# Christian Hecker

> Christian Hecker is the German co-founder and CEO of Trade Republic, the Berlin savings and investing platform he created with Thomas Pischke and Marco Cancellieri. A philosophy and business graduate who entered investment banking through a university workshop, Hecker turned concern about Europe's pension gap into a mobile broker, bootstrapped it for four years, secured a full banking licence in 2023, and helped grow it past ten million customers by September 2025.

- **Role:** Co-Founder and CEO at Trade Republic
- **Organizations:** Trade Republic, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
- **Nationality:** German
- **Education:** Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Bachelor's degree in Philosophy, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
- **Known for:** Co-founded Trade Republic and helped build it from a bootstrapped mobile-broker project into a full German bank., Helped secure Trade Republic's full banking licence from the European Central Bank in 2023., Led the company as it expanded across European markets and passed ten million registered, identity-verified customers in September 2025.

## Career timeline

- **2011** — Met future co-founder Thomas Pischke while returning from a university seminar in Munich.
- **2013-2015** — Worked in investment banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, including on technology-sector capital-markets transactions.
- **2014** — Worked on the Rocket Internet IPO, an experience he has described as a catalyst for wanting to build a company.
- **2015** — Developed the idea that became Trade Republic with Thomas Pischke; they later met app developer Marco Cancellieri at a Munich hackathon.
- **2016** — Co-founded the company, initially known as Neon Trading, with Pischke and Cancellieri.
- **2019** — Trade Republic launched its mobile brokerage service in Germany.
- **2021** — A $900 million Series C valued Trade Republic at more than $5 billion.
- **2023** — Trade Republic received a full banking licence from the European Central Bank.
- **2025** — Trade Republic reported more than ten million customers in September after reporting eight million and more than €100 billion in assets in April.
- **2026** — A Trade Republic subsidiary obtained BaFin approval to operate a multilateral trading facility, giving the group another option as EU payment-for-order-flow rules changed.

## Achievements

- Co-founded Trade Republic and helped build it from a bootstrapped mobile-broker project into a full German bank.
- Helped secure Trade Republic's full banking licence from the European Central Bank in 2023.
- Led the company as it expanded across European markets and passed ten million registered, identity-verified customers in September 2025.
- Built the company for four years before raising venture capital, according to his account of its early history.
- Oversaw an expansion from brokerage into savings, payments, interest-bearing cash, bonds, and wealth-management products.

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Hecker said Trade Republic was changing course on customer service after acknowledging past mistakes, according to a published interview.
- **2026-01** — A Trade Republic subsidiary received BaFin approval to operate a multilateral trading facility; the company had not publicly committed to how it would use the licence.
- **2025-09** — Trade Republic announced more than ten million customers and expanded into private-market investments through partnerships with Apollo and EQT.
- **2025-04** — Hecker said more than eight million customers in 17 countries held over €100 billion on the platform.

## Links

- Website: https://traderepublic.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christianhe/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/christian-hecker
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-09-26