eToro Invests in Extended to Push Onchain Trading
eToro is starting with Extended’s perpetuals engine inside Zengo after helping lead a $12.5 million funding round. From there, the broker wants to roll out DeFi and derivatives trading onchain step by step.
Key Takeaways
- eToro invested in Extended and helped lead a $12.5 million funding round for onchain perpetual futures.
- Extended’s technology will first be integrated into the Zengo wallet, which eToro previously acquired for $70 million.
- eToro later plans to bring more DeFi products to its main platform, widening its onchain trading lineup.
eToro is deepening its blockchain strategy with a new investment in Extended, an onchain perpetual futures exchange. The online broker led a $12.5 million (€11 million) funding round and plans to plug Extended’s technology into the Zengo wallet first, before eventually adding more DeFi products to its core platform.
Zengo as the First Entry Point
The plan builds on eToro’s April purchase of the self-custody wallet Zengo for $70 million (€61.4 million). Elad Lavi, executive vice president of corporate development and strategy, said the company is seeing stronger demand for simple access to DeFi products. By folding Extended’s perpetual futures engine into Zengo, eToro wants to let users trade onchain derivatives while still keeping control of their own assets.
Extended was founded by former Revolut employees and focuses on perpetual futures, a market that now extends well beyond crypto. The platform supports more than 100 perpetual markets and had processed over $245 billion (€215 billion) in trading volume by June, according to the company. It is also building out a wider infrastructure stack, with plans for spot trading, tokenized real-world assets, and multi-asset collateral.
Competition Is Moving Onchain
The investment comes as brokers and crypto platforms race to move more trading infrastructure onto the blockchain. Robinhood launched its own blockchain on Wednesday, added tokenized stocks, and said it wants to bring perpetual futures beyond crypto. Coinbase and prediction market operator Kalshi are also moving toward similar products, which is making the line between crypto exchanges, brokers, and prediction markets harder to define.
For European crypto readers, the main point is how quickly DeFi and traditional markets are converging. If more brokers start offering onchain trading through their core products, wallets, derivatives, and tokenized assets could play a much bigger role in everyday trading. It is still unclear how fast that shift will spread, but it fits the broader rise of onchain finance, which Grayscale also highlights in its analysis of leading protocols and tokenized assets.
Broader Product Offering in Sight
eToro says it also plans to add more DeFi products to its core platform over time. That would move the company beyond the role of a broker and closer to becoming a gateway for a broader onchain trading experience. Extended sees that as part of the next phase, where infrastructure and partnerships will be needed to support a more connected trading setup.
