If you are a US person, then you may be surprised to see such a ranking. Most probably you have easy access to any American ETF from your local broker. However, it is not the same in the case of Europeans. Only a few brokers from the EU offer access to American ETFs for individual investors. However, you can also open an account in an institution outside of the EU – not for everyone. We have conducted a long research to identify a few brokers that can be used in case you are European and want to invest in American ETFs. Without further ado, we introduce our first ranking mentioned in an inaugural post.
US brokers offering American ETFs to non-US people
Our list starts with brokers from the United States. These financial institutions let you trade American ETFs via their International Accounts if you are not a US person.
Firstrade
Stocks & ETFs can be traded almost for free on Firstrade because there are no related commissions. Only the SEC Fee is applicable for sale transactions. It is less than 3.00 USD for every 100,000 USD in sales. Check the list of eligible countries to confirm whether they can accept your application for International Account. The only drawback is that this broker offers only the US market, so if you plan to invest in other countries, then you should either choose a different or additional broker.
tastytrade
There are no opening and closing commissions when trading stocks & ETFs on tastytrade. However, applicable exchange, clearing, and regulatory fees still apply. You may trade many times without paying them but sometimes you will face a few cents in addition to the stock price because stock trades incur a clearing fee of 0.0008 USD per share. All in all, they are close to nothing. The list of eligible countries for International Accounts is much longer than for Firstrade. If you can open an account there, you can have access to their full offering. This broker also offers only US instruments.
European brokers offering American ETFs
Prices offered by these European brokers are much higher than the ones from the US. However, they also offer access to many other markets.
EXANTE
EXANTE is located in Cyprus and it is the cheapest broker from Europe that offers access to American ETFs. Moreover, it offers direct access to over 50 financial markets through one account. Its other commissions are also low. However, EXANTE requires at least 10,000 EUR of the initial deposit to open an individual account or 50,000 EUR to open a corporate account. You can also deposit an equivalent sum in USD, GBP, CHF, CZK, or PLN. You will not be able to open an account on EXANTE, if you are from the USA, Japan, France, Iran, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).
DIF Broker
This very short European brokers list ends with a broker from Portugal. Nevertheless, the order is not accidental. The fees of this broker are significantly higher than the previous institutions in this ranking. Even if you can afford the significant initial deposit of at least 100.000 EUR and trade in high volumes to get slightly better pricing for trading than EXANTE, then you need to consider the custody fee. It is the only broker from Europe in this ranking that charges you based on the number of held securities on your account. On the other hand, its minimum initial deposit is much lower than on EXANTE because it requires only 2,000 EUR. Because of that, it may be a good alternative for people who do not have enough capital to open an EXANTE account but still prefer a broker from Europe or the European Union.
Asian brokers offering American ETFs
This is the last group of brokers that offer American ETFs to non-US people. If you live in Asia or you want to geographically diversify your investments based on institutions, then here you go.
PhillipCapital
This is a broker from Singapore. It is definitely not the cheapest one as we will present you later on. PhillipCapital also provides investing opportunities outside of Canada. It let you connect to 26 stock exchanges and operate based on 10 currencies. They give you access to stocks, CFDs, ETFs, Forex, futures and more. PhillipCapital serves all adults that are not-US people.
Apples to apples
To reliably compare these brokers we prepared a few tables showing the costs of using their services. As this ranking is focused on American ETFs, we limit the scenarios only to those.
Trading scenarios
Let’s first consider a small trade – 5 ETF units, assuming that such ETF price is 5 USD per unit.
| Broker | Trade commission | Trade fees |
| Firstrade | 0.00 USD | 0.00 USD |
| tastytrade | 0.00 USD | 0.00 USD |
| EXANTE | 1.00 USD | 0.00 USD |
| DIF Broker | 3.00-15.00 USD (depending on account value) | 0.00 USD |
| PhillipCapital | 1.88-3.88 USD (depending on account value) | 0.00 USD |
As both EXANTE and DIF Broker require an initial deposit, let’s consider a significantly larger trade – 100 ETF units (price: 400 USD). This results in a 40.000 USD price of just ETF units.
| Broker | Trade commission | Trade fees |
| Firstrade | 0.00 USD | 0.00 USD (buy) or 0.92 USD (sell) |
| tastytrade | 0.00 USD | 0.08 USD |
| EXANTE | 2.00 USD | 0.00 USD |
| DIF Broker | 3.00-15.00 USD (depending on account value) | 0.00 USD |
| PhillipCapital | 1.88-3.88 USD (depending on account value) | 0.00 USD |
As you may have noticed, the trade commission is the same for both DIF Broker and PhillipCapital as in the previous example. In case of DIF Broker, you will be charged a minimum fee depending on the current account value. This broker charges 0.015 USD or 0.02 USD per stock/ETF unit (the price of the stock/ETF unit does not matter), depending on the total account value. However, because of minimum commissions, you will have to buy or sell more than 200 (in case of account value equal to or greater than 500,000 EUR) or even 750 (in case of account value less than 10,000 EUR) stock/ETF units in a single order to start utilizing this mechanism. For PhillipCapital, number of stock/ETF units does not matter.
Dividend processing fee
Some brokers require a dividend processing fee. Luckily, from brokers offering American ETFs, it is only applicable to PhillipCapital.
| Broker | Dividend processing fee |
| Firstrade | 0.00 USD |
| tastytrade | 0.00 USD |
| EXANTE | 0.00 USD |
| DIF Broker | 0.00 USD |
| PhillipCapital | 1% of net dividend (minimum 1.00 SGD, maximum 50.00 SGD per dividend) |
Other fees
Finally, let’s compare other fees. Except for extraordinary situations, there are no additional fees in the case of Firstrade, tastytrade, and EXANTE. They charge you when you are requesting a withdrawal wire transfer. Contrarily, DIF Broker and PhillipCapital will charge you a custody fee. In theory, DIF Broker does not have a withdrawal fee but it passes bank costs to customers.
| Broker | Custody fee | Inactivity fee (monthly) | Withdrawal fee |
| Firstrade | 0.00 USD | 0.00 USD | 25.00 USD |
| tastytrade | 0.00 USD | 0.00 USD | 25.00 USD (domestic wire transfer) or 45.00 USD (foreign wire transfer) |
| EXANTE | 0.00 USD | 50.00 EUR/GBP (in theory because it can be easily waived) | 30.00 EUR/GBP |
| DIF Broker | 0.25% per year, with a minimum of 5,50 USD per market/monthly, plus VAT | 36.00 EUR, plus VAT | 0.00-146.30 EUR (depending on currency and amount) |
| PhillipCapital | 2.00 SGD per counter per month (max 150.00 SGD per quarter) that can be waived (minimum 2 trades per month or 6 trades per quarter or assets worth at least 250,000 SGD) | 15.00 SGD (waived in case of at least 1 trade per quarter) | 0.00 USD |
Taxes consideration
All of the mentioned brokers are Qualified Intermediaries and offer US-related tax forms that simplify the handling of taxes. Instructions related to W8-BEN and W-9 forms as well as additional information can be found on the IRS website (including income tax treaties between the United States and other countries).
| Broker | W8-BEN | W-9 |
| Firstrade | YES | YES |
| tastytrade | YES | YES |
| DIF Broker | YES | YES |
| EXANTE | YES | NO |
| PhillipCapital | N/A* | N/A* |
*Despite both W8-BEN & W-9 tax forms available on PhillipCapital platform, they use it only as a declaration that the investor is not a US person. All of the US shares are held in an omnibus account and all end shareholders are undisclosed. Due to this, only the general withholding rate is applicable.
Only EXANTE does not offer the W-9 form because both USA citizens and residents cannot currently open a trading account with this broker.
Conclusion
Let’s summarize the collected information about the analyzed brokers. So you can buy American ETFs in Europe. Also, we have answered a simple question…
Which brokers offer American ETFs?
- Firstrade
- tastytrade
- EXANTE
- DIF Broker
- PhillipCapital
Best broker offering American ETFs
Generally, in terms of costs, choosing Firstrade or tastytrade is a no-brainer. However, you may decide on EXANTE, DIF Broker, or PhillipCapital in case you prefer to have a single account for trading because the mentioned American brokers’ offering is limited to the US. The European ones are cheaper than the broker from Asia. However, PhillipCapital gives access to many markets that are not offered by other brokers. Eventually, you may pick Firstrade or tastytrade for the US market and consider other brokers for additional countries.