Where Europe Trades on the Web

U.S. discounters are swelling the ranks of on-line brokerages in Europe.

ConSors Discount Broker of Nuremberg processed more on-line trades in the first half of this year than it did in the entire year of 1998. The Swiss stock exchange SWX in Zurich reports that in June, more than 100,000 trades originated with discount brokers, a marked increase over February, when 10,000 trades were initiated by discount brokers.

While these numbers don't compare with statistics from American on-line discount brokerages, they clearly show that there is a growing market demand in this part of the world.

Since European residents are not able to trade on the highly publicized and branded Web sites of discount brokers in the United States, such as E*Trade or Charles Schwab, because of national investing laws, the U.S. brokerages are increasingly developing partnerships with local discount brokers or opening subsidiaries to compete against European discount brokerages.

Some on-line brokers in Europe

Belgium

Gestrabel: Discount broker for Brussels market and foreign exchanges.
http://www.gestrabel.be/

Britain

E*Trade UK: Trading, research, real-time quotes. Part of the U.S. E*Trade Group.
http://www.etrade.co.uk

Charles Schwab Europe: The U.S. broker's European site, principally designed for British investors.
http://www.schwab-worldwide.com/europe

Stocktrade: British stocks.
http://www.stocktrade.co.uk

France

Bourse Direct: French discount trader, offers streaming-media news and reports.
http://www.boursedirect.fr

E*TRADE: A joint venture by E*Trade of the United States and French on-line brokerage CPR Bourse.
http://www.cpretrade.com

Germany

Bank 24: Financial and stock information services, plus brokerage and banking.
http://www.bank24.de

Comdirect: Financial information and real-time data, owned by Commerzbank.
http://www.comdirect.de

Consors: Targeted at specialists.
http://www.consors.de/

Fimatex: A reputation for the lowest prices in Germany
http://www.fimatex.de/

Switzerland

Solothurner Bank: On-line banking and trading.
http://www.soba.ch

Youtrade: Credit Suisse's discount brokerage.
http://www.youtrade.ch

Valerie Thompson