IBKR -LOL

Zzzz1 said:
you make an awful lot of assumptions for someone who is even less well informed than I am on this particular topic.

"market making business was the main reason why they could keep their fees down & be profitable"

That is all pure speculation and not based on any facts or evidence. Just saying.
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I am no more speculative than you are, just making assumptions based on my personal experience.
 
xandman said:
They have the goofiest platform in the business requiring far too many mouse-clicks, data entry, and validation steps. I could go on all day about these crazy quirks. But, ranting is not worth the effort.

Thought I should share this with TWS users.
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More validation steps is a good thing, not bad IMO.
 
Zzzz1 said:
same old, same old, bitching. What is your alternative solution? Someone who offers options, stocks, fx, futures, and bonds on the same platform, and not just a front end but full market connectivity. Name one and we can talk. Platform nowadays is ROCK SOLID, data is stable during fast moving markets precisely because they disseminate snap shots, fees are pretty competitive, depending on what you trade and in what size. Support, ok I give that one to you but even there I have almost always gotten through to someone over the phone. It is not a hft solution for obvious reasons...
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Yeah.

I think IB's niche is that it offers access to so many financial products and many international markets too. Seriously, who offers this?

You can trade the S&P during the day and trade Hang Seng at night, then swtich over to FTSE in the a.m., before going back to S&P. You can trade 24/7 all around the world. You can trade stocks, futures, options, currencies, etc - all around the world. This is it's true advantage to a more sophisticated client.

Moreover, all of that buying power is consolidated and wrapped in the same account and not fragmented by having different specialty brokers with different requirements and just using the same front end software to access all the markets. Which means your P&L from your futures trading can be used to offset buying power in shares, options, etc.

It is a jack of all trades and that makes it attractive.
 
Baron said:
As I suspected, there's trouble in paradise. I guess those ads haven't been working too well:

Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. reported its fourth quarter and fiscal 2016 results on January 17, 2017. The electronic broker and market maker Q4 2016 earnings tumbled 72%, driven by a 29% drop in revenues, higher expenses as well as disappointing performance of its Market Making and Corporate segments.
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The drop looks like it mostly came from the market making side, not brokerage.

Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (NASDAQ GS: IBKR) an automated global electronic broker and market maker, today reported diluted earnings per share on a comprehensive basis of $1.19 for the year ended December 31, 2016, compared to diluted earnings per share on a comprehensive basis of $0.62 for 2015.

Excluding other comprehensive income, the Company reported diluted earnings per share of $1.25 for the year ended December 31, 2016, compared to diluted earnings per share of $0.78 for 2015.

Net revenues were $1,396 million and income before income taxes was $761 million for 2016, compared to net revenues of $1,189 million and income before income taxes of $458 million in 2015.

and December metrics:

Highlights for the month included:

 592 thousand Daily Average Revenue Trades (DARTs), 6% lower than prior year and 19% lower than prior month.

 Ending client equity of $85.5 billion, 27% higher than prior year and 1% higher than prior month.

 Ending client margin loan balances of $19.4 billion, 14% higher than prior year and 8% higher than prior month.

 Ending client credit balances of $41.5 billion, 13% higher than prior year and 1% lower than prior month.

 385 thousand client accounts, 16% higher than prior year and 1% higher than prior month.

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Hardly trouble in paradise.
 
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