eToro Review | Beginner’s friendly guide

Attention! This article is for informational purposes only and does not contain recommendations or calls to action.

The review has been prepared by the CScalp terminal team. You can get CScalp by leaving your e-mail in the form below.

eToro was founded in 2007 in Tel Aviv. It’s a regulated multi-asset exchange that’s widely praised for its safety, ease of use, and a broad range of features for both beginner and experienced traders.

The platform has three main offerings for traders and investors alike:

• eToro.com — base platform for traders and investors
• eToroX — professional interface with advanced crypto trading tools
• eToro Money — local cryptocurrency & fiat wallet

The website is currently available in 19 languages. There is no dedicated mobile app available as of this writing.

You can choose to display your primary balance in USD, EUR, GBP, NZD, or CAD. However, trades on eToro are executed in USD. You can fund your account with USD, EUR, GBP, and AUD. The platform operates on US dollars, and there are conversion fees for fiat deposits.

The platform supports a number of ways to deposit funds, including (for the United States) Credit/Debit Card, Online Banking, Sofort, PayPal, Rapid Transfer, and Bank Account. It also unlocks Skrill and Neteller after the first deposit.

Credit card payments are processed instantly. Keep in mind that there’s a region-dependent minimum deposit threshold.

To get started, you need to log in or sign up via email. You can also link your Apple, Google, or Facebook account for a quick sign-in. You’ll also be asked to fill out a questionnaire so that the platform can tailor its services to your profile.

Being a regulated, custodial platform, eToro has KYC requirements. To access unlimited trading, you have to provide your:

• Personal Details
• Experience and Objectives
• Proof of Identity & Address
• Phone Number

For unverified users, there’s a ‘virtual mode’, available in the bottom-left of the main page. Here, you can paper-trade in a real-time market with an emulated account. Your virtual portfolio is credited with $100,000. Virtual mode can be freely used by anyone.

eToro offers an extensive range of assets for both investment and trading. These include (at the time of writing):

• Stocks: 50 major brands including Apple, Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Netflix, Uber, and many others
• Cryptocurrencies: top cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Chainlink (LINK), and other ~50 altcoins
• Commodities: oil, gold, platinum, and even raw materials like cotton or cocoa
• ForEx: 49 currency pairs
• ETFs: 260+ exchange-traded funds
• Indices: 13 major indices including UK100, Dow Jones, etc.

All types of assets can be added to your personalized watchlists. Also, users with funded accounts can view advanced asset breakdowns and related news.

eToro offers a range of options for active traders as well as investors. However, it’s is a custodial, regulated trading platform, and therefore, it’s not always easy to access and migrate your deposited funds. For example, in order to withdraw cryptos from eToro.com, you would have to trade them for fiat first.

Many experienced users consider the base version to be more suitable for speculation, as you don’t directly own the assets you’re trading. Additionally, the fees on the base platform are comparatively high.

• Copy Trading (aka Social Trading)

eToro’s most widely-appraised feature is Social Copy trading: it lets you follow and copy the strategies of top traders on the platform, as well as rank their performance. Ideal for people looking for stock market copy trading.

You can also submit your own strategies for other users to copy and use, and earn dividends from their successful trades.

When choosing a trader to follow, you can view their detailed portfolio, performance, and risk breakdowns along with their entire trade history and other info.

To start copying a trade, chose a trader with a profile you find suitable, familiarize yourself with their PNL percentage, risk profile and other stats, and click “Copy”. You will be asked to enter the amount to invest in the copied trade, and whether or not you’d like to copy their open trades, too. Also, set the threshold at which you’ll stop copying the trade automatically. You can add more funds to the copy trade at any time.

eToro also offers a range of advanced trading tools such as stop-loss, take profit, and set orders that execute automatically according to a coin's price.

• eToro Smart Portfolios

Smart portfolios are long-term investments in assorted portfolios curated by top traders on the platform. The goal of Smart Portfolios is to allow users to instantly diversify their investments without spending time on market research.

There are three types of Smart Portfolios:

• Top Trader Portfolios — multi-asset bundles made up of the best-performing investors on eToro, according to predefined strategies;
• Thematic Market Portfolios — themed asset selection spanning technology, crypto, traditional industries, regional markets, and other fields.
• Partner Portfolios — portfolios created by 3rd-party experts in a host of areas including AI-led cryptocurrency investment strategies, specialisations, advanced sentiment analysis, and more.

Before investing in a Smart Portfolio, you can familiarise yourself with its detailed breakdown of assets, performance and risk profile, ratings, and other parameters.

The platform has its own wallet app called eToro Money, available for iOS and Android. It lets you swap cryptocurrencies internally and manage & transfer your funds, as well as withdraw crypto from your trading account.

There 5 types of fees on eToro:

• Currency conversion fees for non-USD deposits and withdrawals

The platform operates in US dollars, and there are no fees for depositing USD. For depositing other fiat currencies, there’s a conversion rate (50 pips) already included in the deposit transaction total. When you withdraw funds from your account, by default, you will receive them in the same currency you deposited them in.

• Spreads

A spread is a difference between a Buy and a Sell price. On eToro, you can invest in non-leveraged stocks and ETFs with no commission, paying only for the spread. For cryptocurrency trading, leveraged stock trading, and other types of assets, the platform charges a flexible fee.

• Overnight/rollover fees

An overnight/rollover fee is a payment that occurs whenever you hold a CFD position overnight; only applies to CFD trades. With the exception of crypto assets, overnight fees are not billed on Saturdays and Sundays. Instead, they’re charged with a Weekend fee — a regular payment multiplied by 3.

• Withdrawal fees

eToro charges a flat $5 for each withdrawal request.

• Inactivity fees

Any account that hasn’t been active for over a year will be charged $10 for each idle month. The fee is only charged if there are still funds remaining on the account; no deals will be closed to cover the fee.
For a detailed breakdown of eToro fees, go to Main -> Trading -> Fees.

eToro also offers eToroX, a separate pro-oriented regulated cryptocurrency exchange.

Made for more advanced users and tailored specifically to the crypto market, it offers a full-on trading terminal with a vast range of features not present in the base trading platform. These include special types of orders:

• Market
• Limit
• Fill-or-Kill (FOK)
• Immediate-or-Cancel (IOC)
• Good-Til-Canceled (GTC)
• Good-Till-Date (GTD)
• Iceberg

eToroX also offers 17 unique tokenized fiat stablecoins and two commodity stablecoins (gold & silver). All the tokenized assets are based on the ERC-20 blockchain protocol, backed by USD, and monitored by KYT tools. Underlying assets are hedged by top-tier liquidity providers.

For instant money transfers, the platform offers a SIGNET fiat gateway. Also, it offers a credit program for spot trading alongside a range of API services.

Commission-wise, eToroX employs a dynamic Maker/Taker fee model that calculates your fees on the go based on your past traded volumes. There are no fees for depositing cryptos on eToroX, while crypto withdrawal fees vary from coin to coin; the full list is available here.

eToroX is available in 8 languages.

eToro is a vast trading ecosystem fit for traders and investors of all kinds and specialities. You can copy trade stocks and ETFs, commodities, and cryptos using the copy trade feature. eToroX is ideal for pro-level traders. Both versions of the exchange are centralized and thoroughly regulated, making it a safe place to start your investment and trading as well as take it to the next level.