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Interactive Brokers - experiences and opinions

  • #461
  • Jun 21, 2013 1:04am Jun 21, 2013 1:04am
A new old bug has resurfaced. I don't know when it came back as I haven't traded any futures (or much of anything to be honest) since March when my father died, but once again, even though the I set the Global Preset to "Allow order to be activated, triggered, or filled outside of regular trading hours" (and I checked each sub-category, specifically Futures in this case) I have to manually set it each time, else any Stops you place are going to be ignored for a long, long time if you do most of your trading during the Asian and European market sessions as I do.

The best part is, it's not even an option in the Order Wizard -- of course not, that would make sense -- you have to click on the tiny icon of a clock that sits between your order quantity and the timing (GTC, DAY, etc.)

This doesn't affect Forex trading, only stocks and futures.

The fix (if I remember correctly, which is also the fix for virtually every problem) is to clear your Java cache and reload a Settings File prior to the bug appearing, otherwise clear your settings entirely and start from scratch -- no thanks. I'll just live with it for now.

I'm so glad they spent millions supporting Republican campaigns instead of fixing bugs in their antiquated software. So very, very glad.
You can always make money tomorrow provided you don't lose it today.
  • #462
  • Jun 21, 2013 3:08pm Jun 21, 2013 3:08pm
forgot to mention ...in order to vote you have to login in account management and create a voting subscription...

thanks in advance
ΕΣΟ ΕΤΟÎΜΟΣ
  • #463
  • Jun 24, 2013 7:22am Jun 24, 2013 7:22am
it wasn't really my intention to attract big lot traders in this thread.... nevertheless really i cannot understand your ploblem guys...
at least small lot traders provide liquidity you know..
ΕΣΟ ΕΤΟÎΜΟΣ
  • #464
  • Aug 27, 2013 8:30am Aug 27, 2013 8:30am
New fun today (not that I haven't had a dozen other problems between the last post and this one) -- Interactive Brokers sold my MGC when my stop-loss triggered at $1415.50 ...the fun part being that the lowest recorded bid price in the last 20 minutes is $1416.00. We're not even talking about a data spike here -- they just simply triggered my stop at a price that they don't even show as being valid (and confirmed with 3rd party data).
You can always make money tomorrow provided you don't lose it today.
  • #465
  • Aug 30, 2013 11:39pm Aug 30, 2013 11:39pm
Quoting t23
anyone have same chart spike problem with IB? how do you trade this? {image}
You don't. It's just a bug in the TWS chart, not necessarily means that there was actually a price spike on that candle. If you had another better charting software, you will see there probably wasn't any spikes at all. It happens when one of the tick data is screwed up and the whole bar ends up being affected. No matter how you refresh it, that spike will always be there.

Can't believe IB still hasn't fixed it. That spike problem has been there ever since IB started offering Forex trading. TWS charting's gotta be the worst charting software there ever.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #466
  • Aug 30, 2013 11:59pm Aug 30, 2013 11:59pm
Quoting venzen
Well TWS looks horrible and definitely got bugs from what I can tell in this thread. Nonetheless, I am considering opening an account with them since they are the only broker (that I know of) who offer an API for directly accessing market feeds. I will therefore not be using TWS but my own plotting and trading app. Anyone have experience of this or any advice before I take the plunge?
DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT EVER use their API for anything, trading, charting or anything!!! Their API is HORRIBLE!! Full of bugs, technical issues including non-execution of orders placed and especially if you like to use OCO orders. The trading software that I used to use that has an API to IB specifically tells you that OCO order placed in the trading software will NOT be transmitted to IB trading server via API so they will never get executed.

If you really want to shell out your money to IB, this is my advice: Use their FX Trader ONLY to execute your trades and THAT'S IT!! SO FAR, their exeuction speed is pretty good, their commission is not too bad so just use them for trading ONLY. DON'T use their charting package or API or anything else!! They are absolute GARBAGE!! I am NOT trying to bad-mouth IB; I am just being very honest. Even with their FX Trader, it's tricky to use sometimes. I STRONGLY suggest you to demo trading in FX Trader as much as possible to get familiar with placing orders and submitting orders in FX Trader before you go live. You have no idea how much money I lost due to mistakes in using FX Trader.

What's that line that the innkeepr from Les Miserables always sings? "Nothing comes out of nothing, everything's got a price"?? This couldn't be truer in Forex brokerages; you can't expect eSignal-quality charting and everything provided to you for free with the commission they charge. IB knows this and that's why they don't give a *&^% about us traders' complaints about problems or bugs in their software and they don't and never will bother to fix them.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #467
  • Sep 8, 2013 9:46am Sep 8, 2013 9:46am
Hi guys,

last friday during the us unemployment news release i experienced the following:
about 1 hour before the news release i entered a buy stop order on Eur/jpy at around 130,95 with a trailing stop loss 0.1% away from the price (so at the execution of my buy order my stop loss was at ~130,80)
during the news release then there came up some price action and in the first seconds the price jumped up and my stop buy order got executed at 130,96 - this is ok and so far everything is good.
but then the currency pair turned and the price fell very fast in a few seconds below my stop loss price so that the sl order got hit and got switched automatically into a market sell order to close my long position (so far still everything went like it should) but this sell order got executed at 130,22!!! - this means that it got executed ~60 pips or nearly 0.5% below my stop loss!! this implies that during the news release there was a spread of about 60 pips on this currency pair at Interactive Brokers.

i am trading already since several years and with different brokers and never ever had such an experience before (i also saw never before such a big spread on this pair).
so i wrote them and asked to cancel the trade bcoz mistrade - well, the customer support replied me that this couldnt happen during news release and high volatitly time.

is such a spread (also during news release) really possible? had someone else also a similar experience? right now i am not sure if this is really possible in the market or if there was some error (and delay) on the system of interactive brokers
Pecunia non olet
  • #468
  • Sep 8, 2013 10:53am Sep 8, 2013 10:53am
well, a market sell order which get executed 0.5% below the entering price suprises me - even if there was a news release
Pecunia non olet
  • #469
  • Sep 8, 2013 11:46am Sep 8, 2013 11:46am
Quoting wm-eu
Hi guys, last friday during the us unemployment news release i experienced the following: about 1 hour before the news release i entered a buy stop order on Eur/jpy at around 130,95 with a trailing stop loss 0.1% away from the price (so at the execution of my buy order my stop loss was at ~130,80) during the news release then there came up some price action and in the first seconds the price jumped up and my stop buy order got executed at 130,96 - this is ok and so far everything is good. but then the currency pair turned and the price fell very...
its NFP baby! the broker can widen prices by 100pips and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it. That's why its advised not to straddle or enter trades before or during Friday madness or better still, just sit on the sidelines and watch traders get slaughtered. The choice is yours
  • #470
  • Sep 8, 2013 11:58am Sep 8, 2013 11:58am
well, i traded already several times close (seconds) after the nfp release - i saw spreads of maybe 20 or 30 pips but never 60 or 100 pip...
Pecunia non olet
  • #471
  • Nov 7, 2013 6:45am Nov 7, 2013 6:45am
I've been noticing my account balance decreasing lately having nothing to do with the trades I'm making.

Last night I wrote down my starting balance at midnight, and after making a net gain of $185 (not my best night to be sure) my account balance was now down $72, a net loss of $257 of what I should have.

Talking to the support agent for over a half hour until I was disconnected due to "technical difficulties on their end" with a "failure to reconnect", I was told it is because I am holding multiple currencies so my account balance will not remain static, and he then went on to make examples about how this could affect my balance.

Yet as I was long Aussie, Kiwi, Loonie, Pound, and Euro and short US$, and since Aussie, Kiwi, Loonie, Pound, and Euro went up while US$ went down, how could my balance go down? The residual non-base currency amounts in my accounts after trading are negligible -- a few hundred at most as I regularly trade-out any non-base currency "leftovers" -- so this could not possibly account for such a large discrepancy percentage-wise.
You can always make money tomorrow provided you don't lose it today.
  • #472
  • Nov 12, 2013 9:27am Nov 12, 2013 9:27am
Quoting KADC
I've been noticing my account balance decreasing lately having nothing to do with the trades I'm making. Last night I wrote down my starting balance at midnight, and after making a net gain of $185 (not my best night to be sure) my account balance was now down $72, a net loss of $257 of what I should have. Talking to the support agent for over a half hour until I was disconnected due to "technical difficulties on their end" with a "failure to reconnect", I was told it is because I am holding multiple currencies so my account balance will not remain...
If you hold multiple currencies in your account when your account currency is USD, the drawdown is most likely due to rollover interest that they charged you whenever you held positions over the rollover time and/or when you have made a gain trading in non-USD based currencies like the Yen and the Loonie and etc. And their rollover interest is one-sided for many currencies which means when you are short in that currency over the rollover period, they charge you interest but when you are long in that currency over the rollover period, they don't pay you interest and when they do pay you interest, it's peanuts. Their rollover interest charge is HUGE especially if you held the positions open over the weekend. It can easily offset any gains that you have made on the trade. You have to be *very careful* when trading over the weekend. And once you made gains in non-USD currencies, convert the gains into USD, your account currency right away again to avoid interest. IB charges you interest on those too and they don't convert the gains automatically for you unless it's less than $5USD. Yup! that's another commission you have to pay to convert your own gain into your account currency. I guess this is how they make up for the relatively low commission that they charge you.

Hope this helps
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #473
  • Nov 12, 2013 6:00pm Nov 12, 2013 6:00pm
And btw, IB has been extremely slow to connect to. At one time, I went through 27 connection attempts before I was able to log onto TWS. And even when I logged onto TWS, the redundant server was inaccessible and the data server was not available either and it took another 10 or 15 min. or so before TWS was finally able to connect to the data server to receive price data. The problem has been ongoing for several weeks now.

Is anyone else experiencing this? Is there problems with their servers or they were just lacking servers? Was anyone able to get any official explanation from their tech. support regarding this issue? I opened a ticket inquiring about this issue and all I got back was asking me to recount to them what I was doing and give them the error log.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #474
  • Feb 20, 2014 6:26am Feb 20, 2014 6:26am
If I had problems like this, I'd switch brokers immediately. My time is valuable. I only have one life. There is no replay button for missed opportunities.
You win, you lose. All else is history. The future does not exist.
  • #475
  • Feb 20, 2014 6:39am Feb 20, 2014 6:39am
Quoting The Rhodie
If I had problems like this, I'd switch brokers immediately. My time is valuable. I only have one life. There is no replay button for missed opportunities.
They are the least expensive discount broker here in Canada by far, and the only one that lets you trade everything (stocks, futures, FOREX, options) so unfortunately I don't have a choice. All I can do is hope that their competitors in other jurisdictions force them to finally update their software. The issue with my account balance I never resolved as I had serious health issues from right after I made my last post until recently when I've been able to get back to trading, and so far my account balance has been correct though obviously I will keep an eye on it.
You can always make money tomorrow provided you don't lose it today.
  • #476
  • Feb 20, 2014 10:44am Feb 20, 2014 10:44am
Quoting KADC
{quote} They are the least expensive discount broker here in Canada by far, and the only one that lets you trade everything (stocks, futures, FOREX, options) so unfortunately I don't have a choice. All I can do is hope that their competitors in other jurisdictions force them to finally update their software. The issue with my account balance I never resolved as I had serious health issues from right after I made my last post until recently when I've been able to get back to trading, and so far my account balance has been correct though obviously...
My predictment exactly. It's either them or the MM's like Questrade.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #477
  • Feb 20, 2014 11:15am Feb 20, 2014 11:15am
Quoting Forexia
{quote} My predictment exactly. It's either them or the MM's like Questrade.
Questrade is useful for your RRSP/RIF and TFSA investment holding as well as physical gold and silver with reasonable storage fees.

My main problem with Questrade is when a stock splits or reverse splits they automatically update your number of shares but they don't update your purchase book value so it looks like you've suddenly taken a huge loss or gain. You then have to calculate what your book value should be yourself then contact Questrade support and tell them what it should be (they are unable to calculate it themselves) and they change it manually which, seriously, has got to be against standard practices.

It's a real nightmare if you've added to or sold off some of your affected positions, going through years of transaction history to calculate your actual book value because they don't track purchase history by stock, only by time.

They outsourced their accounting practices last year which I hoped would fix this nonsense, but this new company just does the books, they have nothing to do with the trading platform so you still have to contact Questrade support for a manual price update.

If they weren't literally the only choice for RRSP/RIF and TFSA other than actual Canadian banks which charge anywhere from $10 to $50 per transaction (provided you maintain a minimum $25,000 balance) I'd have nothing to do with them.
You can always make money tomorrow provided you don't lose it today.
  • #478
  • Feb 20, 2014 1:17pm Feb 20, 2014 1:17pm
Quoting KADC
{quote} Questrade is useful for your RRSP/RIF and TFSA investment holding as well as physical gold and silver with reasonable storage fees. My main problem with Questrade is when a stock splits or reverse splits they automatically update your number of shares but they don't update your purchase book value so it looks like you've suddenly taken a huge loss or gain. You then have to calculate what your book value should be yourself then contact Questrade support and tell them what it should be (they are unable to calculate it themselves) and they...
LOL They used to have this ONE guy in the background doing all of their accounting, calculating the profit/loss for each trader and doing the books for them. I guess he either retired or just had enough of them and left. And now they outsourced their accounting. I feel so sorry for that new company. Of course I stay away from that company. I was considering them for their self-directed RESP but after reading some horrible reviews online about their service on that, I never looked at them again no matter how cheap they offer service at.

It's sad that this lack of competition is forcing us to be stuck with IB's abysmal charting software and platform which they have the slightest intention to improve.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
  • #479
  • Feb 20, 2014 1:30pm Feb 20, 2014 1:30pm
You don't have to be stuck with Canadian brokers. You are the person who determines your success or failure. what law says you have to trade with a Canadian broker anymore? Try some of the British ones which are top notch.
You win, you lose. All else is history. The future does not exist.
  • #480
  • Feb 20, 2014 1:40pm Feb 20, 2014 1:40pm
Quoting The Rhodie
You don't have to be stuck with Canadian brokers. You are the person who determines your success or failure. what law says you have to trade with a Canadian broker anymore? Try some of the British ones which are top notch.
I did inquire about them but many of them refused to take Canadians as clients because they are not allowed to do business with Canadians because they don't have a registered office in Canada so says IIIOC, our Canadian equivalent of the FSA in UK.
Make your losses in demo. Earn your profits live.
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