Can someone explain why I bought 3k EUR and my portfolio says I have 2K in the Cash section?
I’m trying to understand how this platform works on the paper account
Thank you!
didn’t you buy 20 shares of VUSA for 48 EUR per piece?
I’ve done that before the currency trade
So what? You have spent EUR, so you had negative Euros. Probably that paper account is a margin account. Otherwise you wouldn’t be able to make the trade.
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To be fair, it’s not that easy to grasp, if you’re new to these kinds of things. 
Trying to put it in simple terms: Unlike (maybe) some other less “professional” brokers, IBKR does not automatically “convert” currencies when buying shares in a different one.
Example:
- You are have 10’000 CHF cash in the account, which you’ve deposited from your Swiss CHF payment account
- You are having 0 EUR cash in the account
- No equity shares
You now try to buy 20 shares of a listed equity (an ETF, for instance, let’s take VUSA as an example) at a price of 50 EUR each. This purchase has to be settled in EUR, for a sum of 1000 EUR.
What’s going to happen?
Some consumer-oriented brokers will execute your order and convert currencies “on the fly”, or “on demand”. Let’s say, they’ll convert 1’100 USD to 1’000 EUR at an exchange rate of 1.10. You’ll now be holding:
- 8’900 USD
- 50 shares of VUSA at a cost of 50 EUR each
- 0 EUR (because only as much USD as needed to settle your VUSA order has been converted on demand)
On IBKR on a margin account, you would “hold” (maybe better call these “positions”):
- 10’000 USD (which, yes, you’ll be paid interest on the whole 10k positive balance)
- 50 shares of VUSA at a cost of 50 EUR each
- -1’000 EUR (a negative EUR balance, which IBKR will charge you interest for, like a loan)
Whereas on IBKR on a cash account, the VUSA order would be rejected by IBKR, as you would be unable to spend EUR before having exchanged currencies.
- 10’000 USD (no change)
- no shares of VUSA (order rejected)
- 0 EUR
8 Likes
Thanks @San_Francisco, the paper account is in $.
I did purchase VUSA in € before converting any dollars.
The mats adds up
Thanks a lot everyone! So interest is only applied above 100k, can anyone confirm this? Has anyone set up dividend notifications?
Interesting take on the USD vs. CHF base currency, both seems to make sense. Do we have frequent users of margin accounts here?
No. Positive interest on credit balances is proportionate to account size (if account size below 100k):
„Accounts with NAV of less than USD 100,000 (or equivalent) receive interest at rates proportional to the size of the account.*
As for the interest rate applied on individual cash balances in different currencies:
„IBKR uses a blended rate based on (…) tiers“
Negative interest (for some currencies) is irrespective of account size:
For balances held in CHF, DKK, EUR, JPY or SEK, IBKR currently applies an effective negative rate to long balances held. The negative rate applied to accounts holding these currencies is the same regardless of account size“
…whereas for important currencies with negative rates, the first tier just so happens to have been set at 0%, for the first 100k USD or approximate currency equivalent
Independently, Interest on margin loans is charged from the first currency unit, again at a blended rate using tiers.
The “interest rate” on USD seems to be zero (whatever numbers I put in there)?
Yes, so, 0. 
The link above leads to same page.
Dear all, quick question. I created a demo - paper - account, logged in the default Portal, managed to do a few orders. That’s all ok.
My problem is that I don’t see how much I have (supposedly the demo has $1mio), and I don’t see my positions when I go on the “portfolio” page. Am I missing sth ?
@denis , welcome to the people that have missing information all time in IB!
I love IB in general buy I’m fighting with them about the missing information for more than 6 months!
The problem is that they say that practically nobody have the problem… So I passed days and days trying different browsers, places, connections, etc.
If you open TWS the data is there. Is just the Web Portal.
Open a ticket and tell them. Hope that they solve the problem quickly.
Regards.
Indeed it’s in TWS but I just can’t use such an interface. I’ve sent them, but if it’s 6 months already for you…there’s not much hope. TBH it’s a total deal breaker for me that this is not working, and worse is if it’s a known issue for so long.
There are also quite many bad reviews
They serve the professionals, so their priority is as following:
1 TWS
2 TWS paper
3 Webtrader
4 App
5 Portal
5 Webtrader paper
6 App paper
7 Portal paper (I didn’t know it existed tbh)
1000 Website in general
So, as long as TWS works, they might be slower to answer anything.
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Hi,
As I said several times the only thing that makes me stay at IB are the currency treatment and the possibility and price for withdraw and deposit money in CHF, EUR, etc…
I have an account in TD for 6 months now and I’ll switch to them from IB in 0.001 seconds if they’d offer different currencies and moving money from/to Switzerland easier and cheaper.
Anything else is much, much better in TD: Interface(s), free trades, free real-time market prices, information, options trade, etc.
Regards.
I thought with TD you have to pay 15% on every trade for the swiss stamp tax.
Edit: wait, are you talking about TradeDirect.ch ? You trade only swiss stocks, right?
Edit2: brainfart…sorry D:
@Tino I’ve explained clearly my issue in the ticket I opened, and the answer I’ve received: “From the Client Portal login window you have to toggle to Paper instead of Live account.”
What an answer…I’ve reopened the ticket 