Best Thread Interactive Brokers

[TomTomson]

Does anybody know whether the deposit you give can be used for trading - a note comes up that the deposit is seperate from my trading account

Good question - I'm also interested in this information.

Maybe def can answer it. He seems to be quite knowledgeable.

Thank in advance,
Tom

 

[def]

I'm not aware of the note but if you're talking about your initial deposit why wouldn't it be available for trading. There is only one cash balance in the statements.

 

[Shaun12uk]

I have been looking into them myself and as far as I am aware you have to opne an account with $10k and quoted from website:

To Trade a margin account you must maintain at least USD 2,000 or non-USD equivalent. For details on margin requirements, see the Margin page.

From this I assume then that your deposit is not segregated but can be used as trading capital - only if you have a zero balance for 45 days will your account become dormant
as I understand it.

Maybe you have more than one internal account for different products and need to transfer funds over to the other? Letus know how you get on.

 

[fundjunkie]

Hi,
I have opened an IB SIPP account. My account is in GBP but I want to trade US Futures and ETFs.

It is a cash account and I realize that I need to do a currency conversion to USD in order to place orders. I understand that there is a means by which i can do this from TWS. Can someone explain to me how I do that please?


Thx
D

 

[goodtyneguy]

Hi,
I have opened an IB SIPP account. My account is in GBP but I want to trade US Futures and ETFs.

It is a cash account and I realize that I need to do a currency conversion to USD in order to place orders. I understand that there is a means by which i can do this from TWS. Can someone explain to me how I do that please?


Thx
D

These may help:

http://ibkb.interactivebrokers.com/node/87

http://ibkb.interactivebrokers.com/node/1172

You'll find you will have to ask fewer questions here if you first search the knowledge base by using the drop down menu when hovering your mouse over "Help and Contacts" at the top right of the home page. Alternatively just type in key words in the search box below it.

If you have forex trading permissions can you let me know what time do they regard as the close of the currency trading day i.e. what time of day in EST (US eastern standard time) does the daily bar close when looking at currency pairs in their charting package.
Thanks

 

[Tantalos]

I was just wandering since commisions for bundled are twice as high with IB for STIRS as they are with Velocity futures

what's the difference between bundled & unbundled under commissions??

Many thankyou


Pedro

 

[onmargin]

I believe the legislation you are referring to takes effect in 2013.

So let me get this straight. Starting in 2013, I will have to give 30% of my withdrawals to the IRS?? This is a major deal breaker for any non-us customers if I am understanding correctly.

 

[Allistah]

So from what I've read, you can only get 1 year of back data at the most? Are you kidding me?! How the hell would I ever back test anything - let alone forward test it? This is a huge deal breaker for me. I almost was going to sign up with IB, but this is completely rediculous for anyone that is a serious systems trader that needs to back and forward test their stuff. Really such a bummer...

I would love it if someone could prove me wrong... Now it looks like I'll have to go to Tradestaion at this point unless someone else has a better suggestion.

Thanks,

-Alli

 

[forker]

So from what I've read, you can only get 1 year of back data at the most? Are you kidding me?! How the hell would I ever back test anything - let alone forward test it? This is a huge deal breaker for me. I almost was going to sign up with IB, but this is completely rediculous for anyone that is a serious systems trader that needs to back and forward test their stuff. Really such a bummer...

I would love it if someone could prove me wrong... Now it looks like I'll have to go to Tradestaion at this point unless someone else has a better suggestion.

Thanks,

-Alli

Back testing should not be broker dependant. If you back test on a different system and use this broker to forward test or execute live strategies there shouldn't be a problem.

 

[maxima]

serious system trader knows that nothing is easy on the market. and the further deep you in the retail branch the less luxuries you get.

serious system trader will not waste his time venting his anger on public boards where ppl normally getting kicks from someone getting in troubles.

serious system trader will pull few hundred bucks out of his hundreds of thousands cash stash under his mattress and buy himself a proper data feed which is designed for serious analysis.

 

[tripletrade]

I would appreciate some feedback from users of IB for forex trading. IdealPro requires minimum sizes of about $25,000 for USD pairs and approximately equivalent amounts for EU pairs. I am wondering if the execution speed and ask/bid spreads are significantly lower and wider with amounts that are lower than the aforementioned IdealPro minimum amounts per trade? Or is the execution and bid/ask spread for non IdealPro trades good in comparison with specialized forex brokers such as FXCM?

I doubt I will be trading as much as $25,000 on any fx pair for quite some time hence my question.

 

[gc1]

On smaller trades (less than $25,000) you'd be paying a commission of roughly 1 pip per side or $2.50 whichever is larger. I suggest you choose somewhere else until your individual trade sizes get to $100K-$125K.

 

[tripletrade]

Thanks a lot for your reply. I like IB for equities but my trade sizes aren't more than $10k. Now that I'm focusing more on forex I'll have a look at a forex brokers such as FXCM and GainCapital. Dukascopy might also be a good option.

 

[cdubey]

Hi,

I am a new investor at IB and have a few questions about the margin. Let me describe the situation first.

Say I have 10k chf in my account, in cash. Now, I want to buy stocks on US exchanges.

Scenario 1:

Let us say, I buy 11000 $ worth of stock, which is < 10000 chf (the cash I have in my account).

After how much drop in my stocks will IB liquidate my holdings ? An extreme case, if my stocks drop 90% will IB liquidate ?

Scenario 2:

Say I have 10,000 chf cash in my account. I borrow 15,000 $ which is > 10,000 chf to buy stocks. Is this possible ? If yes, after how much drop in my stocks will IB liquidate my holdings ?

Regards,
-Ch

 

[maxwellreid]

I have some small forex positions in an old account. How do I close them? Ringing US IB is not a great answer for me, as i live outside their Business Time Zone

 

[def]

I have some small forex positions in an old account. How do I close them? Ringing US IB is not a great answer for me, as i live outside their Business Time Zone

This is an easy way to do it:

start by clicking on the Account button at the top of the TWS, then click on the Currencies menu option and you will see a drop down menu option titled 'Close All Non Base Currency Positions'. Upon clicking that link, the account holder will be guided though a series of steps which will create a market order to close any non-Base Currency positions.

http://ibkb.interactivebrokers.com/node/710

 

[danjuma]

Just a bit of advice please.

I am a complete newbie but would like to paper trade trading US stocks for a while before eventually going live. I intend to use Interactive brokers as they have good reviews. I have had a quick look at their site to try and find answers to my questions, but I am still slightly confused. My questions are:

1. As a UK resident, do I have to register with IBUK, their 'introducing brokers' , and not IB itself based in the US?

2. The reason for the above question is because, IBUK require a minimum of $10,000 to open an account, while IB in US requires a minimum of $25,000 to open an account. Just wondering why the big difference and whether there are some restrictions with the UK account?

3 . If I open an account with IBUK, would I have access to trade on all the US stocks available via IB in US?

4. As a UK full-time working resident trading US stocks, I know guys here are not tax experts, but just wanted a rough idea, where do I stand in terms of tax payable, would it be income tax or capital gains tax?

5. Obviously, I intent to paper trade this method for a while, as well as practice using IB's TWS and other applications, I know from their site IB offer something called Papertrader, a simulated trading account to practice with, which one can create after registering and opening a live account with IB.
So my plan is to open an account with IB, but not carry out any live trading but just use the papertrader account to paper trade for a while. My question is does anybody know whether I will incur any fees and charges from IB even though I am not trading live. As some of their charges/fees etc are based on how active you account is, or how much commission you make for them per month etc?

Many thanks
Dan

PS. I realise I can direct these questions to IB directly themselves, but sometimes you get quicker response and far more useful answers from people that have actually experienced using the services, and not some standard automated reply

 

[def]

Just a bit of advice please.

I am a complete newbie but would like to paper trade trading US stocks for a while before eventually going live. I intend to use Interactive brokers as they have good reviews. I have had a quick look at their site to try and find answers to my questions, but I am still slightly confused. My questions are:

1. As a UK resident, do I have to register with IBUK, their 'introducing brokers' , and not IB itself based in the US?

2. The reason for the above question is because, IBUK require a minimum of $10,000 to open an account, while IB in US requires a minimum of $25,000 to open an account. Just wondering why the big difference and whether there are some restrictions with the UK account?

3 . If I open an account with IBUK, would I have access to trade on all the US stocks available via IB in US?

4. As a UK full-time working resident trading US stocks, I know guys here are not tax experts, but just wanted a rough idea, where do I stand in terms of tax payable, would it be income tax or capital gains tax?

5. Obviously, I intent to paper trade this method for a while, as well as practice using IB's TWS and other applications, I know from their site IB offer something called Papertrader, a simulated trading account to practice with, which one can create after registering and opening a live account with IB.
So my plan is to open an account with IB, but not carry out any live trading but just use the papertrader account to paper trade for a while. My question is does anybody know whether I will incur any fees and charges from IB even though I am not trading live. As some of their charges/fees etc are based on how active you account is, or how much commission you make for them per month etc?

Many thanks
Dan

PS. I realise I can direct these questions to IB directly themselves, but sometimes you get quicker response and far more useful answers from people that have actually experienced using the services, and not some standard automated reply

1. IB UK
2. you don't need 25K to open an account. it's 10K. The 25K is required if you are going to actively trade US stocks to avoid being restricted by the US pattern day trading status rules
3. yes
4. i believe capital gains (others can confirm)
5. yes, you'll need to pay monthly minimums and data fees. All costs are transparent, take a review of the links under this link: http://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/pagemap/pagemap_fees.php

 

[danjuma]

Many thanks for your response def. Much obliged.

 

[coopster]

I have a question with relation to E-Signal 11.2 and the API for linking it to Interactive brokers TWS so that i can trade direct from the Esignal chart.

It seems to work some of the time but not reliably. I've spoken to IB and to E-Signal but they both refer me to each other as expected.

Is anyone else having an issue with this?