Interactive Brokers Portfolio Margin

Tell me some of the equities that you want to trade and I will put a fake order and see how much margin it needs and then I will let you know.

 

Here are the results:

For index ETFs like SPY, IWM, you will need 9% and for general stocks like AAPL and INTC, you will need 30%

 

Ok cool, I plan on mostly buying preferreds. So here is a list of 10 random ones.

DFS PRB

UBP PRF

CBL PRE

RF PRA

RSO PRB

MITT PRB

AMTG PRA

ELC PRC

NLY PRD

HTS PRA

Really appreciate the help. Thanks.

 

All of them consistantly need 30% (29.1%) except UBP which needs 40%.

 

Thanks for the help, that clears it up. Appreciate everything you did. Do you ever notice the PM changes if they occur though, I guess only concern is then whether or not requirements could change from 30% to lets say 40% overnight. That would be a nightmare.

 

I almost trade options and I use margin up to my ears and usually on Thursdays and Fridays I see big change in margin and I get margin call. I handle the case by selling some more options which brings me more cash and then setting the positions (mostly profitable ones ) to get liquidated first by IB.
Now my advice to you is when you change from Reg T to Portfolio margin, go sllow the first few weeks and don't use up all your margin and then see how your margin changes as it goes and then when you get more confident, you can use more margin. Honestly if you are going to trade long stocks, I don't believe you will see much changes in the margin.Not like from 30% to 40%. Maybe 2% max.

 

Hajimow, did you cover your YHOO short yet? How has portfolio margin treated your 49,000 shares short? I hope you got out, I agree Yahoo should have no reason to rise but it's been on a quiet rally since you shorted last month.