The competition is hotting up in the Italian online brokerage industry, with analysts predicting that most banks will offer online trading within the first half of this year, thus triggering a price war.

Directa, the first to offer such services in the country, is getting a head start by not only expanding its range of services but lowering its basic commission rate to L1.3 per L1,000 (E0.52), or 0.13% from 0.19%. Recent reports from analysts show that the average commission charged by leading online brokerage houses was 0.275%.