London-headquartered Trading 212, a retail brokerage firm, has further diversified its business with the recent launch of multi-currency payment cards for its customers in the United Kingdom. The broker has teamed up with Paynetics, a regulated e-money services provider, to offer a payment card that will give cashback of 1.5 percent until the end of September, and then reduce it to 0.5 percent.
Trading 212 Expands with Payment Cards
The payment cards are another effort by the London-headquartered broker to diversify its income from forex and contracts for differences (CFDs) offerings. The broker has been concentrating on its physical shares trading platform in recent years.
In a Companies House filing, the holding company of the Trading 212 brand indicated that its “growth strategy is focused on the stockbroking part of the business and on increasing the value of client money and client asset balances.”
With its latest venture into payments, the retail broker is following in the footsteps of several other competitor brands, including eToro, Equiti, XS, and more. These payment cards basically allow the brokerage customers to make payments with the uninvested cash in their brokerage accounts.
A 5.2 Percent Interest Rate
In the official announcement, Trading 212 explained that its clientele could manage multiple currencies through one easy-to-use card. The card will also offer its users an interest of 5.2 percent, paid daily, which can be withdrawn at any time. Although withdrawals are free up to £400 per month, the platform will charge 1 percent in ATM fees thereafter.
The brokerage further emphasized that the card will be free for all users, without any hidden fees or subscription plans. The payment cards are now available only in the UK but will soon be available in Europe as well.
To offer payment cards, Trading 212 is using the services of Paynetics, a company known for enabling customers to develop and manage financial products, and which boasts more than 115 embedded finance clients.
“By using Paynetics’ infrastructure, Trading 212 will be able to continue empowering investors with the ability to scale their trading globally,” said Ivo Gueorguiev, co-founder at Paynetics UK.
Highlighting the significance of the partnership, Kaloyan Yanchev, head of payments at Trading 212, said: “Democratising savings and investments is something that we’re very passionate about, and this partnership allows us to increase the capabilities of our commission-free platform for our customers.”
Trading 212 was established in Bulgaria in 2004 as Avus Capital and was later incorporated in the UK in 2013. Its business is mainly focused in the UK and the European Union, operating with three entities: one in the UK and the other two in Cyprus and Bulgaria, respectively.
In 2022, the holding group company generated total revenue of £114.9 million, a year-over-year decline of 17 percent, as Finance Magnates reported earlier. However, most of the business was generated by the UK entity, which brought in more than £98.7 million. Although the umbrella group recorded a pre-tax profit of £40.5 million, down from the previous year’s £86 million, the UK entity ended the year with a pre-tax profit of £50.8 million, meaning the Cypriot and Bulgarian branches ended the year with a loss of £10.3 million.
