I have one account on Optionshouse, IB, as well as had an account at TDAmeritrade. I use thinkorswim for most of my charts and that is why I signed up for TdAmeritrade. First they didn't accept my margin information for futures and commissions were raping me out the asshole for daytrading so I closed my account. Also when I wanted to short a certain stock, it wouldn't let me. Now I am having the same problem with Optionshouse. I enjoy their platform and cheap commission. It is the broker I have most of my money with. However it is frustrating to not be able to short certain ETF's when I want to. I see the setup and good risk/reward setup and I am not available to short it makes me frustrated. Only way I can play on the downside is by buying puts with large spread..... Now with IB, I lost almost 8k learning how to trade futures. That is no one's fault by my own. I had only about 2k left on that account but moved some $ over from TdAmeritrade after I quit back into IB. The short position that I wanted to initiate on both Optionshouse and TD was no problem and currently I am maxed out on margin on the account. I guess my question is what should I do with my current brokerage situation? Should I keep it as is or move more $ to Interactive Brokers so I can short a stock when I want to with no problem?
Hed -- no question that IB is the best at shorting stock. I've not been able to make money at shorting stocks, even with screens that clearly show strategies that lose tons of money each year (not so easy to come up with). The problems are several: 1. If the stock delists, you can't get out. Ever. IB will hold that position open until the day YOU are delisted.... 2. The sudden spikes in price cause heartburn unless you have massive undeployed capital. This makes the risk/reward ratio similar to selling options.... 3. The general market trend of going up causes intense frustration on a daily basis
You can't beat consolidating accounts for simplicity. However, it is not a bad practice to separate brokers Futures/Forex vs Equities because of blow ups. ie CHF debacle.
Don't you end up being responsible for the entire loss, which could be more than the value of your account if it blows up? If not, I see a business model here: 1. Find a strategy that goes to -10x half the time, and goes to 10x the other half. 2. Do it several times, with different accounts. 2a. For each account that went to -10x, explain that your account has no more money -- so sorry :-(. 2b. For each account that went to 10x, run laughing to the bank. 3. Rinse and repeat.
If you have like 10K in each account, consolidate it today. If you have like 500K+ on each, don't touch it.