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Retail trading platform eToro has filed confidential documents with U.S. regulators in a key step toward an initial public offering in New York this year that could value the business at more than $5 billion.
The group, whose largest market is Britain, became the latest company to avoid listing in London, which has struggled to attract and keep high-profile companies listed.
Chief executive and founder Yoni Asia told the Financial Times last year that listing in the US would give the company access to a wider range of investors than the UK market.
“Very few of our global clients trade British shares,” he said. “Something about the U.S. market creates a pool of both deep liquidity and deep awareness of assets traded in the U.S.”
Founded in 2007, the company allows customers to trade assets such as stocks and cryptocurrencies. The company managed $11.3 billion in client assets across 3 million accounts, the FT reported last March.
The company’s progress toward going public comes as other startups remain private for long periods of time, disappointing investors and bankers’ hopes for a blockbuster stock market emergence.
The group is currently filing confidential documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission in preparation for a U.S. IPO, the people said. One of the people added that the company could list in New York as early as the second quarter of this year.
Confidential filings with U.S. regulators allow companies to move forward with their listing plans privately before releasing documents publicly as flotation approaches.
The company’s valuation has plummeted since it first attempted to go public in 2021 through a $10.4 billion deal with a blank check company. Asia previously said eToro realized “there was no market” and ended its endeavor in 2022 as the boom in blank check vehicles known as Spacs collapsed.
EToro was valued at $3.5 billion in a 2023 funding round that raised $250 million from investors including SoftBank and market data firm Aeon Group.
A future IPO could value the business at more than $5 billion, according to one of the people familiar with the flotation plan. Banks including Goldman Sachs, Jefferies and UBS are collaborating on the company’s plans, the people said.
Etro, Goldman, Jefferies and UBS declined to comment.
