Entering a Trade through Advisor Portal

Advisors can use the Trade menu in IBKR’s Advisor Portal to trade any available products, view orders & trades, exercise options, convert currency, and close positions. 

Submit a Trade

To launch an Order Ticket through the Advisor Portal, select the menu in the top left, expand the Trade menu, and select Order Ticket. All products available to trade will be listed along the top of the screen: Stocks, Options, Futures, Future Options, Warrants, CFDs, Mutual Funds, Bonds, Commodities, Forex, or the option to Convert Currency or Close Positions. Please note that client accounts will need to add trading permissions for any products and locations the advisor wishes to trade.

The advisor can use the search bar to search by ticker symbol or company name. Enter the symbol, select Enter, and choose the exchange. Multiple exchanges will be listed, however please note, advisors will only be able to submit an order for exchanges their client accounts have trading permissions configured for. Once a ticker symbol has been selected, the page will display a chart, along with the bid and ask. Additional metrics will be shown to the right of the chart, including Volume, Average Volume, Open Price, Market Cap, and more. Investors can adjust the time period of the chart by selecting from the list along the X axis of the chart.

To the upper right, the Advisor can select the account or group of accounts to allocate the trade to by clicking on the icon.

Allocating a Trade to a Single Account

In this first example, the Advisor will place an order allocated to a single account. The Advisor selects the Allocation menu and checks the box for the client they wish to trade for, then selects Save. Next to the allocation menu, select Buy or Sell. At the bottom of the page is the Order Settings, where the Advisor will enter the quantity (which can be entered in shares or dollars, if fractional shares are enabled), the order type, price, time in force, and indicate if they would like the order to fill Outside Regular Trading Hours. When the Advisor is ready to submit the order, they can select the Preview button to view a projection of their account balances post trade, or the blue Submit Order button to transmit the order.

Allocating a Trade to a Group of Accounts

In this example, the Advisor will place an order allocated to a group of accounts. The Advisor selects the Allocation menu and, from the Allocation Groups tab, selects the group they wish to trade. The advisor can also select a sub group of account manually by choosing the Accounts tab and checking off which accounts they want to participate in the trade. The advisor can also select all accounts which allows the Advisor to block allocate across All Accounts/Groups. Once the accounts have been selected, the Advisor selects Buy or Sell and scrolls down to the Allocation Method section. The Advisor can also narrow down the accounts involved in the trade by unchecking any in the Allocation Values area. Select Choose Allocation Method. Common methods will be displayed, or the menu can be expanded to see Advanced Methods. The Advisor chooses the method they wish to use, fills in the parameters, and selects Set Allocation Method. Select Calculate Order Quantities and the Quantity field next to each account will populate. The Advisor fills in the order details and selects Preview or Submit.

Orders & Trades

Investors can see a list of recent orders and executed trades from the main menu, under Trade, and by selecting Orders & Trades. The Orders section will display a list of recent orders and their status, as well as the option to modify or cancel orders that have not yet filled. The Trades section will display any executed trades. 

Convert Currency

Advisors can use the Convert Currency option in the Order ticket area to easily convert cash from one currency to another. Use the account dropdown menu to select the client account and the middle of the page will display the client’s current cash balances. To convert a currency balance, the advisor can use the “From” dropdown menu to select the currency they have and would like to convert and use the “To” dropdown menu to select the currency they would like to convert the balance to. The advisor enters the amount they would like to convert in terms of the starting currency or the ending currency and the other field will automatically populate thereafter. The investor will select Submit when ready to transmit the order. 

Close Positions

The Close Position tool allows advisors to close all or specific positions in their clients’ portfolios. The advisor can choose the account or group of accounts from the Allocation menu. Select from 100%, 50%, 25% or a Custom amount they would like to close. From the Instruments dropdown, the advisor will select the product they would like to close and check off the boxes for Long or Short. Fill in the additional order details and select Close Positions when ready to submit the orders. 

The advisor can also launch an Order Ticket by selecting the blue Trade button in the upper right of the Advisor Portal.

Note that the more advanced tools such as Basket Trader, Market Depth Trader, Risk Navigator, algo order types, and more are only accessed within the Trader Workstation (or TWS). For more information, please see our dedicated TWS courses.