EToro raises $12m from Commerzbank subsidiary

EToro has raised $12 million from Commerzbank’s corporate venture capital subsidiary. CommerzVentures, launched around six months ago, announced the investment yesterday, joining Russia’s Sberbank and China’s Ping An as a follower investor in the Series D financing of the Israeli group.

In December, eToro secured a hefty $27 million in capital from the Russian and Chinese investors. The latest collection of investment funds takes the company’s total investment volume to $39 million. This includes a credit line of $10 million‎ from Silicon Valley Bank. ‎

CommerzVentures — focuses on firms in the market maturity phase, while a separate unit focuses on seed stage startups — has already met with more than a hundred entrepreneurs and companies.

The fund’s co-managing director, said in a statement yesterday that eToro – which has more than million registered users and offers hundreds of contracts for difference (CFDs) on stocks, currencies, commodities and indices — was recognised as a “perfect fit” for CommerzVentures as it had firmly established itself as the leader in social trading.

EToro co-founder and CEO Yoni Assia also commented: “The new funds raised will help us scale globally and grow faster than ever before.”

He added that the Israeli company planned to introduce a completely new platform alongside its revamped Popular Investors programme, which gives traders the opportunity follow other investors’ progress.

When announcing its plans to raise investment funds in December, eToro said that while the firm was looking east, some of the cash would go towards advertising in the UK and beefing up their small team here. Assia noted at that time: “The UK is going to be one of our main focuses.”