Why did I receive an order rejecting while trying to buy a Future Option?

IBKR adds House margins to the Initial margin requirement for a contract. If you hold a position that has a higher Initial margin than Maintenance margin, it is possible for your Available Funds to be negative while your Excess Liquidity is positive. Buying Power is projected as the current Available Funds (Equity with Loan Value less Initial Margin) times a multiple, so when your Available Funds is negative you will not be allowed to enter a margin increasing order…

IBKR will not create a negative cash balance or increase an existing negative cash balance in your Commodities segment for the purpose of sweeping funds to cover a margin deficit in the Securities segment. It is possible that the Commodities segment of your IBKR Universal account has positive Excess Equity from the unrealized profit of an open Future/FOP position but also has a negative cash balance. In this example, if there was a margin deficit in the Securities segment then IBKR would begin to liquidate Securities positions as there is no positive unpledged cash available to be swept over from the Commodities segment. …

No, Future contracts do not have Loan Value and margin loans cannot be created against a future contract to be used to cover a future margin requirements at Interactive Brokers (IBKR). There are specific conditions and requirements for trading futures in your IBKR account:…

The CME requires a Buy/Write combination order that includes a Future with a Future Option to be submitted with a "Delta" value. IBKR does not calculate Delta values for Future Buy/Write combinations so that strategy is not allowed. You will need to leg into or leg out of a Future Buy/Write strategy for any CME future products in your IBKR account. If you need help closing an open position…