it's probably work and worth,if you have 1 account, or you you are long term trader,making few trades a month/week,but imagine yourself with this situation-you trade multiple systems intraday,fully automated,partially-whatever.but you using bunch of sub accounts or your capital spread across small multiple accounts(there is plenty of benefits to have them in IB, unstead of one big). now imagine yourself in morning or on middle of the day, after disconnection OR TWS quotes freezes(which happends) and your hands full of those devices. wtf you going to do with them? which one goes where? how long it will take for you to login into all accounts?
another thing-STP participation rules are still not clear to me-
http://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/accounts/secureTransactionProgram.php?ib_entity=llc
on top it says-
Individuals All individuals will receive a secure device. There are three variations of the device which will be explained to customers during the subscription process.
Registering for the Program
Customers with greater than $100,000 (or USD equivalent) in equity will be able to log into Account Management and see a Secure Transaction Program menu item which must be selected in order to register.
that mean to me -only 100K and greater accounts will have this option. there is no single word about accounts under 100K subscription proccess.
personally-i never recieve any email from IB about mandatory subscription for STP.
IB does NOT cover you for fraud, and now that they are issuing secure devices, it's purely your own fault if you don't have one.
where can i read more about that?
and what about SIPC protection?
http://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/accounts/accountProtection.php
http://www.nasd.com/InvestorInformation/InvestorProtection/SIPCProtection/index.htm
Unauthorized Trading
SIPC's coverage also includes protection against unauthorized trading in customersâ securities accounts. This coverage can include unauthorized trading by persons associated with the introducing firm and may be available even if the clearing firm is still solvent.
this one pretty clear to me.