Interactive Brokers for dummies

Hi @Erma

I am no lawyer, but it usually means persons, who you must support financially by law. In your case, this is most likely only your children, but in case of a divorce, it might mean your ex spouse if the divorce settlement says so. Depending on the country you live in, it could also potentially include your parents, if the are so poor that they can’t support themselves and you have abundant funds.

It doesn’t matter that someone else also has to support them, so I would only list the number of children you have that cannot support themselves. Older children, who have completed their formal education and are self reliant, would not be included.

Thank you very much. So I will only put my daughter there.

Hello everyone!

I finally started using IBKR myself but ran into some issues with the currency converter. Every so often when I try to use it, I click on ‘convert’ but nothing happens. Are there some trading hours I need to account for? Or does the website just break on occasion?

Hi there,

Are you sure you are leaving enough funds in your account in order to pay the FX fees? Typically at IBKR they are around CHF 1.80 or USD 2.00. This caught me quite a few times…

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That’s it, thank you!

Glad to hear that! Yeah their user interface in these terms is terrible, they don’t even display any warnings, nothing… If you go in the orders menu you would see the failed currency exchange but even there you wouldn’t see the reason why.

By the way I think FX trading is closed over the weekend.

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Hello everyone,

Perhaps maybe a relatively obvious question, but wanted to clarify with you all in case someone has tried this already.

I have some money in a bank account in the UK in GBP which I want to put to work and wondered if I can send this to my IB account as £’s even though my base currency is in CHF? I can use the GB iban I suppose and the money will arrive as GBP in my account?

Thanks in advance.

I have done this, from Halifax to IBKR UK, no problem and no fees. Set up the deposit in IBKR and use the bank details provided by IBKR

Is it possible to use Smart Routing from the Client Portal? The new fixed fee structure is very clear, and cheaper.

In my case (buying trackers only) I see no downside to the Smart Routing. Could you please correct me if I’m wrong?

Thank you!

Quick question - something I cant quite wrap my head around.
If I place an order in IB for VT lets say, and I submit a limit order at bid price 104.15 while ask price is at 104.85. My order wont be filled until the security price falls 104.15? The volatility for VT is quite low, so should I be submitting a market order to be filled instantly, looking at a volume of 2k?
Thanks team!

I think that’s what it does by default.

With things where liquidity is high (e.g. big ETFs) a market order is actually ok. But you get lots of annoying warnings if you make one.

So if I really want to buy something quickly, I just create a limit order with a few cents more than the current ask price. Also IB gives you a few live price updates for free to get the actual price (it’s a blue reloading icon under the price).

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I’m not sure it’s by default. The fees I pay today are more expensive.

https://www.interactivebrokers.co.uk/en/index.php?f=39753&p=stocks1

Yes, you are right.

A Limit order is an order to buy or sell at a specified price or better. The Limit order ensures that if the order fills, it will not fill at a price less favorable than your limit price, but it does not guarantee a fill.

[quote=“RAGold, post:461, topic:447, full:true”] The volatility for VT is quite low, so should I be submitting a market order to be filled instantly, looking at a volume of 2k?
Thanks team!
[/quote]

If you wanna play save, use the limit order. If volatility is high and/order your amount is quite low like 2k, you can also use a market order. This way ibkr tries to buy or sell for the best possible price at the moment.

Sharing my experience from a 5-months user, I had always settled up a limit order like XXX.X0 (just because I like to have rounded number from two decimals as a price order (I’m a bit maniac :upside_down_face:)). For exemple, my last limit order was settled to 104.80 when the current price was switching between 104.83 - 104.87.

I personally use market orders when buying VT, the spread is so small anyway. I don’t really care about a few decimal points :stuck_out_tongue: Granted I only buy a few hundreds worth of shares per month right now.

a few hundreds shares per MONTH ? Damn are you reducing a cash cussion ?
At a share price this would mean 20k$ per month min,

he said “a few hundreds worth of shares per month”

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