If this margin requirement is true, you do understand that they are running a business and are interested in protecting themselves--correct?
Do you use full margin? Or... if they would only require 1k margin... would you increase your sizing to 10x? Because the fact is that a lot of the people looking for low margin reqs will just do that and eventually there will be an incident where the broker will land itself into a pile of shit... Since IB caters for the people who are not too worried about the margin reqs, and are probably with IB because want a more stable brokerage... they will do just that... look after their own ass. Which means I'm happy to trade through them, since they are more risk-averse... and I'm not exposed to idiots trading on 100x margin.
I have seen futures on equities (FTI - AEX index) where at one moment in time the market had dried up... there where no offers in the book. Which meant that you couldn't get a fill on your buy order... so you would definitely not make that $1.5k risk, but blow over it. So you might not have had a problem getting filled (yet) but it can most definitely happen.
? Do you trade with low margin requirements at almost all-in/full capacity? If so... I'm happy with the statement I made where you would fit that description.
IB margin requirement is relatively high. Interestingly, despite its high margin requirement, and is unattractive trading platform and its slow speed of response, it has survive for many decades. Anyway, I don't use IB as my primary brokers.
It survived because IMO it is really the best broker for retail, period. They are way ahead of the curve compared to the competition. Some brokers are catching up, but so far IB still leads. Superior technology platform. Even had 2 factor authentication back in the days when other brokers just had a simple web login and trading tool. They have desktop and mobile trading apps when other brokers are only starting to get into that game. They have superior market access. Global access in fact. You can trade stock, options, futures, FOP, etc - of products around major world markets. This is seriously game changing. No other retail broker as of yet has this. Where else can you hold stocks, stock options, CME futures all under one roof? And then go trade the Hang Seng/Nikkei at night on that same account? Maybe you're bullish Lloyd's Bank in the UK, so you can go buy LLOY direct on the LSE instead of LYG on the NYSE as an ADR. They're like a prime broker for retail. Superior commissions pricing (although they are getting expensive quick) for trades, particularly options commissions. Great margin loan rates. Everything about IB is market leading. I'm not aware of any other competing broker even close to what IB offers.
The notional value of one YM contract is currently a tad over $120,000. How could anyone possibly be bitching that they need to put up less than 8% of the notional value ($9,000) to hold that position? Isn't more than 12x leverage enough? I'd say if that isn't enough leverage for you, you are under-capitalized.