Interactive Brokers reported higher revenue and earnings for the first quarter of 2026, supported by increased trading activity and growth in client accounts and balances. The company also announced a dividend increase following the results.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)Earnings and Revenue IncreaseAccording to Tuesday announcement, the broker posted diluted earnings per share of $0.59, compared to $0.48 in the same period last year. Adjusted earnings per share stood at $0.60 as net revenue reached $1.67 billion, up from $1.43 billion a year earlier, while adjusted revenue came in at $1.68 billion.Income before income taxes rose to $1.29 billion from $1.06 billion in the prior-year quarter, while the pretax profit margin improved to 77%, compared to 74% a year earlier.At the same time, Interactive Broker's commission revenue increased 19% to $613 million, driven by higher customer trading volumes. Stock trading volume also rose 25%, while futures and options volumes increased 20% and 16%, respectively.Read more: After StoneX, Interactive Brokers Taps Coinbase for Nano Bitcoin and Ether FuturesNet interest income also grew significantly, rising 17% to $904 million. The increase reflected higher average customer margin loans and larger customer credit balances. Revenue from other fees and services rose 10% to $86 million, supported by gains in order flow payments, FDIC sweep fees, and market data fees.Additionally, execution, clearing, and distribution fees declined 12% to $106 million. The decrease followed a reduction in regulatory fees and higher exchange rebates linked to increased trading activity.Client Growth and Balance Sheet ExpansionInteractive Brokers reported continued growth in its client base and assets. Customer accounts increased 31% to 4.75 million as customer equity rose 38% to $789.4 billion.Daily average revenue trades grew 24% to 4.37 million, reflecting higher activity across the platform. Customer credit balances increased 35% to $168.8 billion, while margin loans also rose 35% to $86.0 billion.The company reported total equity of $21.3 billion at the end of the quarter. Following the results, the board approved a higher quarterly dividend of $0.0875 per share, up from $0.08. Early this year, Interactive Brokers rolled out new “nano” Bitcoin and Ether futures from Coinbase Derivatives, giving eligible clients cheaper, smaller-sized ways to trade crypto. The products include tiny contracts with monthly expiries and perpetual-style futures that closely track spot prices and can run indefinitely. Because the contract sizes are much smaller than standard futures, traders can gain long-term or flexible exposure to Bitcoin and Ether without committing large amounts of capital, and they can do so around the clock with 24/7 trading. This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.

On April 18–19, an attacker drained 116,500 rsETH from Kelp DAO’s LayerZero-based bridge, roughly 18% of the token’s supply and about $292–293 million at the time. The bridge held reserves backing rsETH on more than 20 networks, so the exploit instantly created doubts about whether wrapped rsETH on those chains still had real backing behind it.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)According to DeFiLlama data, the Kelp DAO exploit landed in a market that was already near the psychological $100 billion milestone for total value locked, and it erased almost $14 billion from that figure within a day. Between April 18 and 19, DeFi’s aggregate TVL fell from about $99.5 billion to roughly $85.21 billion.Hack Shakes DeFi, Wipes $14B TVLThe technical root cause looks simple on paper: Kelp ran a 1‑of‑1 verifier configuration for LayerZero’s Decentralized Verifier Network. Only one verifier needed to sign off on cross‑chain messages, so once the attacker controlled that view of the world, they effectively controlled the bridge.The Arbitrum Security Council has taken emergency action to freeze the 30,766 ETH being held in the address on Arbitrum One that is connected to the KelpDAO exploit. The Security Council acted with input from law enforcement as to the exploiter’s identity, and, at all times,…— Arbitrum (@arbitrum) April 21, 2026According to several post‑mortems, the attacker compromised two RPC nodes that fed data to the verifier and then used a DDoS attack to knock clean nodes offline, forcing a failover to their poisoned infrastructure. From there, they injected a forged cross‑chain message that tricked the system into releasing 116,500 rsETH to their address, all without breaking a single line of on‑chain code.Read more: If DeFi Had This in 2022, Maybe It Wouldn’t Have CollapsedFrom an analytical standpoint, this hack sits in the same family as earlier bridge failures such as Ronin and Nomad, where central checkpoints and initialization assumptions became high‑value targets. The common pattern is not a single vulnerable contract but an architecture that treats critical verification as a convenience feature rather than a hardened security boundary.Lending Models Under PressureThe story did not end at the bridge. The attacker rapidly moved the stolen rsETH into Aave as collateral and borrowed large amounts of ETH against it, while opening positions on other lending markets. Investors reacted quickly. On‑chain data and market reports show that more than $5.4 billion exited Aave in short order as users reduced risk, with total value locked dropping even more sharply over 48 hours.Earlier today we identified suspicious cross-chain activity involving rsETH. We have paused rsETH contracts across mainnet and several L2s while we investigate.We are working with @LayerZero_Core, @unichain, our auditors and top security experts on RCA. We will keep you…— Kelp (@KelpDAO) April 18, 2026ETH utilization on Aave briefly spiked to 100%, and AAVE’s token price fell around 10% as traders priced in both the immediate hole and future governance decisions around recapitalization. From a market‑structure perspective, this looks less like a one‑off exploit and more like a stress test of the non‑isolated lending model where one asset’s failure can ripple across an entire pool.He pointed to Aave v4’s planned “hub‑and‑spoke” architecture—closer to semi‑isolated markets—as a potential compromise between composability and safety. The underlying analytical point is that lending protocols may no longer afford to assume that all whitelisted collateral assets share roughly the same risk profile, especially when some sit on complex, cross‑chain restaking rails.A Security Reckoning in an AI AgeThe Kelp DAO exploit lands in a month where crypto platforms have already lost hundreds of millions of dollars to hacks, piling onto a multi‑year trend of bridge‑centric incidents. Whether or not AI played a direct role in this particular hack, the pattern of rapid, multi‑venue attacks suggests defenders can no longer rely on slow human review and ad‑hoc configuration choices to keep up. For DeFi builders, the practical takeaway is less about any single tool and more about assuming that motivated attackers can see the system almost as clearly as its designers.UPDATE: ? The Kelp DAO exploiter has moved about $175 million in ETH to fresh wallets after Arbitrum froze $71 million tied to the hack. https://t.co/xj2Srjob0I pic.twitter.com/GjlFXnE6cH— CoinMarketCap (@CoinMarketCap) April 21, 2026The public blame game between Kelp DAO and LayerZero underscores another uncomfortable reality: responsibility for security in composable finance is shared, but accountability often fragments once something breaks. Kelp says it followed LayerZero’s defaults and common practice; LayerZero says it warned against single‑verifier setups and now promises to stop signing messages for such configurations. For users and institutional participants, this dispute matters less than the broader lesson: default settings on critical infrastructure are de facto risk decisions, not neutral technical details. This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.

Silver traded at $76.55 per ounce on Tuesday, April 21, 2026, down 3.8% in the steepest single-day drop in a month, as markets weighed the approaching US-Iran ceasefire expiry and Federal Reserve Chair nominee Kevin Warsh's Senate confirmation hearing. The white metal now sits 37% below the $121.64 all-time high set on January 29, and roughly 15% below pre-Iran war levels. The Dollar Index has climbed to 98.47 while Brent crude holds near $95, a dual headwind for non-yielding bullion.This week's catalysts are stacked. Wednesday marks the ceasefire deadline, with the second round of US-Iran negotiations still unconfirmed, and Warsh is testifying on Capitol Hill under pressure from Sen. Thom Tillis to block the vote over the DOJ's Powell probe.Follow me on X for real-time silver market analysis: @ChmielDkWhy Silver Price Is Going Down? Iran Ceasefire, Warsh Hearing, and a Stronger DollarThe Tuesday selloff is driven by three overlapping forces: a firmer dollar, rising inflation expectations from elevated oil, and uncertainty over whether Warsh's Fed inherits a more hawkish stance than markets priced in. Bas Kooijman, CEO and Asset Manager at DHF Capital S.A., framed the setup in his Tuesday note."With the current ceasefire nearing expiration, uncertainty around a potential extension is keeping investors cautious," said Bas Kooijman, CEO and Asset Manager at DHF Capital S.A. Kooijman added that any dovish signal from Warsh's testimony could compress Treasury yields and provide a supportive backdrop for silver.The Iran ceasefire expires Wednesday with no confirmation either side will extend it. President Trump said Tuesday he "expects to be bombing" Iran if talks collapse, while the Strait of Hormuz remains largely shut. Since the Iran war began, silver has plunged over 15%, as geopolitical risks clash with resilient US consumer activity and the Fed's 3.50-3.75% hold. Retail sales jumped 1.7% in March, the strongest monthly gain in a year.As I wrote in my March crash analysis, the hawkish Fed hold in March, which revised 2026 dot-plot projections down to just one cut, hit silver harder than gold. That amplification dynamic is repeating today.The four forces driving Tuesday's silver selloff:Dollar Index at 98.47, directly pressuring silver priced in dollarsBrent crude near $95 lifting inflation expectations and Treasury yieldsIran ceasefire expiring Wednesday with no extension confirmed by either sideWarsh Senate hearing creating policy uncertainty ahead of the May 15 Powell transitionThe Physical Market Paradox: Sixth Straight Silver Deficit Meets Paper SellingThe paper market is selling while the physical market keeps tightening. That divergence has defined silver for most of 2026 and has not reversed on this pullback.Key physical data points going into the Tuesday selloff:2026 silver market deficit projected at 46.3M oz, up 15% from 40.3M oz in 2025, per the Silver Institute and Metals Focus April 15 reportStock drawdown reached 762M oz from global above-ground inventories since 2021 to cover the cumulative deficitCoin and bar demand forecast to rise 18% in 2026, supported by a recovery in US retail buyingIndustrial fabrication forecast to drop 3% to a four-year low, with the Iran war cited as a downside risk to global growthAs I wrote in my April COMEX analysis, registered silver inventory has fallen to 76M oz, just 13.4% coverage of open interest. That gap between paper pricing and physical availability is the core structural argument behind Bank of America's $135-$309 target range for 2026.Silver Technical Analysis: $80 Caps, $70 Supports, Fibonacci Warns of $20Very little has changed on my daily chart despite the 3.8% move. Silver remains pinned inside the broad consolidation range it has held since the January 30 flash crash. The 50-day exponential moving average sits near $80 and is actively capping every rally attempt. Below spot, the $70 round-number support has held three times this year and is reinforced by the 200-day EMA at $65.My directional bias is neutral with a bearish tilt, contingent on whether $70 holds on a fourth test. Below $70, the next meaningful floor on my chart is $54.50, the October 2025 breakout zone. Above spot, silver would need to reclaim $80 on a daily close before $90-$94 (the February highs) comes back into play, and only an $80 monthly close would reopen the path toward the $120 all-time high.The Fibonacci extension I run across the 2024-2026 uptrend projects a 1.618 downside target near $20 per ounce, representing a 70% decline from current levels. That figure looks dramatic against a $120 recent high. Worth remembering that silver traded in the $20-$30 range for most of 2022-2024, and spent years below that level before the pandemic. Reversion to that zone would be a regime change, not a black-swan event.Key silver price levels (XAG/USD spot, April 21, 2026):How Low Can Silver Go? Silver Price Prediction 2026 From $20 Bear Case to $309 BullForecasts for silver in 2026 span a range so wide it verges on non-informative, which is itself a signal about how broken the pricing mechanism has become. On the bull side, Bank of America's Michael Widmer holds a $135-$309 target based on gold-to-silver ratio compression. Citigroup projects $150-$170 within three months if the ratio returns to its 2011 low of 32:1. Macro strategist David Hunter targets $180 by Q2, and Robert Kiyosaki calls for $200 under his fiat debasement thesis.On the base-case side, the Reuters poll of 30 analysts sets the 2026 median at $79.50, just above current spot. JPMorgan holds the most conservative major-bank call at $81 average. As the FinanceMagnates.com Citi target report from January detailed, Citigroup described silver as a higher-beta version of gold when it tested $120 before the January 30 crash erased 36% in a single session.Kooijman maintains a constructive medium-term view despite the pullback. He argues that silver could see increased demand while supply shrinks this year, with the sixth consecutive annual deficit providing a structural floor under any further downside. That dynamic mirrors the amplification pattern the FinanceMagnates.com report on the March Iran-driven gold and silver selloff detailed, where physical tightness eventually absorbed the paper selling.Silver price prediction table (2026):As my April 20 gold analysis established, even gold carries a 28% downside risk to $3,400 in a reflation scenario. Silver's higher beta means it will move further in both directions.Silver Price Prediction FAQWhy is silver falling today, April 21, 2026?Silver fell 3.8% to $76.55 per ounce on Tuesday, pressured by a Dollar Index above 98 and Brent crude near $95 lifting Treasury yields. Markets are weighing Wednesday's US-Iran ceasefire expiry and Kevin Warsh's Senate confirmation hearing, where any hawkish signal would further raise the opportunity cost of holding non-yielding silver. Since the Iran war began, silver is down over 15%.How low can silver go in 2026?My chart identifies four progressive downside zones: $70 (tested three times), $65 (200-day EMA), $54.50 (October 2025 breakout), and a 1.618 Fibonacci extension at $20. A genuine Fed hold combined with reflation would target the $54.50-$65 zone. The $20 extension is an extreme scenario but represents silver's normal trading range from 2022 to 2024.What is the silver price prediction for 2026?Institutional targets span from JPMorgan's $81 average to Bank of America's $309 bull case. The Reuters poll of 30 analysts sets the 2026 median at $79.50. Citigroup holds a $150-$170 short-term target, David Hunter targets $180 by Q2, and Robert Kiyosaki forecasts $200. My chart sees $54.50 as the bear case if $70 fails on a weekly close.Will silver recover after the Iran ceasefire?The answer depends on the outcome. An extension or framework agreement would compress Brent crude, weaken the dollar, and reopen the path toward $80 and $90-$94. A collapse into renewed conflict would initially spike silver on safe-haven flows, but as my March 3 analysis documented, silver retraces those spikes within 48-72 hours as industrial-demand concerns reassert.Is silver still in a bull market?Yes, structurally. Silver is up roughly 135% year-on-year and the supply deficit is widening for a sixth straight year. My chart shows silver inside a consolidation range, not a confirmed downtrend. A weekly close below $70 would be the first serious warning. A close below $54.50 would end the structural bull case entirely. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

E8 Markets, a prop trading firm that now describes itself as a "SaaS educational simulation platform for financial markets," issued a warning today (Tuesday) to retail traders about the risks of depositing money with FX, futures, and crypto brokers. The company tied the campaign to US National Financial Literacy Month and used it to launch a loyalty program named after one of its top-earning users, Tom Gibbs.While statistics showing that the vast majority of traders lose money on FX and CFDs are well known, E8 Markets did not disclose how many traders incur losses in prop firms offering trading on simulated rather than real markets. Here, too, the figures do not appear optimistic, according to industry data.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)Warning Leans on ESMA and CFTC Loss FiguresThe company pointed to a December 2024 Commodity Futures Trading Commission advisory stating that most individual traders lose money in futures and foreign currency after fees and taxes, along with CFTC figures suggesting two out of three retail forex traders lose money each quarter. E8 also cited the European Securities and Markets Authority's disclosure framework showing that 74% to 89% of retail CFD accounts lose money, with average losses ranging from €1,600 to €29,000 per client."No one should have to lose $5,000 on a broker with little or no guidance or assurance of future success," E8 Markets Chief Executive Officer Dylan Elchami said in the announcement.Elchami argued that users can start on the firm's platform with as little as $36 in enrollment fees and access $5,000 in simulated capital, earning what the company describes as "performance-based payouts" without committing their own money to live markets.The release characterizes brokers as profiting from customer losses through spreads, commissions, order routing, and pricing mechanics, presenting the deposit model as a series of small, compounding costs that erode trader capital.Prop Firm Payout Rates Sit Below the Numbers E8 HighlightsThe loss rates E8 uses to warn retail traders against brokers sit within the same band as retail CFD outcomes reported in regulated markets. FinanceMagnates.com industry data, however, suggests payout rates inside the prop trading sector itself run materially below those CFD benchmarks.A proprietary dataset from technology provider FPFX Tech, covering more than 300,000 prop trading accounts from 10 firms, found that only 7% of participants ever received a payout, with the average withdrawal at about 4% of the funded account size. Statistics shared last year by The Funded Trader founder Angelo Ciaramello pointed even lower, with challenge pass rates of 5% to 10% and only around a fifth of funded accounts converting into actual payouts. A separate ATFunded disclosure placed funded status at roughly 6% of traders.A survey of approximately 500 active clients of prop firm PipFarm put average participant spend at $4,270 on challenges, with close to 60% of respondents losing capital. A wider Swiset study of nearly 10,000 traders placed the global prop trading failure rate at around 80%.In practical terms, a retail participant choosing between a CFD account carrying an ESMA-mandated risk warning and a prop challenge marketed as a lower-risk path is comparing a regulated disclosure of losing accounts with an unregulated sector whose own data show fewer paid participants.On one hand, there are regulated CFD brokers. On the other, prop trading firms registered in exotic jurisdictions such as Saint Lucia. Regulation in this case is largely nominal, but it is sufficient for MetaQuotes to grant these companies licenses to use MetaTrader. E8 Markets is also registered there.The "Simulated" Pivot Predates This CampaignE8's positioning as an "educational simulation platform" is part of a broader industry shift in language that took shape after US authorities began scrutinizing the sector. In August 2023, the CFTC sued Traders Global Group, the operator of My Forex Funds, alleging fraud tied to a business that had generated roughly $310 million in fees.A US court later threw out the regulator's case after flagging procedural failures, but the original complaint triggered a visible rewrite of product copy across the prop sector.FTMO, one of the largest operators, states on its website that it "simulates real market conditions" using "demo trading accounts with virtual funds." Surgetrader rebranded its challenge as an "audition." Across the industry, the terms "simulated" and "virtual" have effectively become the sector's safe words. E8's language goes further, describing a "SimFi Ecosystem" and stating explicitly in its disclosures that "E8 is not a broker and does not accept margin or deposits," while enrollment fees "do not purchase live capital, a brokerage account, a commodity interest, a security, or any investment opportunity."The category distinction is the commercial point. It keeps most prop operators outside the licensing regimes that apply to CFD brokers, including the ESMA rules E8 cites in its release. Between 80 and 100 prop firms shut down in 2024, according to FM Intelligence estimates, with MetaQuotes' decision to restrict platform access accelerating consolidation. Against that backdrop, payout tracker Prop Firm Match recorded around $325 million in total payouts across tracked firms in 2025, with E8 accounting for about $19 million of that total. The release does not reconcile that tracker figure with the $70 million cumulative payout number the firm attributes to the platform since launch.Regulators Are Watching the FramingNational regulators have been increasingly vocal. Italy's Consob described retail prop trading as online simulations that function more like "video games" than investment services. Authorities in Belgium, Spain, and Germany have raised similar concerns, ESMA has convened discussions on the model, and Australia's ASIC has warned financial influencers promoting prop offerings without risk disclosure. The CFTC is separately weighing whether prop firms that offer exchange-traded derivatives should register as Commodity Trading Advisors, regardless of whether the underlying challenge is simulated.At least one US operator, MyFunded Futures, is moving in the opposite direction, preparing to operate as a CFTC-regulated Introducing Broker under the National Futures Association. When a firm has to iterate its category label from "prop firm" to "funded trader platform" to "SaaS educational simulation platform" to stay outside the rules applied to brokers, a fair question is whether the underlying business sits comfortably inside any category at all, or whether the naming exercise is what keeps it in the regulatory gray zone where national supervisors have started to push.E8 does not publish a challenge pass rate or payout-conversion figure alongside the campaign. Under the firm's disclosures, the Gibbs case is presented as a single participant outcome that "does not, standing alone, describe or predict what other participants may achieve."However, the prop firm’s website states that the pass rate over a period of more than a year between 2023 and 2024 was just under 18% for those who traded at least once during that time and obtained an E8 Trader Account.The release also flags that simulated performance has "inherent limitations and does not represent actual trading." This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

A handful of familiar tickers now shape how equity investors gain exposure to Bitcoin, with fresh data from BitcoinTreasuries.net showing Strategy at the top of the public-company rankings and other well-known crypto names clustering inside the top 10.As a result, instead of investors spreading exposure across multiple crypto-linked stocks, Strategy is starting to function like a dominant, leveraged proxy for Bitcoin on its own, effectively turning what was once a multi-stock trade into one centered on a single ticker.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).While dozens of listed firms hold some BTC, trading flows and market attention increasingly focus on a small group of recognizable brands that combine liquidity, name recognition, and large on-balance-sheet positions.BitcoinTreasuries data show Strategy in first place with 815,061 BTC, far ahead of the rest of the public cohort. Below Strategy, the top 10 list features several brands that are already central to the crypto story for different reasons. Twenty One Capital and Japan’s Metaplanet appear as pure Bitcoin treasury names, with 43,514 BTC and 40,177 BTC respectively, positioning themselves as specialized balance‑sheet vehicles for the asset.MARA Holdings and Riot Platforms, both large miners, continue to convert a growing share of production into long-term reserves rather than selling output immediately, using BTC balances as a form of self-hedging.Strategy Doubles Down on BitcoinCoinbase stands out in this group because it combines a prominent role as a trading venue with a meaningful corporate BTC position. Its 15,000‑plus coins place it inside the upper tier of public holders, but its earnings still depend more on trading and custody fees than mark‑to‑market gains on Bitcoin. That mix makes Coinbase’s stock less of a pure BTC tracker and more of a broader bet on crypto market activity.You may also like: Bitcoin Surges, Oil Slides as Trump Says Iran Has Announced Strait of Hormuz ReopeningThis week, Strategy has taken another big step in its Bitcoin strategy, adding 34,164 BTC in a single week and lifting its total holdings to 815,061 BTC. The company spent about 2.54 billion dollars on the new coins at an average price of 74,395 dollars per bitcoin, pushing its multiyear accumulation program to a new scale.At press time, Bitcoin was changing hands around $75,700, leaving its market capitalization just above 1.5 trillion dollars and extending a period of relatively muted, range‑bound trading.The latest buying round confirms that MicroStrategy continues to treat Bitcoin as its primary treasury asset. The company has now spent roughly 61.56 billion dollars on BTC at an average cost of 75,527 dollars per coin. It started building this position in 2020 and has turned the strategy into a central part of how it presents itself to investors.Strategy Funds Fresh Bitcoin BuysMicroStrategy did not rely on existing cash to finance the new purchases. Instead, it raised capital in the market and converted it into Bitcoin. According to the recent filing, the company generated about 2.2 billion dollars from issuing perpetual preferred shares under the STRC ticker. It raised an additional 366 million dollars from common stock sales.Strategy Adds $2.54B in BTC, Holdings Exceed 815K CoinsStrategy announced it has acquired 34,164 BTC for approximately $2.54 billion at an average price of $74,395 per bitcoin, bringing its total holdings to 815,061 BTC. The total acquisition cost reaching about $61.56 billion… pic.twitter.com/ztArphu1Bs— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) April 20, 2026This approach increases MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin exposure but dilutes existing shareholders, who now own a company more closely tied to the price of a single asset. The strategy also makes the stock behave like a leveraged way to gain Bitcoin exposure. When bitcoin rises, the scale of the holdings can amplify gains. When bitcoin falls, the same leverage works in reverse.Market reaction to the latest announcement was cautious. MicroStrategy shares traded more than 2.5 percent lower in pre‑market dealing after the disclosure. Investors continue to weigh the potential upside of such a large Bitcoin position against the risks of heavy dependence on a volatile asset. This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.

The way retail traders discover brokers and proprietary trading firms is starting to shift, as a growing number of platforms attempt to impose structure on a fragmented and often opaque market.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).For years, discovery has been dominated by affiliate-driven review sites, forums, and user-generated ratings, where commercial incentives and inconsistent standards can make comparisons difficult. As the number of brokers and prop trading firms expands—and as prop firm models face increasing scrutiny—new tools are emerging that aim to standardize how traders evaluate options.Two such efforts moved forward. FXStreet, in partnership with Swiset, launched Propinder, a tool focused on prop trading challenges, while investingLive expanded its broker comparison directory. Notably, investingLive and Finance Magnates are both part of Ultimate Group.Two Approaches to the Same ProbleminvestingLive’s directory is built around structured, side-by-side comparison. It lists brokers in a standardized format, including regulatory licenses such as CySEC, FCA, and FSCA, along with platforms like MT4, MT5, and cTrader, asset classes, minimum deposits, and support details. Users can filter results by criteria such as regulation or platform.The directory currently includes 35 brokers, reflecting a curated rather than exhaustive approach.Propinder, by contrast, takes a guided route. The tool asks users to complete a short survey covering experience, platform preferences, risk tolerance, and location. It then generates three prop trading challenge suggestions, based on aggregated data from similar user profiles. Each result highlights rules such as profit targets, drawdown limits, and time constraints.Both platforms are positioning themselves as clarity tools in segments where offerings can appear similar at a glance but differ significantly in underlying terms.Neutrality Claims Under ScrutinyBoth companies emphasize that commercial relationships do not influence how providers are presented.Neophytos Papageorgiou, CEO of investingLive and Finance Magnates, said inclusion and evaluation are kept separate, arguing that rankings and filters are not affected by partnerships. At Propinder, CEO Javier Hertfelder framed the product as an educational tool, saying its goal is to ensure traders understand conditions “before it costs them anything.”Those claims reflect a long-standing tension in the comparison space. Platforms that aggregate brokers or prop firms typically rely on some form of monetization—whether through cost-per-acquisition (CPA), cost-per-lead (CPL), or listing arrangements—raising questions about how inclusion is determined and how visibility is priced.A Crowded Comparison Market Tools like these are entering an already competitive landscape. In the broker segment, platforms such as BrokerChooser, Finder, Investopedia, and Forex Peace Army have long offered reviews and rankings. In the prop trading space, sites like PropFirmMatch, Prop Firm Compare, and PropFirms.com provide side-by-side evaluations of funding programs, while some firms publish their own comparison content.What distinguishes the new entrants is their attempt to standardize inputs more tightly—either through fixed data fields, as in investingLive’s directory, or through profile-based matching, as in Propinder. Whether that results in more reliable comparisons, or simply repackages existing affiliate models in a more structured interface, remains to be seen.Prop firm challenges look identical until you read the rules. ?Propinder surfaces conditions, profit targets and payout structures upfront. Find my challenges ? https://t.co/M5xY5OGUPt#propfirm #forextrading pic.twitter.com/U3nW3gRitm— FXStreet News (@FXStreetNews) April 17, 2026What It Means for Brokers and Prop FirmsFor brokers and prop trading firms, the emergence of more structured discovery tools could have commercial implications.Visibility in these environments may increasingly shape how firms are evaluated by retail traders, raising questions about how listings are managed, what data is surfaced, and whether paid placement becomes a factor. Firms may also need to monitor how their conditions—spreads, rules, or funding terms—are represented in standardized formats.More broadly, the shift suggests that the retail discovery layer itself is being rebuilt. The key question is whether these new tools can balance usability with transparency, or whether they will inherit the same trust issues that have long defined the comparison space. This article was written by Tareq Sikder at www.financemagnates.com.

Coinbase has launched its crypto-backed lending product for UK customers with the underlying infrastructure provided by the DeFi lending protocol Morpho.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)UK users can now borrow USDC against Bitcoin and Ethereum holdings directly through Coinbase's interface — but the loan itself is processed on-chain, not on Coinbase's balance sheet. The mechanics are straightforward. When a user opens a position, their collateral moves into a Morpho smart contract on the Base network. The USDC is then disbursed from the Morpho protocol to the user's Coinbase account. Coinbase is the front-end; Morpho is the book. Rather than running a proprietary lending operation — which requires capital allocation, credit risk management, and a balance sheet willing to absorb losses — Coinbase plugs into an existing on-chain liquidity pool. The result is a product that can scale without the overhead of a traditional lender, and that operates 24/7 with no fixed repayment schedule and algorithmically set rates based on real-time supply and demand. $2.17 Billion in the U.S. Since January 2025 The UK launch is the first international rollout of a product that has been live in the United States since January 2025. U.S. loan originations through the Coinbase-Morpho integration have crossed $2.17 billion. That figure establishes the product as more than a pilot — it is now a meaningful revenue line being carried into new markets. The expansion model is notable for its simplicity. Coinbase does not need to rebuild a lending operation from scratch in each new jurisdiction. It connects its regulated, local-facing product to the same permissionless DeFi infrastructure. Market entry becomes a compliance and distribution problem, not an infrastructure one. What This Means for Brokers Offering Credit For firms that provide margin lending or leveraged products to retail clients, the comparison is uncomfortable. Coinbase is offering instant disbursement, no repayment schedule, and rates set by the market rather than a credit committee. Traditional brokers carry balance sheet risk, operate within fixed settlement windows, and price credit based on internal models that rarely update in real time. This is part of a broader push by Coinbase to build a full consumer finance stack in the UK — following its FCA registration and the recent launches of savings products and DEX trading access. The lending product is the credit layer of that stack. The structural point is worth stating plainly: a regulated exchange is now using open-source financial infrastructure to offer credit products that most traditional lenders cannot replicate on comparable terms. That gap will not close quickly. This article was written by Tanya Chepkova at www.financemagnates.com.

Russia's regulated forex market posted a record quarterly trading volume of $68.6 billion in Q1 2026. The number tells a story of growth. The data behind it tells a different one.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!) The latest statistical report from the market's self-regulatory organization reveals a sector that is less a competitive market than a structured monopoly with a long tail of inactive accounts. One Firm, 90% of Volume Of the total quarterly volume, 90.6% came from clients of a single firm: Alfa-Forex. There are three licensed forex dealers in Russia. Two of them, combined, account for less than 10% of turnover. Whatever the headline figure implies about market health, the competitive structure doesn't support it. Total registered client accounts grew 8% year-on-year to 183,023. Active accounts — those with actual trading activity — numbered 24,011. It means that 's 87% of all open accounts sitting dormant, with minimal or no funds, with 83,000 accounts have zero balance. The gap is almost certainly a product of bank-run marketing campaigns that reward account opening with perks, without requiring any actual capital commitment. It creates a client count that looks like a mass market and functions like a waiting list. The average balance across all 183,023 accounts is $444 — down from $975 at end-2022. Among active traders, the figure is $3,390. The divergence between those two numbers is the real structure of this market: a small, concentrated group of well-capitalized traders generating almost all of the volume, surrounded by a large pool of nominal accounts.It reflects regulatory decisions made several years ago, when the central bank of Russia revoked licenses from a number of retail forex brokers, consolidating the domestic market around a small group of bank-affiliated dealers. Much of the retail flow moved offshore as a result, leaving the regulated segment with a narrower and more concentrated client base What This Means For the B2B Industry The Russian forex market is not a mass-market opportunity waiting to be unlocked. The roughly 40 million retail investors often cited for Russia’s stock market have no equivalent in forex.The real addressable market is the active segment — fewer than 25,000 traders with higher balances who generate the bulk of trading flow. That's where the volume is and where the competitive pressure actually plays out. Record turnover alongside 90% concentration points to a market that remains structurally limited despite rising volumes. This article was written by Tanya Chepkova at www.financemagnates.com.

Axi has reported that 46% of its client base now holds crypto as part of broader portfolios. This comes despite a three-month period of subdued volatility in the digital asset market.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).The broker said adoption spans its crypto-related products, including perpetual contracts, CFDs, and direct crypto ownership through its “Buy Crypto” feature. The service allows clients to buy, sell, or hold cryptocurrencies on the platform. The launch comes as CFD brokers continue to expand into spot crypto offerings. Pepperstone recently launched a spot crypto exchange in Australia, offering five cryptocurrencies and two stablecoins paired against the Australian dollar. In the UK, IG Group has also entered spot crypto trading after receiving a cryptoasset licence from the Financial Conduct Authority.Traders Mix Ownership and DerivativesAxi said the shift toward spot crypto access reflects a broader industry trend and is consistent with its own client data. It pointed to a move away from purely speculative trading toward combined trading and ownership use cases. Traders, it said, are seeking simplified access to crypto markets while maintaining exposure through multiple instruments within the same platform.Clients Switch Between Crypto InstrumentsWhile derivatives remain widely used, Axi said its Buy Crypto feature is attracting first-time users by allowing leverage-free purchases. Early data indicates some traders are using crypto for portfolio diversification, with longer holding periods in certain cases.Stuart Cooke, Head of New Business at Axi, said trading behaviour is becoming more flexible. He said demand for straightforward crypto ownership is growing and noted that clients are increasingly moving between product types as conditions change. He added that the same underlying asset is now being traded in different ways, including perpetual contracts, CFDs, and direct ownership, as volatility fluctuates. Cooke said the availability of multiple formats allows clients to adjust how they access the same asset based on changing objectives. This article was written by Tareq Sikder at www.financemagnates.com.

“Ultency is not designed as a primary revenue driver, but rather as a strategic layer,” says Christoforos Theodoulou, MetaQuotes’ Chief Business Officer.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).When MetaQuotes introduced Ultency in 2025, it inserted itself into a part of the trading technology stack that, since the early days of MT4, had been the preserve of third-party providers: the liquidity bridge. This is the infrastructure that connects brokers’ internal platforms to external liquidity pools. For decades, MetaQuotes was content to let others mind that gap.No longer.The platform provider has reportedly invested millions in a global server network to underpin the new offering. Ultency’s hosting footprint spans Equinix data centres in London, New York, Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo – hardly a modest undertaking.Yet the pricing model is what truly turns heads. Ultency charges a flat US$1 per US$1m traded – high volumes will even get progressive discounts – a rate that is seemingly a lot cheaper than the industry standard. Traditionally, third-party providers bill brokers per volume: the more a broker trades, the higher its infrastructure costs climbs.Which raises an obvious question. If not to recoup investment or generate profits, what exactly is MetaQuotes up to?“By lowering the cost of connectivity and simplifying infrastructure, our goal is to drive higher adoption, increase trading volumes for both brokers and liquidity providers and further strengthen the ecosystem,” Theodoulou replies.MetaQuotes Puts Pressure on Independent ProvidersMetaQuotes is not alone in muscling into the liquidity bridge business, nor in challenging its pricing orthodoxy. Match-Trade Technologies has long offered its bridge free of charge (with caveats), while in March, Spotware launched cBridge, opting for a fixed fee based on servers and connections rather than trading volume. The motivations are broadly similar, though not identical.For MetaQuotes, the move is framed as a natural evolution. In the industry’s earlier phase, brokers relied on separate bridge software to connect with liquidity providers. That arrangement worked well enough when the market was expanding rapidly and different layers of the technology stack were being built by different tech providers.“Today, however, the landscape has reached a new stage in its evolution,” says Theodoulou.At the centre of that evolution sits MT5. Data from the latest Finance Magnates Intelligence Report shows MT5 accounted for 62% of retail CFD trading volumes on MetaQuotes platforms in Q3 2025, while MT4 slipped to 38% – Ultency is strictly native to the MT5 ecosystem. “With direct interaction in broker technology, shaping trader behaviour, liquidity and pricing dynamics, as well as infrastructure performance, we are now in a position to rethink how connectivity can be better delivered,” Theodoulou says.The benefit of MetaQuote’s bundled bridge, he adds, is operational simplicity. By eliminating the need for third-party integrations, brokers can manage execution, routing, aggregation and risk from a single interface. “This removes the need for platform administrators, dealers, and risk managers having to learn and operate across multiple systems, significantly reducing operational overhead and the complexity associated with working across multiple vendors,” Theodoulou says.For Michał Karczewski, the CEO of Match Trade Technologies, the bundled bridge – MetaQuotes in particular – also enjoys a structural advantage. New brokers entering the market often begin within its ecosystem, using MT4 or MT5 by default. If a credible bridge is available within that environment, the path of least resistance is clear.“That creates real pressure on independent bridge providers who have historically relied on that early-stage relationship to build long-term revenue,” Karczewski adds.Match-Trade initially built its bridge for its own liquidity clients before deciding to externalise it in 2015. “It made sense to offer it more broadly rather than keeping it purely proprietary,” Karczewski notes. At first, the bridge was bundled tightly with Match-Trade’s liquidity offering, FX-EDGE, giving the impression that the two were inseparable. That was never the intention, Karczewski insists; brokers are free to connect to multiple liquidity providers. The bridge, though, is free only if clients use Match-Trade’s own liquidity. As a standalone product, it comes with a price tag.Nonetheless, there was another reason for externalising the bridge: the volume-based pricing system. “It is one of the consistent pain points we observe, especially among startup and smaller brokers. Those fees can be significant when margins are already thin, and they can effectively price smaller operations out of accessing institutional-grade connectivity,” Karczewski notes.The sentiment is echoed by Ilia Iarovitcyn, CEO of Spotware Systems, who argues that the shift in pricing models was inevitable, as volume-based fees have long been misaligned with the economics of bridge infrastructure. “That said,” he adds, “pricing alone does not redefine the category. Brokers still need cross-platform flexibility, clear control over routing and risk, and an interface that dealing teams can use effectively under pressure Karczewski is blunt about the underlying logic: the value capture isn’t really about monetising the bridge directly, but about winning and retaining liquidity relationships. “If a broker is getting reliable execution technology for free as part of the package, that becomes a real differentiator when they’re evaluating which liquidity provider to route their flow through,” he says.The bundled bridge, then, is less than a product and more a retention tool. The strategy also brings to mind the wall gardens erected by the big boys of Silicon Valley: lower the barrier to entry, smooth the user experience, and quietly raise the cost of exit.“There Will Always Be Someone Offering a Cheaper Product”Not everyone is convinced that cheaper is better.Tom Higgins, founder and CEO of Gold-i, a long-established player in the bridge market, views the new pricing claims with measured scepticism. When Spotware launched cBridge and touting potential cost reductions of up to 80%, he notes, the comparison was largely with the most expensive incumbents.“And that’s probably fair,” he concedes.Gold-i, which has evolved into a major player in crypto connectivity, takes a more segmented approach to pricing. It offers specialised pricing for segments such as prop trading firms, while for crypto-focused clients, the standard is a monthly fee with a generous transaction allowance. This, Higgins argues, allows the company to support both the agile startup and the institutional heavyweight without compromising on service.“There will always be someone offering a cheaper product,” he observes. “But that almost comes at the expense of reliability and support. When you buy a car, you don’t buy the cheapest one available; you buy the one that fits your needs and budget.”Elena Petersen, CEO of Your Bourse, offers a different defence of the traditional model. Volume-based pricing, she argues, can actually favour smaller brokers by aligning costs with growth.“It allows startup brokers to benefit from the full technology stack without having to commit to large monthly fees from day one,” she says.Flat fees, by contrast, may raise barriers for brokers that lack sufficient trading volume to justify even modest fixed costs. And, Petersen cautions, such pricing is rarely as simple as it appears.“They often look simple on paper but include limitations, such as trades per second, connection limits, or infrastructure tiers, which means the pricing is not always as flat as it appears,” she notes.Your Bourse, tellingly, does offer flat-fee pricing for another product in its stack, Trade Server.Who Wins in a Race to Zero?Being a pure-play bridge is increasingly precarious, particularly in a world drifting towards low or zero pricing. As Karczewski puts it, flat fees can quickly become “a race to zero”.“And in a race to zero, the parties who can afford to subsidise the technology with revenue from elsewhere – whether that is liquidity, platform licensing or data services – will almost always win.”The logical response is diversification.For Your Bourse, a pivotal moment came with the launch of its matching engine. Petersen describes it as a response to a gap in the market: while many providers aggregated liquidity, few enabled brokers to internalise client flow effectively.From there, the tech provider expanded into a broader platform-as-a-service offering, driven largely by client demand. Brokers wanted to add new asset classes, support margin accounts for B2B clients, and manage multi-currency accounts, all without building their own technology from scratch.These capabilities are now embedded in Your Bourse’s Trade Server. The roadmap extends further still, into areas such as physical conversion and advanced settlement, territory far removed from simple connectivity.As third-party providers evolved alongside their clients, they have created deepening relationships that may prove harder to dislodge than platform providers expect.The DeFI ComplicationNot all bridges are built the same, and that is especially true in the crypto space. Decentralised exchanges operate in a world that often lacks the basic trappings of conventional finance: corporate structures, customer support lines, and even email addresses. Integrating with them is no trivial task.Tom Higgins recalls Gold-i’s early foray into the space. “Initially, crypto was simply an exciting new technology, and nobody really knew where it was headed. At that time, the traditional MT4/MT5 FX broker world had little interest in crypto, so we created a separate brand – Crypto Switch – to target early crypto-native firms.”Since then, the boundaries have blurred. Traditional brokers are launching crypto exchanges, while crypto firms are acquiring MiFID-licensed brokers to offer derivatives.Gold-i eventually unified its offering, but the technical challenges remain formidable. Beyond their unconventional structures, connecting to decentralised exchanges requires translating alien APIs into formats compatible with traditional systems. “It was one of the most interesting technical challenges we’ve worked on,” Higgins says. Latency can be higher in decentralised environments, but Higgins argues that the model is viable. “Importantly,” he says, “settlement and wallet custody remain the broker’s responsibility, but we provide detailed guidance and proven architectures to ensure this can be implemented safely. This really is new market access, not just another exchange connection.”Some Just like It SimpleMichał Karczewski believes that a significant portion of the market is being overlooked in the rush to add features, particularly small- to mid-size brokers. They are simply looking for a reliable and cost-effective way to route trades to the outside world for their A book needs. “They do not need a system layered with features they will never use,” he says.Match-Trade has developed advanced tools, including intelligent order routing and VWAP-based execution, but these are optional by design. The core product remains deliberately simple.“The key principle is that these features are there when you need them – they don’t impose complexity on those who simply want clean, efficient execution,” Karczewski explains.So, What’s Next for the Bridge Space?Where, then, does all this leave the independent bridge providers?"What we are seeing now," says Iarovitcyn, "is less about pricing out third-party providers, and more about a broader reset: pricing models are changing, but so are expectations around usability, transparency and operational control." For Higgins, the answer lies partly in market segmentation. MetaQuotes’ bridge, at least for now, operates within a relatively closed loop, supporting MT5-to-MT5 connectivity. Providers like Gold-i, by contrast, position themselves as cross-platform specialists.“We serve the entire liquidity and platform ecosystem and we partner with the best providers in each category rather than limiting ourselves to a single platform,” he says.Specialisation , whether in crypto integration, institutional-grade infrastructure or bespoke solutions, offers an avenue for differentiation. And having a trusted client base, which extends to institutional players – Gold-i and Your Bourse serve both retail and institutional clients – can give the incumbent third-party providers breathing room.Petersen, for her part, welcomes the increased competition. “And we are not afraid of it. A more competitive environment pushes technology providers to build better products,” she says. “I salute MetaQuotes for continuing to develop new product suites and improving their ecosystem, as this ultimately contributes to the overall development and maturity of the industry.” Even Theodoulou acknowledges that third-party vendors will retain a role, especially when it comes to specialisation. “But,” he argues, “the baseline expectation is shifting and connectivity is becoming an embedded capability rather than a separate product.” Karczewski goes further, warning that the industry has yet to fully digest the implications of the bundled bridge.“The bundling trend is real, and it’s accelerating,” he says. And when core infrastructure is folded into broader platforms, it will inevitably alter the competitive dynamics for standalone providers. This article was written by Adonis Adoni at www.financemagnates.com.

Polish investment app XTB has signed on as Global Trading Partner of SSC Napoli for the 2025/2026 and 2026/2027 seasons, the companies said today (Tuesday), adding Italy's reigning league champions to a sports sponsorship roster that now spans football, MMA, basketball, tennis and boxing.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)Poland's XTB Adds SSC Napoli to Sports Sponsorship PortfolioThe deal gives the Warsaw-listed fintech (WSE: XTB) exposure across Napoli's digital channels, stadium events and fan activations, according to the joint statement. Financial terms were not disclosed. To mark the launch, XTB said it will offer a free share to new Italian customers who register using the code "BENVENUTO," though the company did not specify the value of the share or the duration of the promotion.Omar Arnaout, chief executive at XTB, said the tie-up is aimed at what he called "nurturing investors' mindset among Napoli's global fan community."The deal also carries a quieter domestic angle for XTB. Napoli has built a sizable following in Poland largely on the back of Piotr Zieliński, a long-serving Poland international who spent eight seasons at the club, scored around 40 goals and made close to 300 appearances before leaving in 2024. Italy Moves Up the Priority ListItaly is one of the handful of European markets where XTB already runs a fuller product shelf than pure CFDs, having rolled out fractional shares and passive Investment Plans to local clients. The country also sits inside the regional marketing remit of Zoe Gralinska-Sakai, who joined XTB from Revolut in February as Head of Regional Marketing for the UK, France and Italy, a hire that signaled the Polish firm intended to spend more aggressively in those three markets.The Napoli deal lands at a moment when XTB is competing for European retail flows against Interactive Brokers, Robinhood, Trade Republic and eToro, all of which have either stepped up hiring on the continent or added products tailored to local investors over the past 18 months. In its home market, XTB closed 2025 with roughly 33% of all securities accounts registered with Poland's central depository, according to KDPW data, but management has made clear that future growth has to come from abroad.For Napoli, the partnership is part of a push to monetize a fan base the club estimates ranks in the top four in Italy by size. The Neapolitans won the 2024/25 Scudetto and hold four Serie A titles overall, six Coppa Italia trophies, one UEFA Cup and three Italian Super Cups, the most recent of which was lifted in December 2025. The club will mark its centenary on August 1, 2026.Tommaso Bianchini, general manager for the business area at SSC Napoli, added the partnership "fits naturally into the Club's international growth strategy" and would generate new engagement through digital activations and matchday experiences.Brokers Keep Chasing Serie AXTB is far from the first retail trading brand to bet on Italian football. eToro tied up with eight Serie A clubs for the 2021/22 season, covering Bologna, Cagliari, Genoa, Sampdoria, Sassuolo, Spezia, Udinese and Hellas Verona, before extending its European football footprint to the Premier League, Bundesliga and, most recently, four Ligue 1 clubs in France. Plus500 signed a three-year front-of-shirt deal with Atalanta BC in 2020, and CAPEX.com partnered with Juventus the same year.The Italian appetite has spilled well beyond CFD houses. Crypto exchange Gate.io became sleeve sponsor of Inter Milan in 2024, while Polish exchange zondacrypto signed with Juventus the same year. In February 2026, Ultima Markets became an Official Regional Partner of Inter Milan for Asia, its first major sports sponsorship after picking up an FCA licence in the UK. Cyprus-regulated XTrend linked up with ACF Fiorentina in 2022.Sports Spend Keeps ClimbingThe Napoli agreement adds to what has become one of the most expansive sports sponsorship portfolios in the retail brokerage industry. XTB's 2025 marketing bill rose 69.6% to PLN 584.9 million, according to the company's annual report, with online spending alone more than doubling to PLN 405 million. The broker's combined MMA footprint now includes KSW in Poland and OKTAGON across Central Europe, while its roster of ambassadors features Zlatan Ibrahimović, Iker Casillas and Conor McGregor. In December 2025, XTB also signed on as FIBA's Global Partner through 2027, covering both the Women's Basketball World Cup 2026 in Berlin and the men's tournament in Doha the following year.Just last week, FinanceMagnates.com also reported that XTB had become a sponsor of FIBA and will be one of the main sponsors during the Basketball World Cups this year and next.The payoff for that spend, at least in client numbers, has been steep. XTB ended 2025 with 2.16 million total clients, up from 1.36 million a year earlier, having added 864,286 new accounts during the year, a 73% jump over 2024. Profitability, however, has come under pressure. Profit per lot fell 21.8% to PLN 215 in 2025, and the net profit margin contracted from roughly 46% in 2024 to around 30% last year, a shift that has weighed on the share price through the early part of 2026. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

PropAccount.com said it has added equities trading to its white-label prop firm platform, giving operators on its network the ability to run U.S. stock challenges alongside forex, futures, and crypto within a single infrastructure.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)The Boca Raton company, which is powered by FPFX Tech, said the launch covers both single-session and swing-trading challenges. The four-asset setup slots into the existing onboarding, risk, KYC, and payments tools already used by partner firms, according to the company.Operators Get Equities Without New Infrastructure, Firm SaysPropAccount said the equities module runs on the same back end that handles forex, futures, and crypto across DXtrade, Match-Trader, cTrader, Rithmic, and Tradovate. For existing partners, adding stock challenges requires no new vendor integration and carries no additional cost, the company claimed. New operators can go live within seven days, a timeline PropAccount has promoted since it rolled out fully customizable challenge formats for its white-label partners in 2025.Chief executive Justin Hertzberg said the firm built the addition around demand from stock traders who have not engaged with the prop firm model."Equities are the largest traded market in the world, and traders have been underserved by the retail prop industry for too long," Hertzberg said in the announcement. He added that the inclusion lets operators reach stock traders "without forcing them to adjust to equity CFDs."Stock Challenges Were Already Spreading Across Prop FirmsPropAccount is not first into equities. A cluster of prop firms has been pushing into stock-based challenges since early 2025, testing whether a model built on forex leverage can translate to equities, where margin is lower and spreads are tighter.Blueberry Funded, backed by Australian broker Blueberry Markets, expanded its evaluation program in April 2025 to include CFD stock trading on MetaTrader 5 and DXtrade, covering more than 1,000 stocks. The Trading Pit and Trade The Pool have operated stock-focused programs for longer, with Trade The Pool offering access to over 12,000 U.S. stock and ETF symbols through the Trader Evolution platform. FXIFY and Lark Funding also run stock CFD challenges, though most of these offerings remain structured around contracts for difference rather than direct exchange access.On the infrastructure side, PropAccount's closest competitor is EBSWare, which added U.S., Hong Kong, and Indian equities to its white-label prop platform in March 2025, giving brokers a back end for stock challenges without building the plumbing themselves. EBSWare's rollout and PropAccount's launch target the same narrow segment: operators that want to sell stock challenges without assembling the technology. A $68 Trillion Market, but a Different Economic ModelPropAccount pointed to Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association data showing U.S. equity market capitalization at $68.2 trillion at year-end 2025, with average daily volume of 18.6 billion shares. The company did not provide projections for how much of that activity it expects to pull into the prop firm ecosystem.The push into stocks comes as the retail prop trading sector absorbs a period of heavy attrition. Between 80 and 100 prop firms shut down in 2024 after MetaQuotes restricted MetaTrader licenses for firms serving U.S. clients, prompting a migration to DXtrade, Match-Trader, cTrader, and TradeLocker. The sector was valued at over $10 billion in 2025, with firms paying out roughly $325 million to traders last year, according to Prop Firm Match data cited by Devexperts.FPFX Tech's own data, shared with FinanceMagnates.com in 2024, found that only 7% of traders across 300,000 prop accounts achieved payouts, with the average payout reaching 4% of plan size. Those base rates frame the economics stock challenges now have to fit into. Equities carry lower typical leverage than forex or futures, which alters both the math of the challenge fee model and the risk profile operators face on funded accounts.An Industry Still Built on Challenge FeesThe broader question for PropAccount and its rivals is whether stock-challenge economics can sustain the same margins forex and futures have generated. Payout structures across the prop industry have already come under pressure this year, with several firms restricting gold trading after metal rallies stretched budgets.Hertzberg has argued earlier that prop trading will eventually face tighter regulation, citing CySEC chair George Theocharides, who has said prop trading will fall under robust oversight at some point. Any shift in regulatory treatment of simulated equity challenges, particularly if U.S. regulators eventually classify them as securities-adjacent products, would fall more heavily on infrastructure providers like PropAccount than on single-asset operators. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

BMLL Technologies named nine new hires today (Tue`sday) across partnerships, sales, revenue operations, finance and engineering, continuing the commercial and technical expansion the London-based market data firm kicked off after Nordic Capital acquired it last October.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)The new appointments follow two earlier senior hires this year, including Karen King's arrival in January as head of sales for Asia Pacific and Kevin Barrett's appointment a month later as senior sales director for listed derivatives in the US. Together, the hires point to an accelerated rebuild of BMLL's commercial organization under its new private equity owner.Nordic Capital Deal Fuels Post-Acquisition Build-OutThe latest round of hires puts Deyan Kolev on the executive management team as head of corporate development and partnerships, reporting to chief executive Paul Humphrey. Kolev previously held roles at Tradeweb, Informa, Euronext and NYSE.On the go-to-market side, BMLL hired Mo Badlani from Lightkeeper as senior sales director for hedge funds in the US, with Nick Haydon joining as senior sales director for enterprise from London Stock Exchange Group, where his career has also included stints at FIS and Thomson Reuters. Mariel Solomon, previously at LogicMonitor and Moody's Analytics, takes on the role of head of revenue operations. The recruitment push extends the pattern set by Kevin Barrett's February appointment as US derivatives sales lead, which the company had flagged as part of its futures expansion.“When Nordic Capital came on board, we made our intentions very clear, and we continue to deliver on this mission,” Humphrey commented. “We continue to invest globally in broadening venue and asset class coverage, increasing our years of history, expanding our team and deepening our partnerships.”The supporting appointments include Theo Lane as head of digital marketing, Paolo Ferri as financial controller, and three engineers: Wojciech Wojtkowski, Ryan Henzell-Hill and Robert Anderson. BMLL said further hires across research, product and sales are planned for the second quarter.Competition Heats Up for Granular Historical DataThe recruitment push lands in a market for granular historical data that is becoming more crowded. BMLL's core product sits in the niche of Level 3, 2 and 1 historical data across global equities, ETFs, futures and US equity options, putting it up against both large incumbents and specialist rivals.Bloomberg, LSEG's Refinitiv and ICE Data Services have all widened cloud-delivered data arrangements in recent years. On the specialist side, US-based Databento sells nanosecond-precision data via cloud APIs and launched its own Databricks integration in 2024, while Kaiko has pushed similar distribution deals for digital-asset order book records. LSEG itself moved deeper into low-latency data after acquiring MayStreet in 2022.BMLL has been trying to differentiate through breadth of historical coverage and cloud-native delivery. Earlier this month, the company plugged its datasets into Databricks, adding to existing access via Snowflake Marketplace, AWS S3, API and SFTP. In February, it teamed up with Features Analytics to build market abuse benchmarking products, extending its data into compliance-oriented workflows.Product Pipeline Runs Alongside HiringHumphrey has repeatedly tied BMLL's positioning to rising demand from AI-driven research workflows, and that framing reappeared in Tuesday's announcement. Quantitative teams at banks, asset managers and hedge funds increasingly want standardized, ready-to-use historical datasets to train models and test strategies, which has opened an opportunity for vendors that can deliver content inside the cloud environments those teams already use.The product pipeline reflects that bet. In September, BMLL launched its Trades Plus execution analytics dataset after feedback from members of its Client Product Advisory Board, billing it as the first product built directly from customer input. In March, the firm opened a year-long pilot with Tradefeedr to extend transaction cost analysis from FX into equities and futures. Over the past 14 months, it has also added Asian exchange feeds including Shanghai, Bombay and ASX 24 futures. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

Trade247, a multi-asset broker that operates through entities licensed in the United Arab Emirates and Mauritius, has integrated Acuity Trading's market intelligence suite into its platform, joining a growing list of retail firms bolting AI-assisted tools onto their trader offering.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)The deal bundles Acuity's AnalysisIQ trade signals, AI-enhanced market commentary, economic calendar content and Dynamic Emails inside Trade247's existing environment, the two companies said in a joint statement. Acuity's signal product, rolled out as TradeSignals in early 2025, pairs technical analysis with natural language processing of news sentiment to produce trade ideas across what the London-based vendor says is a universe of more than 2,000 assets. Dynamic Emails, added to the Acuity lineup in 2024, let brokers send content that refreshes each time the recipient opens the message, extending the intelligence layer into client communications.The Acuity Partner List Keeps Getting LongerAcuity has been one of the more active deal-makers in the broker intelligence space over the past year. FP Markets signed up in April 2026 for a similar bundle branded as FP Markets Intelligence and wired into MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5. Andrew Lane, CEO of Acuity, argued that broker platforms increasingly have to provide interpretive context rather than just market access. "Brokers need to do more than provide access to markets," Lane said. "They need to give traders clear, usable context inside the platform itself."OneRoyal added the same AI signal and Dynamic Email combination in November 2025, and Traders' Hub folded Acuity's research tools into its platform later that month, though the signals portion of that deal was restricted to the broker's Seychelles entity pending local regulatory clearance. MYFX Markets, Zarvista Capital Markets, Hantec Markets and prop firm FunderPro have all announced Acuity Trading integrations in the past 12 months.AI Tools Shift From Differentiator to Standard FeatureThe picture gets busier once rival providers are counted in. Autochartist, a long-standing chart pattern recognition firm, was acquired by oneZero in early 2025 and its content now flows into platforms including cTrader and Devexperts' DXcharts, where it sits alongside oneZero's Market Analytics tools added in November 2025. Trading Central continues to supply technical analysis to brokers such as Saxo Bank and TraderEvolution. Platform vendors are also layering in their own AI features, with Devexperts rolling out an in-chart AI assistant earlier this month and FBS launching an OpenAI-powered chart-reading tool in late 2025.The upshot is that AI signals, sentiment analysis and AI-authored commentary are drifting from a selling point to a baseline feature across retail CFD and FX. Trade247 operates through Trade Twenty Four 7 Markets Limited, licensed by the Financial Services Commission in Mauritius, and Trade Everyday Financial Advisors LLC, regulated by the Securities and Commodities Authority in the UAE. The broker offers forex, commodities, indices, stocks, metals and energy products. This article was written by Damian Chmiel at www.financemagnates.com.

AI is everywhere in the RegTech conversation right now, and the promise is real. Smarter surveillance, faster reporting, sharper AML detection, better oversight of communications and financial promotions. The industry is right to be excited. But two things will ultimately decide whether any of it holds up under regulatory scrutiny: explainability and security.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)The conversation about AI risk is well underway. Regulators, industry bodies, and compliance leaders are all engaged. But there is a meaningful gap between discussing these risks at conferences and building the operational infrastructure to manage them. That gap is where the industry is most exposed.The pressure is real and growing. Gartner estimates that the regulation governing the use of AI will cover 75% of the world's economies by 2030, with spending on dedicated AI governance platforms alone forecast to surpass $1 billion by 2030, not counting the far larger investment in people, processes, and internal tooling.The FSB's 2025 Annual Report confirms what many compliance professionals already feel: consistent implementation of regulatory reforms across jurisdictions remains a work in progress. For multi-jurisdictional trading firms, that fragmentation is the operating environment.Explainability Is Where Firms Will Be Tested FirstExplainability is where most firms will be tested first. The question at the centre of any AI evaluation in compliance is not only how accurate the model is, but whether the team behind it could walk a regulator through the full decision chain. What data went in? What logic was applied? Why this output and not another? That demands architectural choices made early and deliberately. Bolting on explainability after deployment is like trying to add foundations to a building that is already standing.Read more: Using Automated Compliance? This FCA Case Shows It Can Freeze Your Firm and Force Fund ReturnsMcKinsey's 2026 analysis of trusted AI found that automated RegTech solutions can lift compliance rates from around 75% to above 95%. That is significant. But automation without transparency does not eliminate failure. It makes failure harder to trace. A regulator will not accept that a model performed well ninety-five times out of a hundred if the firm cannot explain what happened the other five. Leading regulators around the world have been clear on this point.Security Deserves Equal WeightSecurity deserves equal weight, and it does not always get it. regtech systems handle some of the most sensitive data a trading firm possesses: trading activity, client positions, transaction histories, communications records, identity data, and regulatory submissions. All of it increasingly flows through AI models that few people in the organisation fully understand. Who has access to this data? How are models protected against manipulation? What happens if adversarial inputs are designed to blind a detection system? These are architecture questions that need answering before deployment, not after an incident.Data lineage ties both disciplines together. Any firm deploying AI-powered compliance will need to trace every data point feeding its models back to its source. Without that, there is no reliable way to assess whether alerts, risk scores, or regulatory reports stand on solid ground.The encouraging news is that firms investing in this foundation are seeing results. Gartner's survey of 360 organisations found that those deploying dedicated AI governance platforms are 3.4 times more likely to achieve high effectiveness. The investment in transparency and security pays off in measurable ways.The Road to RegTech NirvanaAI will reshape RegTech for trading companies. But the firms that capture the most value will be the ones that treat explainability and security as design principles from the start, not compliance checkboxes to revisit later. The road to RegTech nirvana is real. It runs through these two disciplines, and there are no shortcuts.Imagine what that nirvana actually looks like. Imagine a world where any compliance team member, with no coding background, can use plain language prompts to build the analysis, reporting, risk assessment, and surveillance solutions they have always needed but never had the resources to create. No dependency on internal engineering queues or vendor roadmaps. Solutions built in days, not quarters, with a full audit trail in human-readable form and security baked in by design. When the industry gets there, regtech will never be the same. It will stop being a bottleneck and become a business-enabling catalyst. It will connect defence functions to commercial value. It will turn what has always been seen as a grey, back-office necessity into something genuinely powerful and creative. That future is nearer than most people think. The question is whether you will be the one building it or watching someone else do it for you. This article was written by Avner Yoffe at www.financemagnates.com.

KuCoin, a leading global crypto platform built on trust, today announced an expansion of its PROOF trading campaign with the opening of a new reward pool and additional trading competitions starting April 20, 2026. Building on the initial rollout of KuCoin PROOF, the update introduces more opportunities across futures trading, including individual and team-based competitions and a futures lucky draw, as part of one of KuCoin’s largest trading campaign initiatives. The newly launched competitions contribute to a total reward pool of up to $500,000, offering users additional ways to participate and compete within a structured and transparent framework.The new competitions introduce a broader range of participation formats, including performance-based trading challenges, leaderboard-driven rankings, and team battle modes, designed to accommodate different trading styles and experience levels. Participants will be evaluated based on clearly defined criteria, with performance tracked through standardized leaderboards and consistent measurement methodologies.All competitions under the PROOF framework continue to operate with an emphasis on verifiability and fair play, supported by transparent participation rules, anti-cheating safeguards, and defined reward distribution processes. These measures are designed to provide users with greater clarity into how results are calculated and rewards are allocated.The expansion reflects KuCoin’s ongoing effort to scale PROOF as a multi-stage campaign framework, with additional competitions, themes, and participation formats expected to be introduced over time.Users can visit the KuCoin PROOF landing page to view full campaign details and participate in the newly available competitions.About KuCoinFounded in 2017, KuCoin is a leading global crypto platform built on trust and security, serving over 40 million users across 200+ countries and regions. Known for its reliability and user-first approach, the platform combines advanced technology, deep liquidity, and strong security safeguards to deliver a seamless trading experience. KuCoin provides access to 1,500+ digital assets through a broad product suite and remains committed to building transparent, compliant, and user-centric digital asset infrastructure for the future of finance, backed by SOC 2 Type II, ISO/IEC 27001:2022, and ISO/IEC 27701:2019 Certifications. In recent years, we have built a strong global compliance foundation, marked by key milestones including AUSTRAC registration in Australia, a MiCA license in Europe, and regulatory progress in other markets.Learn more at www.kucoin.com. This article was written by FM Contributors at www.financemagnates.com.

Robust infrastructure and strong regulation have been key tools in Singapore’s offering to hedge funds looking for a presence in Asia, although it continues to face stiff competition from other regional locations.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).According to IG, Singapore and Hong Kong are battling to become the Asian centre for hedge funds. Both cities are gateways to huge and increasingly wealthy regions (Singapore for ASEAN, Hong Kong for mainland China) and benefit from excellent infrastructure, a strong regulatory background and very low taxes.Sally Mung, senior product manager, hedge fund services, Asia Pacific, securities services at BNP Paribas, observes that innovation in onshore fund structures has established Singapore as a regional funds hub and made it a strong locus for growth going forward.As we have previously discussed, Singapore’s variable capital company or VCC initiative has reduced the barriers to entry, in principle enabling managers to target a wider range of previously excluded individual investors at a lower entry point.VCC and regulatory innovationAnother key recent development has been the move by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to simplify the licensing processes for fund managers utilising artificial intelligence, a decision that has transformed Singapore into a testing ground for the application of regulated machine learning.The role of Singapore’s hedge funds has also shifted significantly over the course of this decade as they have transitioned from being simply channels for Western capital to creators of innovative quantitative strategies that are on a par with those offered by their peers in the West.“The VCC has really been impactful since its launch in 2020,” says Patrick Na, head of financial services, South East Asia at TMF Group. “It offers a flexible, corporate-like vehicle with features such as variable capital (easy subscriptions/redemptions), umbrella structures with multiple sub-funds and straightforward re-domiciliation from offshore jurisdictions. This has lowered costs, sped up setup - which is now measured in weeks rather than months - and provided tax efficiencies.”Hedge fund strategies account for around 20% of variable capital companies, and discussions are ongoing around enhancements to further expand eligibility and simplify processes. According to Na, the structure has directly contributed to AUM growth, ecosystem development (service providers) and Singapore’s shift toward onshore fund domiciliation.Singapore is an attractive market for hedge funds because of its predictability; regulations are clear, the legal system is trusted and capital movements are relatively easy. Furthermore, with its tax efficiency, VCC structures and proximity to other Asian markets, Singapore is a practical base for running hedge funds, observes Kelly Chia, head of investment strategy at UOB Private Bank.Talent and visa constraintsOne of the challenges facing the hedge fund sector in Singapore has been the tightening of rules concerning the employment of expats - specifically in the financial sector - with anecdotal reports of companies finding it difficult to get visas for their staff and authorities making it difficult for existing non-Singaporean workers to get visa extensions.This contrasts with the approach taken by Dubai, for example, which offers many different kinds of work permits and operates a zero bureaucracy programme to make applying easy.“Singapore is stricter on visas and permanent residencies compared to Hong Kong,” accepts Chia. “However, many fund managers accept this trade-off for Singapore’s stability, policy consistency and lower geopolitical noise, giving Singapore an edge in long term planning and family office-driven capital.”Competitive positioning and listingsSingapore's appeal rests on several reinforcing pillars including its strategic position as a financial hub in Asia, a strong regulatory framework that provides a stable and transparent environment for investors, political stability, advanced infrastructure, strategic location and a favourable tax regime, says Na.All these factors attract both domestic and international hedge funds, he adds, noting that while Singapore and Hong Kong are the two dominant Asian centres, they differ in a number of ways in terms of focus and talent attraction.“Local politics are complicating Singapore's efforts to remain competitive against Hong Kong and Dubai,” says Na. “Many Singaporeans blame an influx of expats - particularly from Hong Kong during the Covid lockdowns - for driving up housing prices and other costs. Singapore tightened employment pass rules for the financial sector and a lot of senior portfolio managers who have been in Singapore for years struggle to get permanent residence, so after a few tries, they simply move to Dubai.”On the other hand, Hong Kong has been on the offensive. The territory saw a 24% increase in hedge fund managers, private equity fund managers and family offices over a three-year period to mid-2024.However, Na suggests that Singapore retains structural advantages in terms of political stability, clean governance and an ASEAN gateway that Hong Kong simply cannot replicate.“The two cities are increasingly differentiated and no longer seen as substitutable,” he says. “Hong Kong dominates for China-facing strategies and Singapore for Southeast Asia and broader Asia-Pacific mandates.”On the question of whether Singapore may be losing some competitive edge as more companies choose to list on foreign exchanges, Na acknowledges that there is genuine concern. The Singapore exchange has seen delistings outnumber new listings in recent years, with many firms opting for higher liquidity and valuations on US exchanges, Hong Kong or elsewhere.Singapore's growth is poised to moderate as its export-driven model is strained by geopolitical tensions and a fragmenting global trading system, though it could draw support from opportunities in the Middle East. https://t.co/o1KccqTNgC— The Japan Times (@japantimes) April 20, 2026“However, SGX and MAS have responded, for example with the new SGX-Nasdaq bridge, a dual listing bridge connecting both exchanges providing companies in Asia with a direct and harmonised framework, whose aim is to help revive sentiment and attract more listings,” he says. “Singapore’s strength remains in asset management and private capital rather than public equity listings per se.”Continued Attractiveness Despite Identified ConstraintsEven as more companies explore listing overseas, Singapore continues to remain attractive for hedge funds as most managers there allocate capital globally instead of relying on local IPO pipelines, says Chia.“Singapore’s value lies in being a capital and decision making hub rather than an exchange destination,” he concludes. “VCC structures have also removed real friction – both operationally and in terms of tax - making it easier to launch funds, add strategies and attract global allocators. For many managers, this can tip the decision in favour of Singapore rather than offshore alternatives.” This article was written by Paul Golden at www.financemagnates.com.

Dollar stablecoins risk behaving like fragile investment funds at the heart of the financial system, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has warned, calling for tighter global coordination on regulation before the market grows large enough to rival traditional money.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).BIS General Manager Pablo Hernández de Cos said US dollar‑denominated tokens could have “material consequences” for financial stability and economic policy if their use expands beyond today’s crypto‑trading niche.US Dollar Stablecoins Resemble ETFsDe Cos drew a direct comparison between the largest dollar stablecoins and exchange‑traded funds (ETFs), pointing to fees and conditions on primary redemptions and repeated deviations from the one‑to‑one dollar peg in secondary markets.He warned that this structure creates a specific contagion channel because issuers back their tokens with short‑term government debt and bank deposits, not simple cash balances. In a period of stress, a rush by holders to cash out could force issuers to dump Treasury bills and pull funding from banks, amplifying volatility in key funding markets rather than insulating them.At the same time, the BIS chief highlighted financial integrity gaps tied to the use of public, permissionless blockchains and unhosted wallets.Read more: Hong Kong Opens Stablecoin Market with First Approvals for HSBC and AnchorpointA significant share of stablecoin activity takes place outside traditional anti‑money‑laundering and counter‑terrorism financing controls, making the tokens attractive for illicit use unless authorities harden checks at the on‑ and off‑ramps linking crypto platforms with the banking system.De Cos also linked the rise of US dollar‑pegged tokens to the risk of renewed dollarisation pressures in emerging markets, where households already use stablecoins as offshore dollar savings and, in some cases, for domestic payments. Wider adoption could dilute monetary policy transmission, undermine local currencies and open new channels to evade capital controls, he said.Central Banks in Europe, the UK and SwitzerlandIn parallel, major jurisdictions are moving ahead with their own stablecoin regimes, though not yet on fully harmonised terms.The European Union’s Markets in Crypto‑Assets Regulation (MiCA), upcoming UK rules on fiat‑backed tokens and Switzerland’s new framework for Swiss franc‑linked coins all require full reserve backing, clear redemption rights and direct supervision of issuers, while taking different approaches on scope and implementation. De Cos argued that without closer global alignment, uneven standards will either fragment markets or push activity into lighter‑touch centres, undercutting more stringent regimes and leaving cross‑border risks unresolved. This article was written by Jared Kirui at www.financemagnates.com.

Revolut CEO Nik Storonsky said the company expects a public listing no earlier than 2028. In a recent interview, he outlined two near-term priorities: securing a U.S. banking license and expanding the B2B business.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!)He noted that public companies tend to carry more trust, particularly in banking. “We’re a bank, and for a bank, it’s super important to have trust. Public companies are trusted more compared to private companies.” he said in the interview with Bloomberg.Revolut’s Trading Model Relies on External Infrastructure Revolut’s multi-asset trading feature is presented as a consumer product, but the underlying execution layer is provided by CMC Connect, the institutional arm of CMC Markets. CMC handles pricing, execution, clearing, and risk, while Revolut controls the interface and the client relationship. This setup allows the company to offer trading products without building its own execution infrastructure. It also reflects a model in which consumer platforms integrate institutional capabilities through external providers. The B2B Segment Continues to Expand Revolut Business serves hundreds of thousands of corporate clients and generates over $500 million in annual revenue, roughly 16% of group income. The company recently launched Revolut BillPay, a supplier payment platform operating across 150 jurisdictions, extending its treasury, payments, and FX capabilities. At the group level, Revolut reported $6 billion in revenue and $2.3 billion in profit for 2025, with a 38% margin. More than 10 product lines each generated over $100 million, indicating a diversified revenue base across services.Our 2025 pre-tax profit of $2.3B marks our fifth straight year of profitability.We’re proving that high-speed innovation and financial sustainability go hand-in-hand.This resilience is powered by a diversified ecosystem: 11 of our business and retail products each generated…— Revolut (@Revolut) March 24, 2026U.S. Banking License Remains a Key Objective Revolut received its UK banking license in March and has submitted an application for a U.S. banking charter. According to Storonsky, the current policy environment is more accommodating for fintech firms. A U.S. license would provide access to Federal Reserve payment systems and support the rollout of lending and credit productsRevolut processed approximately $1.7 trillion in transaction volume in 2025, reflecting the scale of activity across its retail and business segments. The company is operating across payments, FX, trading, and business services within a single platform.Its use of external infrastructure providers, combined with internal product distribution, positions it within a broader shift toward integrated financial platforms. For brokers, this model raises questions around distribution, partnerships, and competition. Platforms with direct client access and integrated product suites are expanding their role in areas traditionally served by standalone providers. This article was written by Tanya Chepkova at www.financemagnates.com.

The securities regulators in Québec, Ontario and France have signed an agreement to support cross-listings of securities between Canada and France.Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don't!).The agreement involves the Autorité des marchés financiers in Québec, the Ontario Securities Commission and the Autorité des Marchés Financiers in France.Regulators Launch Cross-Listing Coordination ProcessThe framework is intended to support initial cross-listings through prospectuses. It establishes a cooperative process aimed at improving dialogue and information sharing between the three regulators.Yves Ouellet, President and CEO of AMF Québec, said Canada’s capital markets are “navigating a period of rapid change shaped by global economic uncertainty.” He added that the AMF Québec and OSC continue to support competitiveness in Canadian markets, in line with commitments made by the Canadian Securities Administrators in April 2025.OSC AMF Detail Market MandatesCompanies seeking to list securities in both jurisdictions will still need to comply with all applicable regulatory and exchange requirements. The agreement does not introduce regulatory relief. Instead, it focuses on coordination during the prospectus review process and provides increased regulatory support.OSC CEO Grant Vingoe said cooperation between jurisdictions is important for cross-listed issuers. He said the agreement is “another way we can support Canadian issuers by opening up new possibilities.”The AMF Québec said it regulates insurance, securities, derivatives, financial product distribution, deposit institutions, mortgage brokerage and credit assessment, with a mandate to maintain market integrity and public trust.The OSC said its mandate includes investor protection, fair and efficient markets, capital formation and financial system stability.AMF France Highlights Market Protection RoleThe AMF France said it is responsible for protecting savings invested in financial products, ensuring investor information and supervising market operations.AMF France Chair Marie-Anne Barbat-Layani said the agreement reflects efforts to support the attractiveness of French capital markets. She said it confirms “the competitiveness of the Paris financial centre” and highlights relations with Canadian regulators. She also said the authority aims to promote a financial system while maintaining investor protection and supporting financing of the economy. This article was written by Tareq Sikder at www.financemagnates.com.