Why would you prefer one over the other? Here, try this... On the same day... In sim account A, open a 1 contract position and watch it. In sim account B, open a 10 contract position and watch it. When comparing the two... You'll prefer B when the trade works. You'll prefer A when it doesn't. And if you go by the standard statistics everyone touts about failure rates, you will prefer A in both cases because B can go too wrong, too fast. If you want the specifics about what IB really requires you should call them and ask, because I am sure somewhere on their website it says that requirements are subject to change at any time and the website may not be current.
Having a 5-k account is fine as long as you know what your doing and stay within your financial boundaries . But to get to that level of experience, is a road fraught with many additional deposits. Over leverage is cool and exciting until you encounter the deer in headlights syndrome and your account is all gone.
Personally, I find the IB margins a tad too high for futures. When the ES/S&P500 was 2000 points lower, their day trading margins were more appropriate.
Hi Jcabsa, You are correct that IB intraday margin is ~$4000 while other brokers like NT (and AMP, among others) offer $500 intraday margin. You'd have to ask IB why their intraday (and overnight) margin is so high. I guess that they want to reduce the leverage available to clients in order to reduce risk to the company.
I agree with your points about the crazy leverage usage, like Margin SPot FX but bit confused about this "Companies offering leverage of 1000:1 aren't brokers: they're counterparty market-makers pretending to be brokers" This is true in case of FX but are you saying that it is also true in case of Futures brokers? these are mainly Introductory Futures brokers ( background is a large FCM) on Futures business is it not true that everything is straight through to the Exchange ! if it is then how can the Futures broker be a market maker matching trading internally + taking counter party position! Dont they simple act as pure broker just passing all trades to true exchange? Yes sure internally they might have a Prop trading arm but all the trades still have to go to the exchnage so no funny business like FXCM USA
Nooooooooooo - apologies for any ambiguity (I hadn't realised): I was talking only about spot forex "brokers" there (as I was talking to someone who's obviously a spot forex trader and doesn't quite understand what a broker is)! (Futures brokers certainly aren't giving 1,000:1 leverage.)
IB is not for newbies with $500 or 5k accounts. IB's customers understand that their own account is in peril if some cowboy starts trading size with $500 margin. If you get enough of them, they can blow out an FCM.
Is there no middle ground between IB's IMO high intraday leverage and $500 intraday margins? FWIW, I went to AMP instead of IB due to the intraday margins. I used IB in the past when their intraday margin for ES was considerably lower (the ES was priced a lot lower also). 15 minutes prior to the close their overnight margins (which are really high) kick in as well, compared to 5 minutes prior to the close with many other brokers. I won't be utilizing $500 margins at AMP, but roughly $3000 initially and I also have the benefit of holding positions a bit longer than with IB. Yesterday is an example of a day where being able to hold beyond 1545 is of interest.
That's the beauty of competition. You can choose based on what's important to you. The vast majority of traders who want more margin than IB offers will not be around in a year.