Sure there are. Anything over CDIC and FDIC limits. ~100K, per account. Everything over is vulnerable.
The greater fool article was pure speculation on the intent of the budget statement and had zero value as such. This later article at least gets it from the horse's mouth.
There is a huge difference between a portion of your account being uninsured -- something you understand in advance -- and it being commandeered.
Uninsured deposits can be "commandeered" by the insolvent bank. Iow, a rapid conversion of "liabilities" into stock. That's what canada passed into law. Eu and us, same. Perhaps I'm confused?
Can't speak for others but if my choice is losing outright a portion of my uninsured deposit or receiving stock in that (Canadian) bank, I'd take the stock. Now if it were a deadbeat Cyprus or Iceland bank that would be a different matter, but then the money would be gone anyway, so Hobson's choice really.
Bureaucrats didn't commander or raid anything - if it was not for their actions, the bust Cyprus banks would have gone belly up and all depositors would have lost 100% of their account deposits. If you put money in an institution that goes bust, then you will lose money unless it's covered by a government insurance scheme in the country of jurisdiction. That isn't raping, it's getting what you deserve for investing funds into a place that goes bust. Depositor emptor, so do your homework and be careful where you hold funds. Just like Cyprus was obviously a moronic place to hold money, several years after Greek bonds had suffered a catastrophic collapse; so Hong Kong would be a bad place to be invested if Chinese bonds had a huge bear market and HK banks were up to their eyeballs in them. It's just common sense.
If you can cover longshots for minimal time and expense, why not do so? For example I have a bank account with the UK government, and in times of financial crises I put my spare cash there. The risk of default is hundreds of times lower than the risk of a private bank failing, yet there is no extra charge for this massive boost to security, just a slight loss of convenience via slow and stodgy (but reliable) customer service. Similarly, brokerage accounts should only have enough needed for margin trading, the rest should be at more secure institutions such as retail banks. If you can cover a rare but disastrous risk for peanuts, you should always do so. I agree the OP has a distorted sense of risk. The risk of IB going bust overnight due to a rogue trader is far higher than the risk of the US haircutting accounts held in Hong Kong. Hell, the risk of OP blowing out due to stupid trading, or dying in a car accident, is probably far higher than the scenarios he is worried about. Yet I would wager 5:1 that he does not take advanced driving training every year or two, and that his trading methodology doesn't pay enough attention to risk control.
If they are deposits then they are not commandeered - you already lent them. Commandeering is when someone takes your funds by force - not when you voluntarily hand them over and then can't get them back because your debtor is insolvent. Bad debts being turned into equity is what happens in bankruptcy situations all the time. The equity holders get wiped out, and the creditors get their fair share of the carcass of the insolvent entity. Nothing new here, run along.
although not the topic of this thread, you also need to worry about a wealth tax. BCG and others say is coming. Then there is no escape if you are in the system. The only thing safe would be cash and gold in your hands. As far as bank and brokerage deposit confiscation I would say keep only what you need in futures brokers to trade, use high leverage. If you don't have much money, you can keep it in one of the TBTF banks. If you have a lot, you need to open an account with treasurydirect.gov and keep it there. What I don't know is what to do if you are a large stock trader then what do you do? You can't really get the leverage you want and your money is at risk in stock brokerages. I suppose you could direct register your stocks with the company's treasury and only trade them long term, of course that doesn't let you short. Other than that, I don't know.
nature and economics willl exact a wealth tax some of us just want to use government to speed it up a little bit it's going to be one hell of a fight