Haircut on holding Canadian government bills

Discussion in 'Interactive Brokers' started by GRULSTMRNN, Nov 5, 2019.

  1. Does anyone know what the haircut is to hold Canadian government bills in IBKR Pro?

    I am contemplating to change my IB base currency from USD to CAD and to shift a vast amount of my idle cash from US T-bills into Canadian government bills. No problem so far. The only question I have is whether the entire notional amount paid for the Canadian bills is consuming available funds or is there a haircut such as with USD t-bills? When I hold USD T-bills IB only applies a 1% haircut, meaning I can use 99% of the t-bill notional value as available funds for trading in other instruments. Does anyone know what the haircut is for CAD government bills given my account base currency is CAD and all my funds are converted to CAD before buying the CAD t-bills?

    Thanks
     
  2. I don't, but one quick way I use to answer this question myself is to buy a nominal amount of a security and see what the haircut is. This gives you an answer T+1 which is usually quicker than IB customer service.

    GAT
     
  3. Thanks but that does not help much as the precise haircut is hardly seen for small positions. Also I want to know before I undergo the process of changing my base account currency and convert all current non CAD cash