Did I read this right?

[taojaxx]

Was dabbling into going long 1 (all of them 1) BTC Futures at Interactive brokers and the margin requirement is $115,294? That's over 300% for a long position? Where I can only lose 100%
Beats me. No wonder volume is low...
What am I missing here?

 

[Robert Morse]

BTC, last trade is $36,770. The value of 5 coins is 36770*5= $183,850. Each BTC is for 5 Bitcoins.

 

[TimtheEnchanter]

Then why would anyone trade futures instead of just trade BTC...where you can short it too.

 

[RedDuke]

Then why would anyone trade futures instead of just trade BTC...where you can short it too.

Good question and that is why volume is almost non existant. Same for ether futures.

 

[Ninja Mobile Trader VPS]

Was dabbling into going long 1 (all of them 1) BTC Futures at Interactive brokers and the margin requirement is $115,294? That's over 300% for a long position? Where I can only lose 100%
Beats me. No wonder volume is low...
What am I missing here?

Try the micro BTC contract for lower margin requirement. Higher volume than bitcoin futures, but low volume generally speaking.

 

[SunTrader]

Think something is wrong there. TradeStation is $73,227 for big (5 coin) contract and $1463 for the micro (which is 1/10th size of 1 coin)

 

[MrMuppet]

Was dabbling into going long 1 (all of them 1) BTC Futures at Interactive brokers and the margin requirement is $115,294? That's over 300% for a long position? Where I can only lose 100%
Beats me. No wonder volume is low...
What am I missing here?

If you really want to get your feet wet in crypto, go buy some coin for 50$ with a credit card and trade on crypto native exchanges. CME and Bakkt are a dumpster fire

 

[maxinger]

Was dabbling into going long 1 (all of them 1) BTC Futures at Interactive brokers and the margin requirement is $115,294? That's over 300% for a long position? Where I can only lose 100%
Beats me. No wonder volume is low...
What am I missing here?

even the micro BTC futures volume is not fantastic.

look at micro BTC futures bid - offer spread.
it can be 10 to 30 ticks wide.

other more liquid futures bid offer spread is around
1 to 2 ticks wide.

perhaps time for CME to make the micro BTC tick size coarser.
if the tick size is made coarser by 10 times,
then micro BTC futures bid offer spread will improve
drastically to 1 to 3 ticks wide.

 

[RedDuke]

If you really want to get your feet wet in crypto, go buy some coin for 50$ with a credit card and trade on crypto native exchanges. CME and Bakkt are a dumpster fire

it is a matter of trust. For example, I would not put our client money on crypto native exchange. We are algo shop and volatility is great on crypto, but CME volume is anemic.

$50-few K for fun is no big deal of
Course but why even bother???

 

[taojaxx]

BTC, last trade is $36,770. The value of 5 coins is 36770*5= $183,850. Each BTC is for 5 Bitcoins.

Gotcha! I really was missing something lol
Will try the micro one.