Best forex brokers in Italy

• 31 forex brokers with a verified licence serve residents of Italy: 1 holds a local licence (Banca d'Italia) and 30 serve under an EU passport.
• Top pick by Coinish Score: IG (78/100, Editor Rating 4.2/5).
• Lowest advertised EUR/USD all-in cost: 0.1 pips (Deriv), across 18 brokers that publish one.
• No minimum deposit: Fineco and Deriv.

Ranked by Coinish Score: half the Editor Rating for the entity that serves residents of Italy, half Market Signal. Brokers without enough verified data for a rating are placed by Market Signal and labelled; brokers with neither are listed last. How we rate

Of the 31 forex brokers on this list, 22 serve Italy from a CySEC licence in Cyprus (FxPro, FOREX.com, Capital.com and 19 more), 2 serve Italy from a BaFin licence in Germany (IG and CMC Markets), 2 serve Italy from a CBI licence in Ireland (Interactive Brokers and AvaTrade) and 1 serves Italy from a KNF licence in Poland (XTB); 4 more are licensed by Bank of Latvia, Banca d'Italia, MFSA and CMVM.

ESMA's product intervention measures cap retail CFD leverage at 30:1 on major currency pairs, down to 2:1 on cryptocurrencies. In Italy, Banca d'Italia applies them through its own product-intervention rules. The 4 that publish the regulator-required loss figure report that 55% (Swissquote) to 75% (XM) of retail CFD accounts lose money; the median is 73%.

Advertised all-in EUR/USD costs on this list run from 0.1 pips (Deriv) to 1.5 pips (Orbex) across the 18 that publish one.

• Search the company name on the Banca d'Italia register (bancaditalia.it); for a firm licensed elsewhere, on its home regulator's register too (CySEC, BaFin and CBI for most of this list).
• Check which company your contract is with. IG, for example, onboards residents of Italy through IG Europe GmbH (BaFin licence 148759), and the name on the account-opening documents should match the list.
• Look for the percentage-of-accounts-that-lose-money warning on the broker's site. A firm marketing CFDs to residents of Italy without it is probably not using its regulated entity.

Yes, with a licensed provider. Brokers need MiFID II authorisation from an EEA regulator; firms authorised elsewhere in the EEA may serve residents under the European passport. Retail forex is offered as CFDs, which CONSOB restricts for retail clients in or from Italy.

Sources: consob.it, bafin.de

By Coinish Score, IG (78/100, Editor Rating 4.2/5), through IG Europe GmbH (BaFin licence 148759). FxPro (72) and CMC Markets (70) follow. The score rates the company that would serve you in Italy, so the same brand can rank differently in another country.

A broker only handles the tax if you opt in. Italian residents start in the regime dichiarativo, which means declaring trading gains and paying the tax yourself. Under the optional regime del risparmio amministrato, the broker becomes your sostituto d'imposta, calculating each day's net gain or loss and paying the tax for you.

IG offers this to Italian clients. A switch from dichiarativo starts on 1 January of the next year, and under amministrato you can offset losses against gains for up to four years.

Source: ig.com

Yes. A firm authorised under MiFID II in one EEA country can serve residents of the others once its home regulator has notified them. 30 of the 31 on this list reach Italy that way, most from Cyprus (22), Germany (2) and Ireland (2).

The home regulator supervises the firm and its compensation scheme applies, while Banca d'Italia can still set conduct rules for clients in Italy.

Source: bafin.de

If a broker fails, the compensation scheme of the regulator that licenses it applies, not one chosen by where you live. For this list: Investor Compensation Fund (Cyprus): 90% of covered claims, up to €20,000 for clients of CySEC-licensed investment firms (22 on this list); Entschädigungseinrichtung der Wertpapierhandelsunternehmen (EdW): 90% of the claim, up to €20,000 per investor for clients of BaFin-licensed investment firms (2 on this list); Investor Compensation Company (ICCL): 90% of the loss, up to €20,000 per investor for clients of CBI-licensed investment firms (2 on this list); KDPW investor compensation scheme (Poland): 100% up to €3,000 and 90% above that, at most €20,100 per investor for clients of KNF-licensed investment firms (1 on this list). Compensation covers missing client money and assets after a firm's failure, never trading losses.

Sources: cysec.gov.cy, e-d-w.de, investorcompensation.ie, kdpw.pl

Trading gains count as financial income, taxed at a flat 26%. The rate went up from 20% in 2014. An account with a broker abroad also carries IVAFE, at 0.2% a year of the value of the financial products in it, and has to be reported in quadro RW of the Redditi return.

Coinish isn't a tax adviser: check your own situation with the tax authority or an accountant.

Sources: agenziaentrate.gov.it (1), agenziaentrate.gov.it (2), agenziaentrate.gov.it (3), agenziaentrate.gov.it (4)