Interactive Brokers: Brexit account migration = insurance drops from 500k USD to 20k EUR

44

Dear fellow Mustachians,

I’ve contacted IB regarding this issue, and finally got an answer in my message center:

Thank you for your message.

Since Switzerland is not part of the European Union we do not plan that your account will be affected. This is the reason why you have not received a specific communication.

Please let us know if there are any other questions.

Best regards,

Nick
IBKR Client Services

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45

Thank you.
As expected, vs. all the “panic” which ensued in the thread.
But I am not surprised that even their own customer facing support is not 100% knowledgeable on all things, with differing answers from different sources.

46

Yeah considering that I got a completely opposite response from them. But there seems to be hope!

47

This seems to be in line with their current registration process. If you select a country from the EU, they will show this warning:

eu_registration
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But the warning will not be shown if you select Switzerland:

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Sorry for the separate reply, but the platform doesn’t allow new users to upload 2 images in a post.

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50

Thanks for the test! This is not a proof, but still a good sign :slight_smile:

51

“News” from IB about IBCE & their Budapest office.

…oh and really impressive y/y growth of users (>50%), and it’s not like IB is a new start-up & was “small” a year ago. Their system hasn’t always been 100% stable in 2020, but let’s hope part of that has been due to all those new users.

As a comparison, Swissquote, which also reported being over-run with new clients during the first lockdown/crash, increased client numbers by 50’000 Jan to June 2020, from about 350’000 at year-end 2019.

Interactive Brokers expands Central European operations
Dec. 14, 2020

  • Interactive Brokers Central Europe Zrt., (IBCE) opening of an office in Budapest.
  • With this addition, the bank will now serve 1M+ client accounts in more than 220 countries and territories.
  • “We plan to make Budapest the center of our operations for Central Europe to keep pace with account growth, which has been rapid in both Western and Eastern Europe and around the world,” chairman Thomas Peterffy commented.
  • As of Nov. 30th, client accounts worldwide had grown 52% Y/Y with over 80% of the expansion coming from outside of the U.S

Source Interactive Brokers expands Central European operations https://seekingalpha.com/news/3644154-interactive-brokers-expands-central-european-operations

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52

Has anyone residing in CH received a request to migrate at all? Not me, so I contacted the support and got the confirmation that if you live in Switzerland you can stay with IB UK and thus continue to benefit from the 500k of the SIPC (which anyway only becomes relevant if IB really messes up - keyword segregated accounts).

IB Support (German):

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54

I got the same reply from IB UK when I asked if Swiss residents will be migrated.

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55

Good to know. I saw afterwards that Mr.Paprika also received this information. So it is quite likely that this is true and not just a statement from an uninformed first level support employee.

56

And for new account stay in UK ?

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I would assume so, although I did not ask that directly.

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58

Account is at the Citibank with a CH IBAN so seem good for new account too :slight_smile:

Thank you

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Welcome to the forums Mr. Good News Bringer. Please post more :slight_smile:

60

Great news. I’ve been a bit lax on the IB Brexit migration - if I don’t have to do anything, this is awesome.

61

I have recently received a request to migrate my account to IBIE. Anyone else?

Is there any suggestions how to mitigate this risk?

  • Additional paid insurance?
  • Change broker? From which amount should a second/third broker be considered?
62

No, I got no such request…

Are you a Swiss resident?

63

I am, or at least was…

I am moving to Liechtenstei. As I was updating my profile a failure came up telling that I needed to close my account and open one new to change countries. So my account is still as Switzerland address.

I am not sure if it was a coincidence…