“Culture, not campaigns”: Exness’ Community Director on making impactful CSR in Cyprus

Our Community Director, Martin Thorvaldsson, gives the full picture of how CSR operates, particularly at Exness in Cyprus, where CSR initiatives may seem like product development than philanthropy.

Behind that simple line lies a program built around pilots, data, and a deliberate choice to treat CSR as a culture and community-driven initiative rather than just a campaign. To find out more, we sat down with Martin to explore what that means.

Pilots, KPIs, and a bias for evidence

Exness’ CSR framework borrows from effective altruism: focus resources where they can deliver the greatest impact, and insist on evidence that they do.

New projects typically start as small pilots. The team sets clear KPIs, runs them for a sufficient period to collect meaningful data, and then either scales the initiative or quietly discontinues it.

Crucially, Thorvaldsson notes that the company also acknowledges that CSR has “secondary purposes”, reputational benefits for employees, regulators, partners, and the public. But that is not the main motivation.

The ambition is that helping should feel routine, not performative. That philosophy was stress-tested in 2025, during one of Cyprus’ worst wildfire seasons in decades.

Wildfires reveal the strength of community response

When fires tore through villages outside Limassol, Exness already had equipment on the ground: three fire trucks and two terrain-adapted drones, which had been previously donated in partnership with the Cyprus Institute and the Department of Forests.

What followed, Thorvaldsson suggests, was less about strategy documents and more about reflex.

A call for help went out on internal channels. Within an hour, 15 employee cars had arrived, loaded with supplies for evacuation centers and frontline crews. Later, the firm opened 14 company apartments to families who had lost or evacuated their homes, some of whom still receive financial support.

“No one was posing for pictures,” he recalls. “It was a moment when you see what culture really means—people doing the right thing without waiting for applause.”

“It doesn’t matter how many trucks you buy if they’re standing in a parking lot,” Thorvaldsson says. “Technology only works when the command structure works too.”

Cars, scholarships, and “capital expenditure on people”

The same test-and-learn mindset is applied to Exness’ work in healthcare and education.

A recent donation of 50 vehicles to Cypriot cancer charities, including Pasykaf, Little Heroes, and the Anti-Cancer Society, stemmed from a simple gap analysis. These organizations were already providing vital medical and psychological support. What they lacked was reliable transport.

The cars now link patients, families, and medical teams, facilitating hospital visits, airport runs for treatment abroad, school drop-offs, and therapy appointments. The project is tracked by usage metrics, including mileage and the number of beneficiaries.

On the educational side, the Exness FinTech Scholarships have now supported over 70 students in six countries, with recent Cypriot recipients heading to institutions such as Harvard, Imperial, UCL, Edinburgh, and ETH Zurich.

Thorvaldsson calls scholarships “capital expenditure on people”—investments that may not show up in next quarter’s results but could shape economies decades from now.

First responders and a new home for multi-need children

Two newer projects hint at where Exness wants to go next.

The first is United Rescue Cyprus, a charity start-up building a network of trained first responders. The model is simple but powerful: when someone calls 112, the system can alert nearby volunteers who are qualified to provide first aid in the crucial minutes before an ambulance arrives.

Initially, the network is formed from medically trained volunteers. Over time, others will be able to join after around 200 hours of training.

“Those 10, 15, 20 minutes are crucial for saving lives,” Thorvaldsson says. “I don’t think there is anything better you can do in life than save a life.”

The second is a major infrastructure project with Theotokos Foundation in Limassol. Exness is funding a new day-care center for children with complex, multi-disciplinary needs, replacing an outdated facility currently located at the old Limassol hospital.

“A purpose-built center means dignity, structure, and a chance at a normal school life,” Thorvaldsson says. “That is the kind of measurable change we want to deliver.”

Check out all our CSR initiatives.

Watch a full interview

Watch the full episode of the FinanceFeeds Podcast with Martin Thorvaldsson to learn how Exness’ wildfire response and community initiatives connect to long-term CSR commitments.