Can you also prove what you say? FYI: I've last Fri proved here even with screenshots that it is possible. IB's margin calc engine is dynamic and realtime. I even think that the calculator makes use of the Black-Scholes formula (spot, t, IV, etc.) for its calculation, ie. the less time left till expiration the fewer the margin requirement becomes (ie. it gets dynamically updated, here reduced)... For example after market close on Friday the margin requirement was about 12k (cf. screenshot of then), and currently it is only about 10.8k. There were no new trades since then (see also "Realized PnL=0"): The previous screenshot (of Friday) is here: https://www.elitetrader.com/et/thre...east-30-per-month.301450/page-35#post-4313889
@optioncoach, stop lying! Because this is live trading since Friday! The above screenshot is from live trading! Paper accounts have a 1M funding, not 10k...
One shortcoming of TWS' OptionTrader is that the "Check Margin" button (or the context menu item) works only if the order has not been submitted yet. After submitting the limit order into the orderbook (ie. a not yet filled short-sell limit order), unfortunately it no more shows the margin impact at all; it just shows the credit. I think this could be improved...
Hitting the bid with a sell order will mean you get a partial fill and the rest moves away from you, or it moves away just as you enter the order. If everyone would get paper-trading quality fills, it would be easy. I think fills are much better at IB than with other brokers but far from ideal.
The margin requirement is IMO inconsistent, example: MR for 1 contract is $91 MR for 2 of the above contracts somehow is a whoppy $433
Nothing will happen, as I will be able to fullfil the margin requirement. What do you think will happen? Update: I now even did a trade just to test this out, and it worked as expected by me! And here's the screenshot. Compare this to the previous screenshot of today: the total credit increased by about $65 (it was just 1 contract): Ie. $14044 vs now $14107 https://www.elitetrader.com/et/thre...east-30-per-month.301450/page-39#post-4314711 I even have about $3559 available for trading... but I need to have a cash-cushion b/c of the realtime dynamic nature of the margin requirement for the open positions...