March 15, 2021 | AtoZ Markets – Social trading platform and brokerage intermediary, eToro, is considering a merger with a blank-check acquisition company to publicly list its shares on Nasdaq, according to an Israeli newspaper, Calcalist.
eToro calls SPAC merger "market rumors"
As per the report, the trading company is looking for a listing valuation of approximately $10 billion.
However, when asked by the Calcalist newspaper, an eToro spokesperson replied that they were not commenting on “market rumors.”
Note that in December 2020, the same local publication Calcalist published information that eToro was planning to conduct a $5 billion IPO on Nasdaq in 2021.
Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) are shell companies with only the intention to merge with operating companies, helping them to go public bypassing the traditional and time-consuming initial public offering (IPO). SPACs became very popular in recent years due to their demand and some are even raising hundreds of millions of dollars.
At the moment, however, it remains unknown which SPAC eToro is considering a merger.
While eToro hasn't confirmed any intentions of a public listing, there has been a massive demand for its shares among private investors due to the media reports. Though the broker was officially valued at $800 million in its last funding round, a private sale of at least $50 million worth of eToro shares was reportedly sealed in 2020 at a valuation of $2.5 billion.
If eToro truly manages to gain a valuation of $10 billion, it will become one of the largest publicly-traded Israeli fintech companies.
Founded in 2006 by Yoni and Ronen Assia and David Ring, the Israeli-based fintech firm grew aggressively over the years. eToro ended 2020 with a revenue of $600 million as the trading volumes skyrocketed to $1.5 trillion.
Think we missed something? Let us know in the comment section below.