Hello, I'm planning to open an account at Interactive Brokers but I have a few questions about how they operate. 1. Does IB have options approval levels like Etrade for example? 2. Does IB require a minimum net worth/minimum income, etc... any qualifications for trading futures? Thank you in advance for any responses.
err this is wrong. You have to state your income and approx. net worth but not provide "proof" and I don't know whether they actually make use of this info, though presumably there's a cut-off for granting somebody a margin account. In order to trade different types of instruments (futures, options, bonds etc.) you basically need to check a box that says "I'm an experienced stocks/bonds/futs trader." With a cash (ie non-margin) account I believe you can only buy (not short) stocks and bonds, no futures, and your stock trades are subject to the free-riding rule. Don't know about options.
I'm curious about the options part because at a typical "retail" broker they divide up options strategies into various approval levels with the lower levels needing only a cash account while the higher levels needing margin.