How to Buy US Stocks From Europe

Path one: EU-regulated local broker (DEGIRO, Trade Republic, Interactive Brokers Ireland, Saxo Bank, Comdirect, Boursorama, ING Direct Invest, BNP Paribas Cortal Consors). These hold a license from a national EU regulator, route to US lit exchanges via correspondent brokers, and provide custody on the actual shares. They are the default for buy-and-hold investing.

Path two: A US-based broker with EU operations. Interactive Brokers Ireland is the canonical example — an EU-regulated entity with the same trading platform and routing as the US parent. Charles Schwab International, Fidelity International and Vanguard International serve some EU countries but with restricted product offerings and higher minimums.

Path three: A CFD provider. eToro, IG Markets, Plus500, CMC Markets and XTB offer CFDs on US stocks — economically a leveraged synthetic exposure, not actual share ownership. Costs are embedded in the spread and overnight financing rather than commission, which can look attractive on small trades but compounds on long-held positions.

Commission: DEGIRO charges €1-€2 per US trade with €1 FX. Trade Republic offers €1 per trade. Interactive Brokers Ireland charges fixed-rate tiered commissions ($1-$5 typical). Saxo Bank ranges from $4-$10 per US trade depending on account tier. eToro is commission-free but the bid-ask spread on CFDs is meaningfully wider than the underlying.

Currency conversion: This is the hidden cost on most platforms. DEGIRO and Trade Republic offer the choice of holding a USD sub-account or converting per-trade — auto-conversion typically applies a ~0.25% FX spread. Interactive Brokers Ireland offers FX at near-interbank rates (~0.002%) which is structurally cheaper than every retail-focused broker.

Custody and inactivity: Some platforms charge custody fees on US holdings (DEGIRO historically did, removed for most accounts; Saxo has a quarterly custody fee on small accounts). Inactivity fees are common at €5-€10/quarter on small accounts.

US dividends paid to non-US persons are subject to 30% US withholding tax by default. A W-8BEN form (Certificate of Foreign Status) submitted to the broker invokes the relevant US tax treaty — typically reducing withholding to 15% for most EU residents (10% in some treaties). Every reputable EU broker handles the W-8BEN process automatically at account opening.

Locally, US gains and dividends are taxed under each EU country's domestic rules. France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and the Nordics all have specific reporting regimes — capital gains may be flat-rated or aggregated with income; dividends may be taxed at a flat withholding rate; some countries offer foreign-tax-credit relief for the US withholding portion.

CFDs have very different tax treatment. UK CFDs are taxable as capital gains; spread-bets (a UK-only variant) are tax-free. Most EU countries treat CFDs as financial-instrument income at flat rates. CFD providers do not issue 1099 or treaty-adjusted withholding documents — there is no underlying US share.

EU retail investors face a significant practical restriction: most US-domiciled ETFs (SPY, QQQ, VTI, IVV) are not available to retail accounts under EU PRIIPs regulation, which requires a Key Information Document the US fund sponsors do not produce. The workaround is UCITS equivalents — SXR8 (iShares Core S&P 500), VUSA (Vanguard S&P 500), CSPX. These trade in EUR or GBP on European exchanges and are PRIIPs-compliant.

Single-stock US equities are not affected by PRIIPs — AAPL, MSFT, TSLA can be bought freely on any EU-regulated broker. The restriction is specific to fund products. Professional accounts (with the qualified-investor test) can access US ETFs directly.

For most EU buy-and-hold investors: Interactive Brokers Ireland or a local low-cost broker (DEGIRO, Trade Republic) for actual share ownership in single-stock US equities, paired with UCITS ETF equivalents for broad-market exposure. CFDs make sense only for short-term tactical positions, with explicit acknowledgement of the costs and the loss of share ownership.