eToro CEO Says Buffett Convinced Him to Reduce Focus on Cryptocurrencies

eToro CEO Yoni Assia spoke with CNBC on Thursday about the company's IPO and its history with cryptocurrencies. He said that eToro got involved with cryptocurrencies early on, purchasing Bitcoin for the company treasury with $50,000, and was the first regulated institution in Europe to launch cryptocurrency trading.

An early $50,000 cryptocurrency investment once increased in value to $50,000,000, but the board of directors considered it a non-core business and required its sale.

Assia believes that cryptocurrencies have become a new type of capital market, flourishing globally, with over 130 types of cryptocurrency trading outside the United States, but his enthusiasm for capital markets and the stock market has not diminished.

In fact, a meeting with "Oracle of Omaha" Warren Buffett changed his business focus. Buffett once said he would never hold cryptocurrencies, and his former colleague Charlie Munger also criticized Bitcoin.