Ib

[NATHAN LLOYD]

My first day on IB, and it will not let me trade anymore. I made 8 trades today. When I try to transmit an order, it will not let me. It says something about being a potential day trader.

[KJ]

yea, you need $25,000 in equity if you get labeled as a pattern day trader...

[NATHAN LLOYD]

I guess I'll be watching for 5 days now, as oil shoots up. :(

[roehrigs01]

yep.. they did the same thing to me 2 weeks back..I had to sit out 5 days... just gotta make sure you don't make too many day trades...

[madcowdisease]

I guess I'll be watching for 5 days now, as oil shoots up. :(

Ouch, that's no good. You can live vicariously through me :)

[Bman409]

yep.. they did the same thing to me 2 weeks back..I had to sit out 5 days... just gotta make sure you don't make too many day trades...

Same thing happened to me when I first started at IB.


There are a couple ways to deal with the rule. (BTW, its an SEC rule, not an "Interactive Brokers" rule)


The easiest thing to do is open your positions late in the day, and hold them overnight.. or open them right at the close

then the next day, you can sell them (or cover shorts) and its not a day trade.


The other thing I did was enable my account to trade on the Canadian Exchanges.

That way, there is no day trade rule... you can day trade all you want.. as they aren't regulated by the SEC

Bman

[madcowdisease]

The other thing I did was enable my account to trade on the Canadian Exchanges.

That way, there is no day trade rule... you can day trade all you want.. as they aren't regulated by the SEC

Bman

That's a great idea as some of the stocks I'm most interested in trade on the Toronto Exchange. I'm go ahead and presume there is an additional fee involved in doing this? I don't know who you had before IB but do you know if Scottrade has a similar feature?

[Bman409]

That's a great idea as some of the stocks I'm most interested in trade on the Toronto Exchange. I'm go ahead and presume there is an additional fee involved in doing this? I don't know who you had before IB but do you know if Scottrade has a similar feature?


Yeah, you have to pay an extra $10/month I think to get the real time data from the Toronto Exchange (which allows you to place orders)


I used to use Power Etrade and they didn't offer trading on the other exchanges. I don't know about Scottrade

[madcowdisease]

Yeah, you have to pay an extra $10/month I think to get the real time data from the Toronto Exchange (which allows you to place orders)


I used to use Power Etrade and they didn't offer trading on the other exchanges. I don't know about Scottrade

Hmm... I don't know if it's worth it then. I don't have a huge account and don't know if I can justify $120/yr for the priveledge of tading on the TSX. Thanks for the knowledge that the opportunity exists.

[NATHAN LLOYD]

Bman,

I heard in IB chat that I could trade futures as much as I want. I'm not even sure what that means. I guess it has something to do with trading commodities. If it's a complitated concept, don't try to explain. I'll have to research this. However, do you know if it costs more to trade futures with IB?

Another question: I have noticed that it seems that candles give you the same information as bars--except for candles being easier to read quickly. Is this correct?

BTW: Oil is going up, as I predicted.

[NATHAN LLOYD]

I read about them...and I'm not about to start doing that.

[NATHAN LLOYD]

looks to be going down a little today.

[Luc1Grunt]

Nate, on candles. They do offer some trend change signals that are helpful. If you switch from OHLC to candles, you will see the trends over time and eventually pick up some of the patterns there as well. I use candles as "slight confirmation" only, but I know traders who use them as their main indicators. Americanbulls.com has a good glossary of candle patters. If I am questioning my own indicators and hesistant to pull the trigger on a stock, I pop into americanbulls and run the screen. If their pattern shows a strong "sell if", I wait. That has proven to save me some $$$ over time, but I do not use their recommendations stricly by themselves. Happy trading, Luc 8)