6:1 margin for overnight stock positions at InteractiveBrokers

Do you want IB to allow portfolio margin for accounts <100,000$

  • Yes

    Votes: 77 58.8%

  • No

    Votes: 54 41.2%
  • Total voters
    131
Quote from Cre8UrF8:

Does Portfolio Margin work with a stock against a stock (not options)? For example, if I have 1,000 shares of KO long and 1,000 shares of PEP short, do I get 6:1 leverage under portfolio Margin or only Reg-T 2:1 overnight?
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Yes. You can get maybe even more than 6:1 leverage (stock, overnight) if you structure the trade/trades right.

You don't even have to pair trade to be able to use that kind of leverage. I have only long positions in my account and I am able to use more than 5:1 overnight leverage.
 
It is impossible to cover long stocks with short but PM will be lower then reg T if you have a well balanced multiple stock portfolio. Forget about it if you have only 2-3 stocks on the account.
 
Why is that? 2 strongly correlated stocks, 1 long & 1 short, should bring down the margin commitment almost to 0. Example: long SPX, short SPY, the margin should be near 0.
 
Slightly different question -- does anyone have experience as to how long it takes PM to be approved? It said a few business days, but i's been ~10 calendar days for me, but I don't want to bother CS w/o giving processes 2 full wks (and probably wait until after Memorial Day) unless others experience a 2-3 day turnaround suggesting something is amiss!
 
So portfolio margining treats everything as a futures contract with a span type margining?? I am going to have to read up on this and switch over.

What about Forex trades? Difference in margining?
 
It is a bit different than SPAN but idea is the same. Forex is not involved. PM affects only US stocks, options, and SSFs.
 
Quote from rayl:

Slightly different question -- does anyone have experience as to how long it takes PM to be approved? It said a few business days, but i's been ~10 calendar days for me, but I don't want to bother CS w/o giving processes 2 full wks (and probably wait until after Memorial Day) unless others experience a 2-3 day turnaround suggesting something is amiss!
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Mine took 2 or 3 days to get approved...

But that was almost immediately after they introduced it, maybe they have more applications now so it takes longer...
 
Quote from ids:

It is impossible to cover long stocks with short but PM will be lower then reg T if you have a well balanced multiple stock portfolio. Forget about it if you have only 2-3 stocks on the account.
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I tried the TWS Protfolio Margin Demo. I put on 8 stocks 4 long and 4 short. I divided the "Initial Margin" number by the "Securites GPV" number and it came out to 15%. So I was getting 6:1 leverage on my 8 stocks, correct? Did I use the right numbers to figure that out?
 
Quote from Cre8UrF8:

I tried the TWS portfolio Margin Demo. I put on 8 stocks 4 long and 4 short. I divided the "Initial Margin" number by the "securities GPV" number and it came out to 15%. So I was getting 6:1 leverage on my 8 stocks, correct? Did I use the right numbers to figure that out?
More...

I use Excess Liquidity/Initial Margin*Leverage to get the max leverage I can use under current investing(stockpicking) rules.

Also, the higher current leverage is the better estimate you get...
 
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