model averages $1.41 for June, still above the range
floor I expect to break. DigitalCoinPrice's $0.44-$1.43 band is the only
mainstream forecast whose low end overlaps my structural read. Not everyone
shares my bias, and across our XRP coverage the targets run far higher. As I
covered recently, one trader on X is targeting $20 under very specific fundamental
conditions, though my daily chart says the opposite.XRP Price Analysis FAQWhy is XRP falling today?XRP fell to
$1.25 on June 2, 2026, its lowest since February, after Bitcoin broke below
$70,000 for the first time since early April. Strategy's first Bitcoin sale in
four years and $2.43 billion of May ETF outflows pushed the whole crypto market
lower. XRP also sits at the bottom of a four-month range, with sellers
attacking the $1.26-$1.30 floor for the third time.What is the XRP price
prediction for 2026?Forecasts
split sharply. Standard Chartered targets $8 by year-end on $10 billion of ETF
inflows, while Bitrue sees $2.25-$2.50 and The Motley Fool $3. My own technical
analysis runs the other way: I see a structural path toward $0.54, the
late-2024 lows, almost 60% below the current $1.25. The gap reflects a
flows-versus-chart disagreement that has defined XRP all year.How low can XRP go?My
long-term downside target is $0.54, the late-2024 lows, roughly 57% below the
June 2 price of $1.25. The nearer milestone is $1.11-$1.13, this year's low and
the weakest level since November 2024. A daily close below $1.13 would confirm
the breakdown from the four-month range and open the move toward $0.54.What would invalidate the
bearish XRP view?A break
back above the 200-day exponential moving average at $1.65 would negate my
bearish structure. That level is reinforced by the April 2025 lows. Above it,
XRP faces a dense resistance ladder at $1.80, $2.00, $2.35, and $2.66. Until
the token reclaims $1.65, my read stays bearish regardless of regulatory
headlines or ETF figures.Are XRP ETF inflows
helping the price?Not yet.
XRP ETFs drew $118.29 million in May, the strongest month of 2026, but the
token still fell 6.19% over the period. That disconnect is the core of the
bearish case: capital is entering the funds while the spot price keeps sliding.
Until inflows outpace broader crypto selling, they have not been enough to lift
XRP.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
Revolut Is the Most Dangerous Name in Retail Trading. Nobody in the Industry Wants to Say It.
I have spent nearly two decades inside the fintech industry and have watched brokers burn through marketing budgets that would make a Premier League club blush, all chasing the same prize every one of us is taught to chase from day one: the regulated, KYC'd, deposit-ready retail trading client.
That client is the most expensive thing our industry buys. We pay for him through affiliate networks. We pay for him on Google Ads and on Meta, bidding against each other until the cost-per-acquisition stops making sense, then bidding a little more anyway. We pay KOLs to lend him their audience. The whole machine exists to manufacture one outcome: a funded account belonging to someone who didn't have one yesterday.
Revolut doesn't pay for him at all. He's already there.Revolue has 68 Million Customers GloballyRevolut, as a platform, checks all boxes: Sixty-eight million customers. A $75 billion valuation off the back of last November's share sale, with a 2026 round reportedly aiming to push it past $100 billion and IPO talk circling $200 billion. A UK banking license granted this March. A CySEC crypto authorisation under MiCA that passports digital-asset services across the entire European Union. Stocks, ETFs, commodities, crypto, and CFDs, all sitting inside the same app.The average European under 35 already opens to splitting a dinner bill or paying for coffee in Lisbon.This is not some fintech sideshow. It is one of the most valuable private companies on earth, and it has quietly walked into our market while most of us were looking the other way.Related: “Neobanks Want Trading; We’re the Partner that Delivers It,” CMC Markets’ UK HeadHere is the number that should keep every acquisition lead awake at night. Roughly 14 million Revolut customers, about a fifth of the base, already trade crypto. Not "expressed interest." Not "clicked a banner." Fully onboarded, KYC-passed, actively trading. That is not a projection. That is a larger active trading book than almost any broker reading this will ever build, and Revolut assembled it as a side feature of a checking account.
Read that again, because it redraws the entire competitive map. The thing we spend a decade and a fortune trying to acquire, Revolut already owns by the tens of millions. The customer didn't arrive through a trading funnel. He arrived because he wanted a cheaper way to send money abroad, and one day a "Stocks" tab appeared next to his balance.Revolut choisit la France.Après un investissement historique en 2025, le groupe annonce une expansion de 100 millions d’euros d’ici 2030 et la création de 200 emplois, traduisant une volonté de faire de la France son hub européen pour l’innovation financière.Thank You!— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) June 1, 2026Revolut Now Offers CFDsHere is the detail that should really unsettle people. Revolut didn't even have to become a broker to do this. It launched its CFD product by plugging into CMC Markets' infrastructure. CMC provides the pricing, the execution, and the clearing. Revolut provides the only thing it actually cares about: the interface and the customer. It has already rolled CFDs out across some 29 countries, mostly in Europe. A 35-year-old CFD firm now runs the engine while Revolut owns the dashboard. Ask yourself which half of that deal holds the power.Read more: CMC Connect Breaks Down CFDs Deal with RevolutNow look at the economics from the other side of the table. Why would Revolut pay an affiliate or a KOL to deliver a client they onboarded three years ago for completely unrelated reasons? Why would they bid on the keywords we fight over? They have no reason to. The most expensive client in our industry costs them nothing, because he was already a customer before trading ever entered the conversation.
This is the part the industry genuinely does not want to confront. The threat was never that Revolut would outbid us on traffic or poach our partners. The threat is structural, and it has a name: the super-app. Revolut isn't trying to be a trading platform. It is trying to be the only financial app on your phone. The place you get paid, spend, save, exchange currency, book a hotel, buy insurance, invest, and trade, without ever leaving. Trading is just one tile on that screen.When a platform already holds your salary, your card, your savings, and your holiday booking, the trading account is simply the next tab you tap. Distribution beats product. It always has. The broker with the better spread loses to the bank that's already in the customer's pocket.#Revolut's CFD trading feature offering 2x leverage just showed up in the Revolut app for EU based user. In June 2024 Revolut entered into partnership with CMC Markets for access to various markets including CFDs for its customers. pic.twitter.com/ij37GdDWgh— Max Karpis (@maxkarpis) January 24, 2025The Phase of Dictating Terms Is ComingOnce Revolut crosses 100 million accounts with a mature, fully regulated multi-asset product, it stops competing with us on acquisition cost altogether. It starts dictating terms. Liquidity deals, white-label arrangements, distribution access, all on its terms, not ours. The CMC deal is the early template, and the template is brutal: the neobank keeps the customer, and the trading firm becomes a vendor.You may also like: “People Knocking on Our Door to See That We’re Here,” IG Group’s MENA CEOAnd this isn't only Revolut. It's a super-app race, and everyone is serious about running it. Binance built the same gravitational pull in crypto. The neobanks across Southeast Asia and Latin America are building it in their regions right now. Different logo, same playbook. Own the everyday money relationship first, add trading later, and let the switching cost do the rest.
So what does a broker actually do about it? You stop fighting for the client the super-app has already captured, and you go hard at the one it will never serve properly: the trader who has outgrown a tab next to his grocery budget. Real depth. Real instruments. Execution that holds up when it matters. Service from people who know what a drawdown feels like. The mass-market beginner was never defensible. The serious
trader still is. That is the only ground worth standing on.
Our industry has spent years arguing about leverage caps, regulatory regimes, and each other, while the company best placed to take the retail client wasn't even being treated as a competitor.
When the bank already holds the salary, who do you think wins the second account?
This article was written by Badea Alexandru Gabriel at www.financemagnates.com.
Tiger Brokers Parent Swings to Loss as China Penalty Wipes Out Its Profit
UP Fintech
Holding, the company behind the Tiger Brokers app, fell into the red in the
first quarter after Chinese securities regulators imposed roughly $59.7 million
in fines and confiscated gains across several of its units.The
Nasdaq-listed broker (NASDAQ: TIGR) reported a
net loss of $26.9 million for the three months to March 31, a reversal from the
$30.4 million profit it posted a year earlier. Revenue moved the other way,
rising 26.3% to $154.9 million.China Fine Overshadows a
26% Revenue Jump at Tiger BrokersThe penalty
came from the Beijing bureau of the China Securities Regulatory Commission,
which on May 22 ordered the confiscation of illegal income and levied
administrative fines totaling about 411 million yuan. Regulators
said certain Tiger Brokers subsidiaries had run an unlicensed
cross-border securities business and carried out illegal fund and futures
activity in mainland China. The split was roughly 308 million yuan in fines and
103 million yuan in confiscated income.The charge
lands weeks after
a far larger one against rival Futu Holdings. In mid-May, the CSRC and its
Shenzhen bureau told Futu it faced proposed fines of about $271 million over similar accusations, namely
that its entities handled securities trading, fund sales and futures business
on the mainland without the required approvals.The same
enforcement wave reached other names. Chinese authorities flagged action
against a New Zealand unit of Tiger Brokers and a Hong Kong arm of LongBridge
Securities, a sign regulators are tightening the screws on platforms that route
mainland clients into overseas markets.Both Tiger
and Futu have spent years operating in this grey zone. They are registered in
Hong Kong, but the "one country, two systems" framework does not
extend licensing to the mainland, and Beijing has never issued licenses for
cross-border online brokerage. The two
firms were first warned by the CSRC back in
2022, and have been
pushing growth toward Singapore and other markets ever since.Operating Numbers Hold Up
Beneath the ChargeStrip out
the fine and the picture looks different. The penalty sat in the "others,
net" line, which swung to a $64.1 million expense and pulled pretax
results into a $16.5 million loss. Without it, the broker would have stayed
comfortably profitable.Commissions
rose 15.3% to $67.2 million on heavier trading, while interest income climbed
19.8% to $64.5 million. Other revenue, which the firm tied to its wealth
management push, jumped to $20.7 million from $7.9 million.Costs grew
faster. Total operating expenses rose 32.9% to $89.2 million, with the staff
bill up 38.5% as the company said it added headcount and accrued higher bonuses
to support its overseas expansion.Singapore and Hong Kong
Drive Client GrowthUP Fintech
added 28,900 funded accounts in the quarter, "with great majority of which
came from Singapore and Hong Kong markets," Chairman and Chief Executive
Wu Tianhua said. Total funded accounts reached 1.28 million, up 11.3% from a
year earlier.Net money
coming in hit $2.9 billion, which the company said marked its first quarter
ever above $2 billion in net inflows from consolidated retail accounts. Singapore has become a core market
for the broker,
where it switched on trading for local retirement savings accounts last year.Client
assets told a rockier story. A market pullback across financial, technology and
consumer stocks wiped out $4.9 billion in mark-to-market value, pushing total
assets down 3.2% from the prior quarter to $58.9 billion, though they were
still up 28.4% on the year. Wu said
Nasdaq's second-quarter rebound has since recovered those paper losses on a
quarter-to-date basis.Tiger AI Adds Anthropic's
Claude to Its LineupOn the
product side, the broker reworked its Tiger AI assistant into a
"Multi-Agent" setup that splits search, analysis, forecasting and
risk control into separate agents, and added a futures-focused agent. The company
also said Tiger AI now plugs in Anthropic's Claude model alongside its existing
two, turning it into what it called a "triple-model intelligent
assistant."The firm
has leaned on AI branding for a while. It launched the industry's first AI
assistant, TigerGPT, in 2023, and last year became the first global broker to wire in
China's DeepSeek model. It also
turned on Hong Kong index options and a TWAP order type for options during the
quarter.IPO Pipeline and a $50
Million BuybackThe
corporate desk stayed busy. UP Fintech underwrote 10 Hong Kong listings in the
quarter, including AI developers MiniMax and Zhipu AI, and worked on two US
SPAC deals. It said subscriptions for Hong Kong IPOs on
its platform have topped HK$1 trillion so far this year, while its employee
stock plan business added 42 clients to reach 790.Alongside
the results, the board approved a buyback of up to $50 million in shares over
12 months starting June 1, funded from cash on hand. The move follows a record 2025 for the group, when annual revenue crossed $612
million.Cash and
term deposits ended the quarter at $598.1 million, down from $793.1 million
three months earlier.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
FXPesa Signs Nairobi City Thunder as Its 2026 Trading Partner
FXPesa, the
Kenyan brokerage owned by Equiti Group, has signed on as the official trading
partner of basketball club Nairobi City Thunder for the 2026 season.The broker,
which trades as EGM Securities and was the first company to win a retail
brokerage license from Kenya's Capital Markets Authority, said the arrangement covers fan
and community activations across the season. The
companies did not put a value on the agreement or specify its length beyond the
current campaign.Nairobi
City Thunder was the first Kenyan team to qualify for the Basketball Africa
League and that it went undefeated across the 2023–2024 and 2024–2025 Kenyan
Basketball League seasons. The club returned to the BAL for a second time in
the 2026 edition."The
partnership with Nairobi City Thunder is a natural fit for us," said
Moonika Jurgenfeldt, Managing Director of FXPesa.[#highlighted-links#] "At
their core, both trading and basketball are about discipline, timing and
performing under pressure... We see this as more than a sponsorship. It's an
opportunity to connect with a new generation, support a fast-growing sport in
Kenya and reinforce a mindset we believe in."A Familiar Marketing
Playbook for BrokersSports
sponsorship has become one of the most common ways for forex and
contracts-for-difference brokers to buy brand recognition, and FXPesa is
following a route well worn by larger rivals.Plus500 signed a four-year deal with the
NBA's Chicago Bulls in 2022, its first US sports tie-up, after ending a long-running shirt deal
with Atlético Madrid. Robinhood became the jersey patch partner of
the Memphis Grizzlies for the 2024–25 season, adding to an earlier deal with the Washington
Wizards.Football
still dominates the category, with CFI naming itself AC Milan's online
trading partner in January 2024. But brokers
have increasingly moved beyond football into local and
niche sports, where
loyal regional fan bases offer cheaper, more targeted exposure. FXPesa's
choice of a Nairobi-based basketball club fits that pattern, anchoring the
broker to a home-market audience rather than a global property.Colin
Rasmussen, CEO and founder of Nairobi City Thunder, said the deal was "an
exciting step" for the club. "Basketball
requires discipline, preparation, timing and the ability to make the right
decisions under pressure, all principles that align well with FXPesa," he
said, adding that the club wanted to work with a brand focused on
"creating value beyond the court."Kenya's Crowded Broker
FieldThe
sponsorship lands in a Kenyan market where a handful of licensed brokers
compete for a limited pool of retail traders.Alongside
EGM Securities, the CMA has authorized firms including Scope Markets, Pepperstone, Exinity and Exness, while INGOT Brokers secured its own Kenyan
license in late 2022.
With
offshore operators still targeting Kenyan clients, local brand visibility has
become a competitive battleground.FXPesa
offers Kenyan retail clients access to forex, commodities, indices, shares and
ETFs through CFD trading, the company said, on an execution-only,
straight-through-processing basis. Equiti, the
parent group, holds licenses across the UK, the UAE, Jordan, Kenya, Seychelles,
Armenia and Cyprus, and has expanded the FXPesa brand into Uganda.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
BMLL Hires Chief Revenue Officer to Steer Global Sales After Nordic Capital Buyout
BMLL has
hired Michael Chiappinelli as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), giving the financial
market data firm a US-based commercial leader to run global sales as it pushes
to grow under new private equity ownership. He reports
to Chief Executive Paul Humphrey and joins the company's executive management
team.BMLL Hands Global Sales to
a US Data VeteranChiappinelli
will oversee the entire global sales function, which now reports to him
directly. His job, according to the company, is to widen BMLL's international footprint and deepen ties with
institutional clients. It is the
most senior commercial appointment the firm has made since Nordic Capital
bought it last October, in a deal that also involved Optiver, the market maker
and existing minority shareholder.That
purchase kicked off a hiring run that has been building for months. The company
brought in Karen King as head of sales for Asia
Pacific in January,
added a US derivatives sales lead in March, and in April disclosed nine more hires across partnerships, sales, revenue
operations, finance and engineering. Chiappinelli
now sits above much of that commercial structure.Data Vendors Race to Add
Senior Sales TalentHumphrey
tied the new hire to rising demand from clients building artificial
intelligence tools, an argument BMLL has leaned on repeatedly through its
recent product launches."I am
delighted to welcome Mike to the team," Humphrey said. "His
appointment is a crucial step in our global expansion following the acquisition
from Nordic Capital." He added that "AI continues to fuel
unprecedented institutional demand for the highest quality content."The
appointment lands in a market for granular historical data that has grown more
crowded, pitting specialist vendors like BMLL against far larger incumbents and
exchange groups that sell their own data products. Competition
for senior commercial talent has picked up alongside it.In April,
trading software firm Trading Technologies named Josh Monroe as chief revenue
officer and created
a chief strategy officer role for the first time, part of its own push deeper
into data and analytics. The same
month, TP ICAP's data arm, TraditionData, hired Shynna Lee from the London
Stock Exchange Group
to extend its sales reach. Both moves
point to the same playbook BMLL is now running, putting experienced revenue
leaders in place to sell data into institutional desks.In recent
months the firm has plugged its records into Databricks, added SpiderRock's US options
analytics to its research environment, and opened a year-long pilot with
Tradefeedr to stretch transaction cost analysis from FX into equities and
futures. Hiring a
CRO to coordinate global sales is the commercial counterpart to that product
expansion.From Refinitiv to a
Cambridge SpinoutChiappinelli
brings more than 25 years in institutional sales across market data, analytics,
algorithmic trading technology and enterprise software, according to BMLL. He most
recently ran global sales and account management for the investors business at
web analytics firm Similarweb, and before that was managing director and head
of sales at alternative data company SESAMm.Earlier in
his career he held senior roles at financial information group Acuris,
investment bank Cowen and Refinitiv, the data business now folded into LSEG. The company
said he has built sales teams at both private equity-backed growth firms and
established data providers, the two worlds BMLL now straddles after the Nordic
Capital deal."I am
incredibly excited to join the firm at such a defining time," Chiappinelli
said. "BMLL has built an enviable reputation for delivering the industry's
highest quality historical data products, and there is a clear, growing
appetite among institutional participants for this depth of insight."The Nordic
Capital purchase followed
a $21 million investment led by Optiver in October 2024. Before that, BMLL
raised $26 million in Series B funding across
2022 and 2023, and roughly $36 million in earlier seed and Series A rounds,
backed at various points by Nasdaq Ventures and FactSet.
This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.
AIMS Indonesia Officially Opens in Jakarta, Secures BAPPEBTI Licence
Jakarta, Indonesia – AIMS officially launched AIMS Indonesia on 25th May 2026, marking a major milestone in the company’s regional expansion and reinforcing its long-term commitment to Southeast Asia’s largest economy.The Grand Opening celebrated a defining achievement for the company: securing the BAPPEBTI licence, the regulatory authorisation that formally permits AIMS to operate in Indonesia. With this approval, AIMS Indonesia is fully authorised to serve the Indonesian market with high standards of compliance, fund security, and institutional-grade trading infrastructure.Held at the newly established AIMS Indonesia Office in central Jakarta, the event welcomed more than 300 guests, including industry leaders, strategic partners, clients, media representatives, and AIMS delegates from across the globe.The evening featured a Lamborghini Huracán displayed beneath a custom-built LED tunnel, alongside an immersive brand showcase that reflected AIMS’ premium positioning and global ambitions.A key highlight of the event was a corporate presentation tracing the growth of AIMS since its establishment in 2015, including landmark partnerships with Borussia Dortmund in 2022, the ASEAN Football Federation in 2023, Tottenham Hotspur in 2024, and Lamborghini in 2026.“This is not merely an office opening — it is a declaration of our long-term commitment to Indonesia and to every trader who has placed their trust in us,” said Mr. Windy Alexandra, CEO of AIMS Indonesia. “Fund safety remains at the core of everything we do. Receiving our BAPPEBTI licence validates our approach and affirms that AIMS Indonesia is here to serve the market with integrity, transparency, and the highest standards of compliance.”With a population exceeding 270 million, growing digital adoption, and rising interest in financial markets, Indonesia represents one of the region’s most important growth opportunities for AIMS.The launch of AIMS Indonesia marks the beginning of a significant new chapter for the Group. Backed by a strong local leadership team, BAPPEBTI regulatory approval, and the global AIMS ecosystem, AIMS Indonesia is positioned to become a leading force in one of Southeast Asia’s most dynamic financial markets.About AIMSAIMS is a brand with an 11-year industry heritage and a trusted financial broker for institutional and individual traders worldwide. With a global presence spanning more than 21 countries and regions, AIMS is renowned for its high-performance trading platforms, highly competitive spreads, and client-centric service philosophy.For more information, visit www.aimsfx.com or follow AIMS on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
Panda Trading Systems: Inside a Modern CRM, Trading Platform, and Trading Server Stack
Panda Trading Systems builds its product portfolio around three pillars — the Panda CRM and Trader’s Room, the Panda WebTrader and native mobile apps, and the Panda Trading Server, each engineered to be modern, simple, and fast to deploy. As more brokers re-evaluate aging infrastructure, Panda’s product strategy is built around what they’re actually asking for.The brokerage industry is in a quiet but persistent modernization cycle. Margin pressure, rising client acquisition costs, and the operational drag of legacy infrastructure are pushing brokers — both new entrants and established firms — to re-evaluate the systems they run their business on. Legacy CRMs slow down sales and retention teams. Recompiled white-label trading platforms make differentiation impossible. Pricing and execution infrastructure built a decade ago struggles to keep up with current market expectations.Panda Trading Systems’ product portfolio is built around exactly these problems. Now in its 20th year as a brokerage technology provider, the company has built its strategy around three core pillars, with a broader stack of supporting components designed to fit alongside them.Panda CRM and Trader’s RoomThe Panda CRM is a brokerage-native CRM purpose-built for retail and institutional FX firms, covering the full client lifecycle from lead intake and KYC through funding, retention, reporting, and compliance workflows. It is designed for the operational realities of multi-desk, multi-jurisdiction brokerages: configurable user roles, granular permissioning, and clean integrations with the KYC vendors, payment providers, and back-office systems brokers already rely on.Paired with the Panda Trader’s Room, it gives brokers a unified front for client onboarding, account management, funding, and support. Both can be deployed independently of any other Panda product, and both are built to integrate cleanly with whatever trading platform a broker is already using. The differentiators are practical: a modern interface, fast deployment timelines, and a roadmap shaped by an in-house team that works with brokerages every day.Panda WebTrader and native mobile appsThe Panda WebTrader is a full-featured browser-based trading platform requiring no downloads, with charting, order management, and account tools designed for traders who expect a web-app experience comparable to the consumer fintech products they use elsewhere. Alongside it, Panda offers fully native iOS and Android trading apps, built natively rather than wrapped, for brokers whose clients increasingly trade on their phones.Both surfaces are fully brandable, allowing brokers to ship a differentiated client experience without relying on a third-party platform’s roadmap or release cadence. They are engineered to compete on the qualities that define a modern trading experience: speed, design, reliability, and the pace at which new features ship.Panda Trading ServerThe Panda Trading Server is the high-performance execution engine underneath a broker’s book — built for the speed, reliability, and scale that production trading environments demand. It handles pricing, aggregation, and order execution with the low-latency throughput brokers need to deliver a competitive trading experience, holding up under the peak load that comes with high-volatility events and market opens. The Trading Server scales to support large client books and multi-asset offerings while giving risk teams real-time visibility into exposure across the platform.It is offered as a standalone product to brokers running their own front-ends, or as part of a fully integrated Panda deployment.Plus the rest of the stackBeyond the three pillars, Panda also provides the surrounding infrastructure brokers need to operate — including the Panda IB Portal for partner and affiliate management, alongside a range of plugins, integrations, and customizations developed around its core products. Brokers can take what they need and leave the rest.Built for the brokerages of today“Brokers don’t have time for slow implementations or systems built for the market five years ago,” said Dragos Petrea, Head of Marketing and Commercial Operations at Panda Trading Systems. “Everything we build is designed around the same three principles — modern, simple, and fast to deploy — whether a broker wants a single product from us or the full stack. The brokerages we work with want the freedom to evolve without rebuilding their tech stack every two years, and that’s the through-line of every product we ship.”Two decades into building technology for brokerages, Panda has accumulated something most of its newer competitors can’t claim: a sustained view of what works, what breaks, and what brokers actually need to scale. That perspective shapes product decisions — fewer half-baked features, faster implementations, and infrastructure built to evolve without forcing brokers to start over.About Panda Trading SystemsNow marking its 20th year, Panda Trading Systems is a technology provider headquartered in Israel, with operations in Cyprus, serving retail and institutional brokerages worldwide. Its product portfolio includes the Panda CRM, Trader’s Room, WebTrader, native mobile apps, Trading Server, IB Portal, and a range of supporting plugins and integrations. For more information, visit pandats.com.
This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.
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