E*TRADE, now operating as E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley, is an online brokerage whose visual identity has centered for decades on a distinctive asterisk mark. The company traces its roots to 1982, when Bill Porter and Bernard A. Newcomb founded Trade*Plus Inc. in Palo Alto, California, which later launched E*TRADE Securities in 1991 and the E*TRADE.com website in 1996.[1]
Design and History
The modern E*TRADE identity was developed in 2000 by the Palo Alto branding firm Michael Patrick Partners.[2] Prior to that redesign, the company’s mark “looked like a brass plaque on a financial institution,” according to Dan O’Brien, co-founder of Michael Patrick Partners. It lacked color, variety and personality. To reinvent the image, the firm worked with the asterisk that appears in the company name. After market research tested different color combinations, green and purple emerged as the preferred palette. The firm then overlaid arrows in those colors within the asterisk, which graphically represented the concept of “exchange,” or trading.[3]
In 2020, Morgan Stanley acquired E*TRADE. Following that acquisition, the company refreshed its logo to reflect the new relationship. Morgan Stanley changed the logo color to mix the parent company’s light blue with E*TRADE’s purple and integrated the two names as “E*TRADE from Morgan Stanley.”[4] E*TRADE’s own website confirmed the change, noting: “Notice our new logo? While we’re still the E*TRADE you know and love, we’ve refreshed our iconic logo to reflect our joining with Morgan Stanley.”[5]
The brand architecture work for Morgan Stanley and E*TRADE was recognized with a Silver award in the “Best brand architecture solution” category at the 2022 Transform Awards North America, where the project was credited to Interbrand.[6]
Meaning and Symbolism
The converging arrows within the asterisk have carried documented symbolic meaning. According to Andrea Zaretsky, Morgan Stanley Wealth Management’s chief marketing officer, “The E*TRADE converging arrows logo, which has always symbolized the joining of Wall Street and Main Street, now takes on an additional role of symbolizing the joining of E*TRADE and Morgan Stanley in this new chapter for our firms.”[4]
A trademark filing for the current mark describes it as “a purple arrow converging with a blue arrow,” confirming the two-arrow construction and the blue and purple color scheme.[7]
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