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Friend
Posts: 27
Location:
USA: VA, Alexandria | Good features of IB include:
A) Breadth of products tradable in IRA Roth & Rollover accounts (if qualified) at reasonable commission rates
1) Futures for hedging OV portfolios of stocks & ETFs, or trading
notably: Indexes, interest rates (esp. if rates rise), stock futures, sector commodities, etc.
2) Options (same reasons) on stock and futures underlyings
3) Currencies (same reasons, notably to preserve worldwide purchasing power of capital/yields)
4) Bonds, structured products, alternative asset classes
4) Foreign securities in Americas, Europe, Asia (if interested, esp. for Nirvana customers based outside USA)
5) much more @IB's web site http://individuals.interactivebrokers.com/en/index.php?f=1563
6) margin available at very low interest rates in IRA accounts
B) Safer, more durable broker (less likely to fail or cause problems)
1) Clearing Broker for most markets traded
2) Financially strong
3) Real-time internal risk management and margin system
(i.e., far better to prevent problems than to fight them afterward)
4) Strict customer funds segregation
5) Account protections & insurance
C) Excellent array of technology options
1) Desktop software for Windows, Apple OS X, Linux
2) Mobile on most OS platforms
3) Plug-ins via API, DDE, etc. available from 3rd parties (some free)
4) Other Algo trading software available (at a price) as alternatives or backups to OV
5) OmniTrader compatibility
6) much more @IB's web site http://individuals.interactivebrokers.com/en/index.php?f=4691
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Friend
Posts: 27
Location:
USA: VA, Alexandria | Investors and traders normally don't give much thought to whether their broker clears their own trades.
However, I learned the hard way how problems can arise when two or more parties cross signals, make errors, and/or refuse to cooperate. (All of these applied.)
1) Penson (the same clearing agent custodian that also clears for GX and MB Trading, I think) committed an error reporting to the IRS about an IRA account transfer.
2) As a result, I suffered through 8 months of tax hell fighting to get the record set straight.
3) When my broker and I asked for a corrected report to IRS, the clearing agent refused to cooperate. Unfortunately, I was caught in the middle to fit my own battle.
4) For months the IRS kept asking for one more item of proof at a time, lost certified mail, claimed that information submitted (confirmed by IRS mail signatures) was not in their files, etc.
OK, that's the IRS dysfunction--but the issue is, I should never have been involved in the first place to have to fight this battle with them.
5) The broker helped by submitting a notarized letter confirming that a broker to broker transfer had indeed occurred. (i.e., I never had constructive receipt of the funds.)
6) However, the IRS initially took the position that the information was not from the proper clearing agent. It took a long time and legal intervention to get them to accept the proofs offered.
In the end, I won, and owned nothing--not the $30,000 plus the IRS tried to grab. Plus some out of pocket costs. However, the process was like slow torture for month after month.
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Veteran
Posts: 208
Location:
Australia: , Church Point, NSW | I have only positive comments about IB.
I particularly like their ability to find stock to short. I've done approximately 500 short trades with IB and going back over my records I found about 15 examples where they notified me before market open that there may be an issue with finding the stock. In all but three instances they were able to find the stock to short before market open!
IB is also very responsive to questions and I even had them fix a flaw in their computer programs within days.
I also like that they enforce the rules - I once made a stupid mistake that took my account over limit and they were straight on to me to get the account back in line.
Whenever I've done random samples of their fill prices versus the market they generally are at or better than the reported market price, occasionally worse.
Finally, I like their financials; they are very profitable, just what I want in a broker, to stay afloat!!
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Elite
Posts: 473
Location:
USA: NY, Baldwinsville | Guys:
Yes, I use IB too and like the fact that I rarely ever cannot short a stock. I use to use Scottrade and I might "stalk" a stock for a good portion of the day's session. When I finally wanted to enter the trade, Scottrade would come back with the fact that the stock was not available for shorting. Now with IB I just put the symbol on their Trader Workstation platform and color-coding tells me immediately whether or not shares are available for shorting. Mousing over the green color code even tells me how many shares are available for shorting as shown in the screen shot below.
Additionally you can trade almost anything on IB - stocks, futures, and options are just some of the things I have tried. Execution is excellent and, as far as I can tell, I am filled where I think I should have been filled.
Also you only have to make 30 trades a month (15 round trips) to get most everything free.
Their accounting is immediate and excellent and end-of-year tax reporting superb.
So, you can probably see why IB is voted number one in every survey you ever see like in TAS&C!
(IB Short Availability Indicator.png)
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
Attachments  IB Short Availability Indicator.png (40KB - 3 downloads)
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Veteran
Posts: 208
Location:
Australia: , Church Point, NSW | I've attached a link to IB's Financials here:
http://interactivebrokers.com/en/index.php?f=559
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Spectator
Posts: 6
Location:
USA: GA, Johns Creek | This is a problem regarding Interactive Brokers. I recently updated Java 7 to update 21. What I found out is this new Java update, is not compatible with Trader Workstation 935.3, which is the only version that works with OT and VT. The work around IB's support desk had, was to upgrade TWS to version 938.1. That fixed the problem with Java, however, 938.1 does not work with OT or VT. When I asked Nirvana about this, they said it would be "quite some time before we have a new IB Build 938.1 available". They suggested I download an earlier version of Java, that would work with TWS 935.3. I'm reluctant to do that because of security concerns.
Is any one else experiencing this problem?
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Spectator
Posts: 3
Location:
USA: CA, La Crescenta | Mike,
I'm using Windows 7 64bit
TWS 935.3
Java 1.7.0_21
OT2013 Release 2M
I traded Friday without any issues.
Domenic
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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| I had problems with the combination of
Windows 7 64bit
TWS 935.3
Java 1.7.0_21
OT2013 Release 2M
IB said I needed TWS 938 and discovered this won't run with OT. Final solution was to go back to java 1.7.0_17 and TWS 935.
The problem I was having with Java ..._21 and TWS 935 was that TWS became unstable. Unable to enter symbols, windows would not maximize from the taskbar if minimized and the longer it ran the more pronounced the problem was.
I do get occasional warnings on security and have to grant permission with the Java but it hasn't been too disruptive. Let's hope Nirvana gets on it but I'm afraid their priority is TP and GX Trader for obvious reasons.
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Spectator
Posts: 3
Location:
USA: CA, La Crescenta | Guys,
I haven't seen these issues. I have been using the Mosaic interface and I have not been opening and closing other windows.
Just for comparison purposes, on the hardware I have an i7 with nvidia geforce graphics and 16gb memory. Thanks for the heads up with your problems. I'll leave my Mosaic setup alone for now.
Domenic
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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Spectator
Posts: 6
Location:
USA: GA, Johns Creek | I was not at the Bash, but posted this question online:
Q: When will you upgrade OT/VT to accept Interactive Brokers TWS 983.1? The recent Java upgrade is not compatible with TWS 935.3, the one Nirvana uses. There are still a few of us using IB and are reluctant to download a lower version of Java, due to security concerns. This was recommended as a fix by your support department.
A: We will try to get it done this month. I just put in the request again with QA.
I guess we will have to wait and see if this gets done.
Mike
Thread moved by JimDean on 3/26/2013 3:35 PM from Nirvana Club (NC members only) > OmniVest & Trade Processor > IB Features and War Stories
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IB Features and War Stories
