Problem with Interactive Brokers and PDT Rule

K

kroon1ke

Hello,
IB divides your universal account into three (see attached picture):
  1. IB Securities Account (governed by rules of SEC)
  2. IB Commodities Account (governed by rules of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission - CFTC)
  3. IB Regulated Account (no clue how it works)
If you account falls under PTD (pattern day trader) Rule you need to have $25 000 on your IB Securities account to open new positions/trade. Today I made a short trade in european VSTOXX futures and now part of my money is stuck on IB Regulated Account. Now I cannot open new positions since my IB securities account has less than $25k, although I do not have any futures/opttions positions open on US/non-US markets.
I chatted for two hours with support and it seems that no one there has a clue how IB Regulated Account works, and how to transfer money from there.

I tried doing internal transfer from my "F" account to my Non-"F" account, it didn't help.
I also have excess funds sweep turned on (it automatically transfers money from futures/commodities account into securities account) it doesn't help as well.
 

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This is correct. Futures trades cannot be in a securities account and money for margin and positions must be in a seg account. If you add funds to a reg-T account today, you don't get that buying power until tomorrow.
 
kroon1ke said:
Hello,
IB divides your universal account into three (see attached picture):
  1. IB Securities Account (governed by rules of SEC)
  2. IB Commodities Account (governed by rules of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission - CFTC)
  3. IB Regulated Account (no clue how it works)
If you account falls under PTD (pattern day trader) Rule you need to have $25 000 on your IB Securities account to open new positions/trade. Today I made a short trade in european VSTOXX futures and now part of my money is stuck on IB Regulated Account. Now I cannot open new positions since my IB securities account has less than $25k, although I do not have any futures/opttions positions open on US/non-US markets.
I chatted for two hours with support and it seems that no one there has a clue how IB Regulated Account works, and how to transfer money from there.

I tried doing internal transfer from my "F" account to my Non-"F" account, it didn't help.
I also have excess funds sweep turned on (it automatically transfers money from futures/commodities account into securities account) it doesn't help as well.
More...
Why does it show a margin requirement in your IB Securities Account if the only open trade you have is a futures position in VSTOXX? And no margin showed in your Futures account? BTW, if you haven't already done it you can ask them nicely once to excuse your PDT designation and they'll do it, assuming you're not actually daytrading.
 
Sig said:
Why does it show a margin requirement in your IB Securities Account if the only open trade you have is a futures position in VSTOXX? And no margin showed in your Futures account? BTW, if you haven't already done it you can ask them nicely once to excuse your PDT designation and they'll do it, assuming you're not actually daytrading.
More...

All my futures positions are closed atm. I have some open positions in securities, which leads to margin requirement in Securities Account. The problem is that part of my balance is stuck on "IB UK Regulated account" and I have no clue what it means and how to transfer money from there to my Securities Account.

You are right I am not a day-trader, however, there are occasions where I would like to execute several trades in one day.
 
kroon1ke said:
All my futures positions are closed atm. I have some open positions in securities, which leads to margin requirement in Securities Account. The problem is that part of my balance is stuck on "IB UK Regulated account" and I have no clue what it means and how to transfer money from there to my Securities Account.

You are right I am not a day-trader, however, there are occasions where I would like to execute several trades in one day.
More...
Could it be that the money hasn't cleared from your futures trade yet? When did you close the futures position?
 
I would try asking for a PDT reset.

FINRA has provided brokerage firms the ability to remove the PDT flag from a customer's account once every 180 days. If an account was erroneously flagged, and the customer's intent is not to day trade in his/her account, we have the ability to remove this flag. Once the PDT flag is removed, the customer will then be allowed three day trades every five business days. If an account gets re-flagged as a PDT account within 180 days after the reset, the customer then has the following options:

  1. Deposit funds to bring the account's equity up to the SEC required minimum of $25,000
  2. Wait the required 90 day period before any new positions can be initiated
 
Sig said:
Could it be that the money hasn't cleared from your futures trade yet? When did you close the futures position?
More...
As it turned out this was the case. IB also uses a separate balance (IBUK Regulated) for positions in european CFDs, futures, etc.
 
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