With companies like Etoro, Stocktwits, Cortal Consors with Hopee or Fidor, one of the key theme for Finovate Europe was how financial service can be changed by being developed around the interaction of its users.
One of the consequences of this approach is the possibility for successful amateurs to become a direct competition to established business model.
– EToro (voted Best of Show) is an online Forex broker with a major twist. By implementing social trading, it allows users to copy specific trades from others or even follow a specific trader.
As seen in the image above, EToro also has added a gaming perspective to trading, by creating traders ranking and watch lists. For now it seems that what is driving the platform dynamic is mainly the game mechanic, but it could be expected that leading traders may be remunerated at some points for their financial advice (in a way close to Covestor for example).
Note:
* When copying a trade, users get a close equivalent to the precedent trade, but not exactly the same one (but teh same trades when following)
* Etoro assured me they have set a killswitch so that if you follow a trader going “rogue”, they will disconnect its followers’ trade. Continue reading Finovate Europe 2011 : Part 2 [A social world and the rise of the amateur]