Upvest vs Alpaca
Upvest is a European alternative to Alpaca: same payments & finance use case, headquartered in Germany and governed by EU GDPR, while Alpaca (Alpaca Securities LLC) is based in the United States.
By the EU Alternatives team Last updated
BaFin-regulated embedded brokerage APIs for stocks, ETFs and funds with fractional-share settlement, tax reporting and custody under German investor-protection rules.
- Jurisdiction
- EU / EEA
- Primary privacy law
- EU GDPR
- US CLOUD Act exposure
- No
- Open source
- No
- Free tier
- No
Developers embed US stock, options and crypto trading through a clean API, and self-directed accounts trade American equities commission-free. Money is made elsewhere: margin lending at 6.5 percent and negotiated Broker API deals for fintechs. Alpaca Securities LLC, a US broker-dealer based in San Mateo, California, holds the accounts, so client assets stay under American securities law.
- Jurisdiction
- United States
- GDPR by default
- Requires DPA + TIA
- US CLOUD Act exposure
- Yes
Upvest vs Alpaca at a glance
| Upvest | Alpaca | |
|---|---|---|
| Headquarters | Germany | United States |
| Data jurisdiction | EU / EEA | United States |
| Primary privacy law | EU GDPR | Requires DPA + transfer assessment |
| US CLOUD Act exposure | No | Yes |
| Best for | Teams that need payments & finance built for European data-protection requirements | Teams already invested in the Alpaca Securities LLC ecosystem |
Choose Upvest if…
- You want a provider governed by a European privacy regime
- GDPR or public-sector data-protection requirements apply to you
- You'd rather back the European tech ecosystem
Stick with Alpaca if…
- You depend on integrations only available in the Alpaca Securities LLC ecosystem
- Your organisation has no EU data-residency constraints
- Migration costs outweigh the jurisdiction benefits for now
About Upvest
Upvest is a Berlin-based investment infrastructure provider offering embedded brokerage, custody and settlement APIs that let fintechs, banks and neobanks launch stock, ETF and fund investing products without building a broker-dealer from scratch. Founded in 2017 and licensed by BaFin, it operates as a regulated German investment firm covering the entire EU.
The platform pairs a single Investment API with direct connections to European and US exchanges, real-time fractional-share settlement, tax reporting, corporate-actions handling and compliance workflows. Partners integrate trading, custody and reporting in weeks rather than the years required to build or acquire a brokerage licence.
Key benefits:
- Embedded brokerage API for stocks, ETFs and funds across EU and US markets
- Fractional-share trading with real-time cash and instrument settlement
- Custody and safekeeping under German BaFin oversight and EU investor protection
- Tax reporting and statements generated automatically for end customers
- Corporate-actions and dividend handling abstracted from partner code
- KYC, AML and suitability workflows available through the same API
- Direct exchange connectivity keeping execution costs low and transparent
Upvest is headquartered in Berlin, Germany, licensed by BaFin as an investment firm under MiFID II and covered by the German investor compensation scheme EdW. All customer assets and data are held in German infrastructure under GDPR and the BDSG, with ISO 27001-aligned operations and SCCs for any non-EU partner.
Trusted by N26, bunq, Revolut and other European fintechs, Upvest is the reference choice for product teams that want to embed investing inside their app with a fully regulated, BaFin-supervised European partner.
Why choose Upvest over Alpaca?
The decisive argument is data jurisdiction. Alpaca is headquartered in the United States, which means personal data processed through it can be subject to non-EU legal regimes: the US CLOUD Act, FISA 702, or similar laws depending on the provider. After the 2020 Schrems II ruling, EU organisations must carry out a transfer impact assessment for every such data flow.
Upvest removes that overhead. As a Germany-based provider, it operates under EU GDPR, and data stays inside the EU/EEA by default. For regulated sectors such as health, public administration, and finance, that's not a nice-to-have but a requirement. For everyone else, it's concentration-risk insurance: you avoid depending on a single jurisdiction that can change the rules without warning.