The UAE, the first country to formally regulate financial influencers, now counts 171 registered “finfluencers” on its Capital Markets Authority (CMA) registry—just over a year after launching the framework.
Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don’t!).
However, a FinanceMagnates.com review identified inconsistencies across the database, including broken, mismatched, and in some cases non-functional social media links, raising concerns about enforcement quality and verification standards.
In response, the CMA said it would review “all available links of the financial influencers,” but did not directly address the specific discrepancies highlighted. Despite these gaps, the initiative has attracted broad participation, including regulator-affiliated influencers and CFD broker executives, with the registry continuing to expand.
A section of the CMA’s list of registered finfluencers
Still, the identified anomalies make it difficult for users to reliably verify registered finfluencers, potentially undermining the transparency the framework aims to provide.
GBE brokers takes over JFD clients
Meanwhile, GBE Brokers agreed to buy a large part of the client base and partner network of JFD Group, which operates as JFD Brokers. The deal is an asset purchase and includes most of JFD’s client accounts and relationships with intermediaries. GBE Brokers is also growing internationally with a new representative office in Dubai, strengthening its presence in the Middle East and North Africa.
The firm said the Dubai office complements its existing setup, which includes its headquarters in Cyprus and a branch office in Germany, as well as operations across financial centres in Europe, Africa and Asia.
eToro buys Zengo to scale prediction markets
In another case of business expansion, eToro is acquiring Israeli self-custodial wallet provider Zengo, the Nasdaq-listed broker. The deal gives eToro a ready non-custodial wallet product to support a broader digital asset strategy that it has explicitly linked to prediction markets and decentralized trading.
According to the fintech giant, Zengo wallet will help facilitate tokenized assets and “emerging decentralized trading models such as prediction markets and perpetuals.” This wording aligns with a strategy the company has been outlining publicly since the start of the year.
NAGA touts AI-first model as Xetra shares rebound ahead of Q1
A section of brokers are eying AI for growth. NAGA, the Xetra-listed fintech behind the Naga One financial app, said that it is building its next phase of growth around AI. The company said the technology now handles most of its chat-based customer support without human agents and allows it to operate its marketing function with about 20% fewer staff.
The announcement comes one week before NAGA is due to publish its unaudited first-quarter results and after a sharp rebound in its Hamburg-listed shares. NAGA reported that AI fully resolved about 66% of chat-based customer support interactions in the first quarter without any human involvement and added that it plans to roll out similar automation for email support.
Source: Tradingview.com
NAGA’s AI push comes after a highly volatile period for its stock. On Thursday, the share price extended its rebound, rising as high as €6.00 intraday and reaching €5.50 at one point, a move that represents roughly a 350% gain from the April low.
Polish watchdog fines XTB
Not all is matching the letter of MiFID II though. Poland’s financial regulator, the KNF, fined Warsaw-based brokerage XTB SA PLN 20 million (about $5.5 million) for breaking MiFID II and investor protection rules. In a decision dated 30 March 2026, the watchdog said XTB did not properly assess clients’ knowledge, failed to clearly define who its products were aimed at, and did not adequately explain the risks of trading Contracts for Difference (CFDs).
The KNF said that between January 2022 and September 2023, XTB used client questionnaires that did not accurately measure customers’ experience with complex financial products. It added that the broker treated experience with simple instruments as sufficient for trading high-risk CFDs, which could have exposed inexperienced clients to large losses.
Scaling prop firms without burning cash
Building a scalable acquisition engine for a prop firm usually comes down to three things: the channels you use, how you segment your audience, and the creatives you run. We looked at all three, covering six key channels, a structured way to test creatives, and eight specific creative themes backed by real performance benchmarks.
However, the performance metrics shared in the article are not universal and can differ by market. Copying any of the creatives directly will not guarantee results, and the examples are provided only as inspiration and for educational purposes.
Kraken’s $550M Bitnomial acquisition, IPO, Extortion Claims
In the crypto industry, Kraken is at the center of several major moves. It quietly filed for an initial public offering (IPO) late last year, co-CEO Arjun Sethi said at the Semafor World Economy event in Washington, DC. He did not disclose any details about the deal, such as the company’s valuation or how large the share sale might be.
The exchange has also signed a definitive agreement to acquire Bitnomial, the only crypto-native firm in the United States that holds all three CFTC licenses required to operate a fully integrated crypto derivatives business. The deal is valued at up to $550 million, with Bitnomial’s extensive regulatory footprint seen as the key driver behind the acquisition.
Not everything is smooth sailing though. Videos circulating on dark web forums have drawn Kraken into an extortion attempt, with a criminal group allegedly threatening to publish internal footage to force a ransom payment, but the exchange says no systems were breached and client funds remain safe.
Kraken Security Update
We are currently being extorted by a criminal group threatening to release videos of our internal systems with client data shown if we do not comply with their demands. It’s important to start with the most important points: our systems were never…
— Nick Percoco (@c7five) April 13, 2026
Kraken disclosed that it traced the issue to two insider incidents involving limited access to support data that exposed around 2,000 accounts, about 0.02% of its client base, and added that both cases were linked to support team members whose access credentials were revoked as soon as the activity was detected.
SEC clears $25k day trading limit
Away from crypto, day trading in the US may get a major boost after the Securities and Exchange Commission approved a plan to scrap the Pattern Day Trader rule, which requires a minimum account balance of 25,000 dollars for active traders. The current rule also limits traders with less than that amount in their margin accounts to no more than four day trades in five days.
Today, the SEC approved a major FINRA rule change that eliminates the Pattern Day Trader (PDT) rule and replaces it with a new intraday margin system.https://t.co/QB7FlwCBE6
📷 What’s Being Removed
The $25,000 minimum account requirement for day traders📷 What’s Replacing It…
— Cobra Trading (@cobra_trading) April 14, 2026
Instead, the regulator plans to introduce a new intraday margin system that measures risk in real time rather than simply counting trades. Under this approach, traders would need to maintain enough equity to cover their actual market exposure, potentially allowing more flexibility but also demanding tighter risk control.
Do stocks beat cash, or just thanks to a few big winners?
For decades, investors have been told that holding shares for the long term beats keeping money in cash or cash-like assets. Recent analysis, however, suggests that while staying invested in equities can pay off, only a small number of individual stocks are responsible for most of the market’s outperformance over safe assets like Treasury bills.
An article in the Financial Times highlighted research by Professor Hendrik Bessembinder of Arizona State University, who examined the long‑term performance of individual US stocks.
He found that four out of every seven common stocks in the Center for Research in Security Prices database since 1926 delivered lifetime buy‑and‑hold returns below those of one‑month US Treasuries. Over the past century, the top 4% of listed US companies accounted for the entire net wealth created by the stock market, while the remaining stocks collectively only matched the returns of Treasury bills.
Executive Moves: IG, oneZero, and XTX
In the executive moves, IG Group appointed Qu Zhao as Head of Japan, following the departure of Tomoharu Furuichi. Furuichi stepped
down after nearly seven years as Representative Director and Chief Executive
Officer of IG Japan.
oneZero Financial Systems appointed Alberto Bruno as
Director of Business Development, adding to its senior leadership team. The
move is aimed at strengthening the firm’s Engagement Division, which focuses on
helping brokers leverage marketing analytics to grow their client base and
improve retention.
Lastly, XTX Markets Chief Technology Officer Joshua Leahy left the firm, the company confirmed in an email to Finance Magnates. His
departure brings to a close more than a decade at the quantitative trading
company.
The UAE, the first country to formally regulate financial influencers, now counts 171 registered “finfluencers” on its Capital Markets Authority (CMA) registry—just over a year after launching the framework.
Singapore Summit: Meet the largest APAC brokers you know (and those you still don’t!).
However, a FinanceMagnates.com review identified inconsistencies across the database, including broken, mismatched, and in some cases non-functional social media links, raising concerns about enforcement quality and verification standards.
In response, the CMA said it would review “all available links of the financial influencers,” but did not directly address the specific discrepancies highlighted. Despite these gaps, the initiative has attracted broad participation, including regulator-affiliated influencers and CFD broker executives, with the registry continuing to expand.
A section of the CMA’s list of registered finfluencers
Still, the identified anomalies make it difficult for users to reliably verify registered finfluencers, potentially undermining the transparency the framework aims to provide.
GBE brokers takes over JFD clients
Meanwhile, GBE Brokers agreed to buy a large part of the client base and partner network of JFD Group, which operates as JFD Brokers. The deal is an asset purchase and includes most of JFD’s client accounts and relationships with intermediaries. GBE Brokers is also growing internationally with a new representative office in Dubai, strengthening its presence in the Middle East and North Africa.
The firm said the Dubai office complements its existing setup, which includes its headquarters in Cyprus and a branch office in Germany, as well as operations across financial centres in Europe, Africa and Asia.
eToro buys Zengo to scale prediction markets
In another case of business expansion, eToro is acquiring Israeli self-custodial wallet provider Zengo, the Nasdaq-listed broker. The deal gives eToro a ready non-custodial wallet product to support a broader digital asset strategy that it has explicitly linked to prediction markets and decentralized trading.
According to the fintech giant, Zengo wallet will help facilitate tokenized assets and “emerging decentralized trading models such as prediction markets and perpetuals.” This wording aligns with a strategy the company has been outlining publicly since the start of the year.
NAGA touts AI-first model as Xetra shares rebound ahead of Q1
A section of brokers are eying AI for growth. NAGA, the Xetra-listed fintech behind the Naga One financial app, said that it is building its next phase of growth around AI. The company said the technology now handles most of its chat-based customer support without human agents and allows it to operate its marketing function with about 20% fewer staff.
The announcement comes one week before NAGA is due to publish its unaudited first-quarter results and after a sharp rebound in its Hamburg-listed shares. NAGA reported that AI fully resolved about 66% of chat-based customer support interactions in the first quarter without any human involvement and added that it plans to roll out similar automation for email support.
Source: Tradingview.com
NAGA’s AI push comes after a highly volatile period for its stock. On Thursday, the share price extended its rebound, rising as high as €6.00 intraday and reaching €5.50 at one point, a move that represents roughly a 350% gain from the April low.
Polish watchdog fines XTB
Not all is matching the letter of MiFID II though. Poland’s financial regulator, the KNF, fined Warsaw-based brokerage XTB SA PLN 20 million (about $5.5 million) for breaking MiFID II and investor protection rules. In a decision dated 30 March 2026, the watchdog said XTB did not properly assess clients’ knowledge, failed to clearly define who its products were aimed at, and did not adequately explain the risks of trading Contracts for Difference (CFDs).
The KNF said that between January 2022 and September 2023, XTB used client questionnaires that did not accurately measure customers’ experience with complex financial products. It added that the broker treated experience with simple instruments as sufficient for trading high-risk CFDs, which could have exposed inexperienced clients to large losses.
Scaling prop firms without burning cash
Building a scalable acquisition engine for a prop firm usually comes down to three things: the channels you use, how you segment your audience, and the creatives you run. We looked at all three, covering six key channels, a structured way to test creatives, and eight specific creative themes backed by real performance benchmarks.
However, the performance metrics shared in the article are not universal and can differ by market. Copying any of the creatives directly will not guarantee results, and the examples are provided only as inspiration and for educational purposes.
Kraken’s $550M Bitnomial acquisition, IPO, Extortion Claims
In the crypto industry, Kraken is at the center of several major moves. It quietly filed for an initial public offering (IPO) late last year, co-CEO Arjun Sethi said at the Semafor World Economy event in Washington, DC. He did not disclose any details about the deal, such as the company’s valuation or how large the share sale might be.
The exchange has also signed a definitive agreement to acquire Bitnomial, the only crypto-native firm in the United States that holds all three CFTC licenses required to operate a fully integrated crypto derivatives business. The deal is valued at up to $550 million, with Bitnomial’s extensive regulatory footprint seen as the key driver behind the acquisition.
Not everything is smooth sailing though. Videos circulating on dark web forums have drawn Kraken into an extortion attempt, with a criminal group allegedly threatening to publish internal footage to force a ransom payment, but the exchange says no systems were breached and client funds remain safe.
Kraken Security Update
We are currently being extorted by a criminal group threatening to release videos of our internal systems with client data shown if we do not comply with their demands. It’s important to start with the most important points: our systems were never…
— Nick Percoco (@c7five) April 13, 2026
Kraken disclosed that it traced the issue to two insider incidents involving limited access to support data that exposed around 2,000 accounts, about 0.02% of its client base, and added that both cases were linked to support team members whose access credentials were revoked as soon as the activity was detected.
SEC clears $25k day trading limit
Away from crypto, day trading in the US may get a major boost after the Securities and Exchange Commission approved a plan to scrap the Pattern Day Trader rule, which requires a minimum account balance of 25,000 dollars for active traders. The current rule also limits traders with less than that amount in their margin accounts to no more than four day trades in five days.
Today, the SEC approved a major FINRA rule change that eliminates the Pattern Day Trader (PDT) rule and replaces it with a new intraday margin system.https://t.co/QB7FlwCBE6
📷 What’s Being Removed
The $25,000 minimum account requirement for day traders📷 What’s Replacing It…
— Cobra Trading (@cobra_trading) April 14, 2026
Instead, the regulator plans to introduce a new intraday margin system that measures risk in real time rather than simply counting trades. Under this approach, traders would need to maintain enough equity to cover their actual market exposure, potentially allowing more flexibility but also demanding tighter risk control.
Do stocks beat cash, or just thanks to a few big winners?
For decades, investors have been told that holding shares for the long term beats keeping money in cash or cash-like assets. Recent analysis, however, suggests that while staying invested in equities can pay off, only a small number of individual stocks are responsible for most of the market’s outperformance over safe assets like Treasury bills.
An article in the Financial Times highlighted research by Professor Hendrik Bessembinder of Arizona State University, who examined the long‑term performance of individual US stocks.
He found that four out of every seven common stocks in the Center for Research in Security Prices database since 1926 delivered lifetime buy‑and‑hold returns below those of one‑month US Treasuries. Over the past century, the top 4% of listed US companies accounted for the entire net wealth created by the stock market, while the remaining stocks collectively only matched the returns of Treasury bills.
Executive Moves: IG, oneZero, and XTX
In the executive moves, IG Group appointed Qu Zhao as Head of Japan, following the departure of Tomoharu Furuichi. Furuichi stepped
down after nearly seven years as Representative Director and Chief Executive
Officer of IG Japan.
oneZero Financial Systems appointed Alberto Bruno as
Director of Business Development, adding to its senior leadership team. The
move is aimed at strengthening the firm’s Engagement Division, which focuses on
helping brokers leverage marketing analytics to grow their client base and
improve retention.
Lastly, XTX Markets Chief Technology Officer Joshua Leahy left the firm, the company confirmed in an email to Finance Magnates. His
departure brings to a close more than a decade at the quantitative trading
company.