After getting the green light from the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC), Mogo Inc. launched its commission-free stock trading app on December 21.
The FinTech startup claims that its app, MogoTrade, is Canada’s only commission-free trading app with free real-time streaming quotes.
The FinTech startup claims that MogoTrade is Canada’s only commission-free trading app with free real-time streaming quotes.
The stock trading app is available on IOS or Android. Members will be added to the waitlist for access to the commission-free trading feature, which will be released in a phased rollout through the first quarter of 2022.
Select Mogo members will be able to trade immediately, and the startup will regularly invite members to activate the commission-free trading feature, according to Mogo management.
“How people invest is changing, and we couldn’t be more excited for Canadians to experience what we see as the future of investing,” said David Feller, CEO of Mogo.
“We are very much in the early days of the transformation of investing and wealth man and wealth management to a mobile-first digital experience. MogoTrade is the centrepiece of our digital wealth strategy,” Feller added. “Our next-generation platform will begin with equities, and we expect to expand this over time to include other assets such as crypto and NFTs.”
While Mogo insists its app is the only one of its kind in Canada, the company faces stiff competition from FinTech giant Wealthsimple, which offers its Trade service with commission-free stock trading and is also available as an app on IOS and Android.
Real-time streaming quotes via the app are gated by subscription, however. In early December, Wealthsimple announced the launch of a new ‘Plus’ tier at $10 per month, which offers streaming quotes, commission-free trading, as well as no currency conversion costs for US trades.
Central to Mogo’s trading app launch was its acquisition of Fintech startup Moka in June in a $64 million CAD all-stock deal. At the time of the deal, Feller called the addition of Moka’s digital saving and investing products, platform, and team to Mogo’s portfolio “another significant milestone” in Mogo’s journey to become “the leading digital wallet for Canadians.”
In mid-December, Mogo announced the closing of a registered direct offering with net proceeds of approximately $25.3 million USD ($32.5 million CAD). The startup intends to use the proceeds as working capital, as well as for potential future acquisitions and investments including in the cryptocurrency space.
In its third-quarter results, Mogo posted revenues of $15.4 million, up from $9.7 million compared to the same quarter last year. The startup’s adjusted EBITDA represented a loss of $3.4 million compared to a positive adjusted EBITDA of $4.8 million in Q3 2020.
During Q3, the company launched a green Bitcoin, promising to plant enough trees to completely offset the CO2 emissions from the mining of every Bitcoin purchased from its platform.