eToro Review

eToro is a popular online brokerage and trading platform offering forex, CFDs, stocks and cryptocurrencies. The company is best known for its copy trading community.This review covers eToro services in New Zealand.

Updated 7 August 2023

In this review, we take a deep dive into the products and features offered by eToro and explore specifically which features are available in New Zealand.

Know this first: The scope of products eToro offers in New Zealand is severely limited compared to the rest of the world.

eToro summary:

eToro is a multinational online trading broker with licenses from multiple regulators.
eToro is not licensed to operate as a derivatives issuer, nor is the broker registered with the FSPR.
On the 30th of September 2018, eToro discontinued support of CFD and securities trading for New Zealand residents.
Currently, the only service eToro provides to New Zealand residents is cryptocurrency trading.
eToro operates a standalone cryptocurrency exchange and wallet called eToroX.
The company is backed by major investors and recently announced a public offering.

To explain eToro in detail, our guide covers:

Warning:

By publishing this guide, we are not recommending or suggesting in any way or form that Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency is a suitable investment.
We published and update this guide to help people understand the eToro platform - MoneyHub is conservative, and our publisher, Christopher Walsh, has zero Bitcoin or other cryptocurrency investments.
We present this information in good faith and remain objective at all times. By including this guide under our Investing and Saving section, we are not advocating that cryptocurrency is an investment. We may earn a referral bonus for anyone that clicks on some of the below links - see our Advertising Policy for more details.

Introduction to eToro

eToro is a popular name in the online trading community with more than 20 million registered users. The company operates worldwide with numerous licenses to offer various investment and speculative trading products, such as forex, contracts-for-difference, stocks and cryptocurrencies.

The company was founded in Israel in 2007 by three fintech entrepreneurs with the vision of making the global financial markets accessible, simple and transparent for everyone.

eToro has built a large community around its copy trading platform where experienced traders can host detailed strategy profiles for prospective investors to evaluate before copying in their accounts. Copying other traders with a verifiable track record is attractive to many retail investors who don’t have the time or skills to trade themselves.

eToro licenses and regulations

eToro has several licenses and registrations for providing financial services around the world. At present, eToro does not have a license to provide financial services in New Zealand, nor is the company registered on the Financial Services Provider Register.

In 2010, eToro gained its first license to provide investment services. The brand received an Investment Firm license from the Cyprus Securities Exchange Commission (CySEC) (license no.109/10). A few years later, eToro became authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK (firm ref no. 583263). Subsequently, eToro became authorised by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and licenced by the Financial Services Authority Seychelles (FSAS).

As eToro began expanding into the United States, the brokerage registered with FinCEN as a Money Services Business and became a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC).

eToroX, the standalone cryptocurrency exchange offered by eToro, is a regulated distributed ledger technology (DLT) provider licensed by the Gibraltar Financial Services Commission, with licence number FSC1333B.

eToro products and services

Internationally, eToro offers a wide range of trading instruments and features. In New Zealand, the only service offered is cryptocurrency trading.

eToro cryptocurrency trading in New Zealand

eToro offers cryptocurrency trading on its flagship multi-asset social trading platform, a dedicated crypto exchange called eToroX and a cryptocurrency wallet.

On the eToro platform, all New Zealand can do is open and close long (buy) positions without leverage. Instead of closing the position, you can choose physical settlement in cryptocurrency, which is transferred to your eToro wallet; this operation incurs a fee of the greater of 0.5% or US$1. Therefore, you can buy and trade cryptocurrency on the platform.

Cryptocurrency trading fees

eToro does not charge commissions for trading cryptocurrencies but does charge a spread. The spread starts at 0.75% for trading Bitcoin and varies according to the product. The highest spread is 5% on Tezos.

Cryptocurrencies supported on eToro

eToro supports 30 cryptocurrencies on its trading platform, all of which can be withdrawn to the eToroX wallet. Supported cryptocurrencies are:

Bitcoin (BTC/USD), Ethereum (ETH/USD), Bitcoin Cash (BCH/USD), XRP (XRP/USD)
Dash (DASH/USD), Litecoin (LTC/USD), Ethereum Classic (ETC/USD), Cardano (ADA/USD), MIOTA (IOTA/USD), Stellar (XLM/USD), EOS (EOS/USD), NEO (NEO/USD), TRON (TRX/USD), ZCASH (ZEC/USD), Binance Coin (BNB/USD), Tezos (XTZ/USD), Maker (MKR/USD), Compound (COMP/USD), Chainlink (LINK/USD), Uniswap (UNI/USD), Yearn.finance (YFI/USD), Dogecoin (DOGE/USD), Aave (AAVE/USD), Algorand (ALGO/USD), Decentraland (MANA/USD), Enjin (ENJ/USD), Basic Attention Token (BAT/USD), Polygon (MATIC/USD), Shiba (SHIBxM/USD)

Deposit methods

To start trading cryptocurrency on the eToro trading platform, New Zealand residents can deposit funds using various payment methods, such as bank transfers, PayPal, Skrill, NETELLER, credit and debit card and other methods. If you deposit New Zealand dollars to your eToro account, you will be charged between 50 and 100 pips on the exchange rate, depending on the deposit method.

For example, if you deposit via bank transfer, the conversion charge is 50 pips. Suppose you deposit NZ$3,000, and the current NZD/USD exchange rate is 0.7150. Instead of getting US$2,145, you’d get US$2,130.

Minimum deposit

The minimum first-time deposit for New Zealanders using eToro is US$1,000. After the first time you deposit, all subsequent deposits must be over US$50 except for bank deposits, which have a minimum of US$500.

Other fees & commissions

Besides the various fees and commissions described above, here are some other costs to be aware of:

Withdrawal fee: eToro charges a US$5 withdrawal fee for any withdrawal. The minimum withdrawal amount is US$30.
Inactivity fee: if you do not log into your account for 12 months, eToro will charge a monthly inactivity fee of US$10.

Alternative cryptocurrency trading platforms to eToro

Because of eToro’s high transaction costs and restrictive deposit and withdrawal methods, you might be interested in exploring other cryptocurrency exchanges and trading platforms that are based in New Zealand.

Easy Crypto Review

eToro copy trading in New Zealand

Copy trading is a service where one trader can copy the trades of another. Experienced traders can enlist as strategy providers allowing other traders to copy them for a fee. Copy trading is incredibly popular because trading is time consuming, stressful and requires years of practice even to have a chance of becoming consistently profitable.

eToro has developed a thriving copy trading platform that fosters social interaction between users. Strategy providers curate their own micro-communities and interact with their followers, making eToro a social trading platform.

Unfortunately, eToro copy trading isn’t available in New Zealand. The copy trading service revolves around CFDs and stocks. As eToro is not authorised by the New Zealand Financial Markets Authority, the broker cannot offer regulated products, such as CFDs or stock trading.

eToro forex & CFD trading in New Zealand

eToro is primarily a forex and CFD copy trading broker. The platform offers CFDs on forex, commodities, indices, stocks and cryptocurrencies. CFDs are derivatives that let traders go long or short to speculate on the rising or falling price of various assets using leverage.

eToro does not have a derivatives issuer licence in New Zealand. Therefore the company is not permitted to provide CFDs to New Zealand residents, even from its Australian licensed entity. There are several licensed and regulated forex and CFD brokers in New Zealand, and we have reviewed them in detail:

eToro stock trading in New Zealand

eToro is a popular platform for trading stocks because of its 0% commissions on trading shares from the US, Europe and Asia. eToro does not offer stock trading to New Zealand residents. New Zealand has many options for trading or investing in stocks with low and even zero fees; some of our most popular guides explain more:

Alternatives to eToro - Easy Crypto vs Swyftx vs Binance vs LocalBitcoins

We compare popular and trusted options below:

Easy Crypto

Payment methods: POLI instant pay, debit and credit cards, local NZ bank transfer
Fees: All fees are included in the spread, which is why the bid and offer prices might look higher than other platforms. The fees are around 0.70% to 0.90%.
Minimum order size: NZ$50
Settlement: Private wallet
Coins available: 109, including Bitcoin
Learn more: Easy Crypto

Swyftx

Payment methods: To buy Bitcoin with New Zealand dollars on Swyftx, only bank transfers are permitted.
Withdrawal fees: Minimum withdrawal of NZ$30 with a NZ$10 withdrawal fee.
Trading fees: 0.6% platform fee on the value of the transaction. Swyftx states that it offers high volume discounts.
Verification requirements: The steps from signup to trade are simple - first, users create an account (by entering their name and details). Then, Swyftx verifies your ID (via photo ID, phone number and email address) and, once done, asks for a deposit (made via bank transfer). Once the deposit has cleared, users can start trading.
Limits: Daily deposit limit up to NZ$50,000, no trading limits.
Markets available: Various
More details: Visit Swyftx and/or read our Swyftx review.

Binance

Payment methods: Debit/credit card via third-party payment provider Simplex
Fees: Card processing fees are 3.5% with a minimum fee of US$10. When withdrawing Bitcoin, for example to your private wallet, there is a withdrawal fee of 0.0005 BTC, approximately NZ$28
Minimum order size: The minimum order size is the equivalent of US$30, which is approximately NZ$46
Settlement: On an account
Coins available: With a bank card, you can buy 18 different cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin. On the exchange, there is hundreds of coins are available to trade once you have an account funded with crypto
Learn more: Binance or read our Binance Review

LocalBitcoins

Payment methods: It depends on your agreement with the seller
Fees: A fee of 1% is charged to the party which listed the ad on the platform, other fees might be priced into the offer from the seller
Minimum order size: The seller sets the minimum order size
Settlement: Private wallet
Coins available: Bitcoin only
Learn More: LocalBitcoins

eToro - Frequently Asked Questions

We answer common questions below to help further explain eToro's offering:

Does the FMA in New Zealand license eToro?

No. When the FMA introduced new requirements for short-term derivatives to be licensed from the 1st of December 2017, eToro did not apply or at least was not issued a license from the FMA and therefore was no longer permitted to offer services to New Zealanders.

Is eToro a publicly listed company, and can I buy shares in eToro?

eToro is not a publicly listed company. In March 2021, the company announced it is planning to become a publicly listed company through a reverse triangular merger with a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) called FinTech Acquisition Corp V (NASDAQ: FTCV). SPACs are a controversial technique for taking a company public because they are not subject to as much scrutiny as a company listing itself on a stock exchange. Considering the substantial investment into eToro from major players like SBI Holding, Softbank, Commerzbank, Sberbank and many others, it’s likely these firms expect a strong exit via a public listing.

What is the difference between eToro and eToroX?

eToro operates an easy to use online trading platform which supports trading various cryptocurrencies against the US dollar. The eToro trading platform supports 30 cryptocurrencies. eToroX is a standalone cryptocurrency exchange trading platform and supports over 100 cryptocurrencies that are physically settled in the exchange account.

Is eToro copy trading available in New Zealand?

eToro copy trading is not available in New Zealand as the company does not have the necessary licenses to provide forex, CFDs or stock trading in the country.

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