You're probably correct. Since this doesn't concern banking but only retail and we know the EU is actively trying to kill retail trading outside of the EU. Sacrificing 9 or 10 thousand retail traders is nothing for the EU machinery.
If you're in Baltics why were you saying that "Personally, this is just an incentive to update my residency information.". Wouldn't you fall anyway in IBUK ?
I got in touch with IB today and was told that their legal/compliance department is working on a solution for EU investors to change their status from "retail" to "professional" on an opt-in basis (if qualified). Qualifying should take 2 out of the 3 criteria listed earlier in the thread. To quote IB, they are taking the issue "very seriously". I was not confirmed the Q3 anticipated completion time threshold, however. Business-wise, this is a disaster for active traders. This new regulation is the culmination of years of Statist doctrine. We are talking about 35% of trading income vanishing overnight in my case because of some clueless regulators trying to justify their paychecks by producing ever more cumbersome rules and norms for a market that they neither traded nor understood. It is all about increasing the size of an already bloated government under the false guise of "protecting [insert victimized group]". We know the drill. Same old sickening garbage. This mess, yet again, has nothing to do with protecting retail investors. Quite the contrary. Your alternative as a retail trader is in fact to trade EU proxies with horrendous liquidity, higher spreads, hefty costs, sometimes stamp duty on top of that, most of them un-optionable, unusable trading hours (if you trade the US session until the close), unfair USD currency conversion for some, and of course, a fraction of the variety of ETF/sectors/regions available in the US. Not to mention the fact that it will now be nearly impossible to diversify, decorrelate and reduce your overall portfolio risk into different asset-based ETFs. As I said, this is a disaster. But we all know what the true goal is... follow the money. I was already contemplating moving away from the EU within 18 months, but this for me is the last nail in the coffin. Hopefully IB can mend things soon to alleviate this until the next regulation perks up. Because let's face it, with the number of useless bureaucrats now needing to be fed, the way forward in the EU will be more regulation, not less... until the inevitable Soviet style collapse does happen, that is. By staying in this hell hole, you will have to accept to leave your business at the whims of these regulators' new inspiration, which is unacceptably risky. There are two types of people in this world. Those who want to be left alone, and those who simply won't leave you alone. Years of a people that did not consider itself as a responsible adult but rather as a helpless child led to this creeping 360-degree control we are living now, ready to accept every possible way to remove risk, all forms of it, from life in general. The consequence is singular: slavery. That is, unfortunately, what it all comes down to.
I have no idea but if the principle is to "protect" EU customers, if somehow IBUK will not be obliged by these regulations, all IBUK EU customers would have to be transferred to something like IB Germany or alike.
UK won't leave the EU until at least 2021. For long term investors like me, I found a loophole around this regulation. If you really have to own SPY, Buy deep ITM call option close to expiry and exercise it immediately. IB has no choice but to deliver the shares.
I was informed by IB that they would auto-liquidate that position rather than give you the shares. Have you confirmed this ?
Not sure if they don't auto liquidate it. But even if it's not the case, DITM options, close to expiration, are horribly priced (too large spread).