IB Communiqué - February 25, 2005
We are pleased to announce yet another brokerage industry first, IB SmartRouting Auto-RecoverySM which will automatically re-route your US options order to a new market center should a market center with your order experience a technology malfunction. Unlike other brokers that must wait for an exchange to recover an order to ascertain whether or not your order has been executed, IB will automatically re-submit your order to a functioning exchange and undertake the risk of a double fill on the malfunctioning exchange. Rather than having to experience the uncertainty of a pending order in limbo, you will now know the exact status of your order. Auto-Recovery is yet another reason to choose IB and SmartRouting.
IB has added an additional Forex dealer to its IDEAL Pro trading venue, increasing the competition and tightening the price spreads. Unlike other brokers that build their commissions into your spread, IB’s pricing is transparent, with dealer spreads and commissions charged separately. IDEAL Pro Forex commissions are .00002 of the trading currency value with a minimum of $5 or USD equivalent. Over the coming months we plan to add additional Forex dealers to continue to increase the competition. IDEAL Pro quotes are easily accessed through the TWS trading window by typing in a currency symbol and choosing cash as the contract type.
As of March 5, 2005 new 2004 yearly statements will be available under Account Management with 1099/1042S/T5/T5008 transaction detail and a Profit and Loss summary for the year. For securities, profit and loss is computed on a first in, first out (FIFO) basis, and for commodities on a mark-to-market basis (60% long term/40% short term split). Canadian form T3 yearly statement details will be provided as of March 31, 2005. For details on how to read your statement, click here.
Upgraded monthly and daily statements that include improved equity, profit/loss, position, and transaction sections will be introduced with the March Statement (available the first week of April). Also at that time, January and February monthly statements will be available with the new formats.
Maximize your income from Buy-Writes (buying stock and writing covered calls to generate current income from premiums and dividends) with low commissions and IB Inter-market SmartRouting for Spread Orders. Our inter-market smart routing sends your stock and option legs to the best available venue with IB undertaking the risk for partially executed orders. Buy-Writes and other spread orders are easily entered through our new spread order input window.
A reminder that Direct Access Bond Trading is now available at IB. Destinations include the NYSE and Bond Desk ECN. IB SmartRoutingSM will be available to dynamically seek the best price for your bond order, and will also include our market making affiliate (TMBR) as a dealer competing for your order. If the NYSE or TMBR have the best available price, IB will immediately execute your order with them. To help you minimize your trading costs, bond commissions will be priced at $1 per $1,000 of face value, dropping to $.25 above $10,000 of face value with a minimum of $5 per order.
Detailed information on bond trading is available under Trading/Products/Bonds on our website. To initiate bond trading you must have trading permissions and market data for bonds, which can be activated through Account Management. For non-professional market data subscribers, bond market data is a part of the standard US bundle and is activated with US bond trading permissions.
We have recently completed integration work with Captools and are looking for advisors to beta test. Captools is a portfolio management platform for advisors and hedge funds which consolidates account information across multiple brokers. Any IB and Captools customer interested in beta testing our new connectivity should send an email to ibmarketing@interactivebrokers.com.
- 100 simultaneous
market data lines may now be displayed in the Trader Workstation
for free. Customers with greater than $800 USD (or equivalent)
of commissions in a month will be provided with additional
market data lines in the next month at the rate of 1 line
for each $8 USD (or equivalent) of commissions above $800
USD (or equivalent).
- The next beta release
of TWS scheduled to be released on March 3,
2005 has been upgraded to include bonds in the market scanner.
In addition, we have created a brief market scanner survey
for customers to voice their opinions on what future market
scanner features they would like to see next. Click
here to complete the survey.
- With the release of the next beta
version of TWS, API customers will be able to request back-fill
market data for the current trading day.
- Native future option spread orders
are now available on Globex. To enter these orders, use the spread
trading window.
- NYSE may be removed
as a SmartRouting destination in the Configure/Misc/SmartRouting menu
in TWS.
- In order to take advantage of all of our new TWS features, customers with the standalone version of TWS are encouraged to upgrade their software. The latest current production version is 842. As of April 30, 2005, those customers who have not upgraded to at least version 831 of the TWS will not be able to use their TWS.
Eurex US has recently introduced Russell 1000 (WR1) and Russell 2000 (WR2) futures contracts. Both contracts are available for the bundled price of $1.31 USD.
Interactive Brokers will be present for the Las Vegas Financial Advisor Retirement Planning Symposium on April 20-22, 2005 at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino. For information and a free pass, visit http://www.financialadvisorsymposium.com/lvfa/main.asp.