I'd add a number 4. During the negative crude oil prices when the company's software quoted prices wrong to retail traders he made traders who suffered from this whole. I think it shows Peterffy's integrity.
Risk of client like Bill Hwang blowing up IBKR
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Key word there - integrity. That's all anyone wants from a broker (alongside financial stability/resources).
All of the stocks that Bill Hwang had in his portfolio were all extremely liquid stocks that trade on major exchanges with very good daily volume and good bid/ask spread. So by this criteria, IB would still take this "factor" into account when assessing how much margin to extend. I am not disputing that IB has active management practices in place but I have observed differences in lending practices extended to different sizes of accounts at IB perhaps according to these "factors" that you have mentioned. That you cannot deny. And in light of Bill Hwang's extreme wealth and taking into account of other "factors", I can speculate that IB would be lot more lenient in extending margins if he had actually opened accounts with IB to trade his portfolios vs to any average joe's.
And on the other hand towards retail investors, IB does apply more stringent margin lending practices that are unnecessarily restrictive to the point of damaging the profitability of retail investors anywhere from forced liquidations of profitable positions that were well within the margin limit to restricted position size for CASH-covered puts that uses zero margins. I have experienced them all personally and have suffered profit losses due to these so called "risk management" margin lending practices when I have already exercised very prudent trading practices that always included at least near-delta-neutral hedging and limited trading size that never used full margin. So excuse me if I call out the hypocrisy and double-standard of IB's margin lending policy.
What was the leverage given to Bill Hwang? and compare it to the leverage that IB would have given him.
You have jumped to conclusions not based on any fact. IB offer portfolio margin if you apply and have cash or assets over $100,000. There is no information or evidence that anyone has been offered more than that or that it is even possible.
All this forced liquidation stories is what keeps me away from IB. I dont like adding an unknown counterparty risk I cannot hedge against when trading.
Didnt IB let some traders massively over leverage Crude oil lots because the price was almost zero and the IB computer thought prices couldn't go negative.
After that event im not sure i have the same level trust with IB risk management as i did before.
Human error is always the weak point, eg. programming the risk management systems incorrectly.
After that event im not sure i have the same level trust with IB risk management as i did before.
Human error is always the weak point, eg. programming the risk management systems incorrectly.
Do you think you can do better somewhere else? Then post it instead of useless complaining where the firm took care of traders affected
They still had to meet margin requirements.
Not just forced liquidation to meet margin requirements. I would understand if IB forced me to unload my positions because my capital couldn't cover my potential trading losses or if I was making losses but IB forced me to liquidate my positions when they were in PROFIT!! I was making money with my positions and I was hedged with the right proportion that rendered me near-delta-neutral so there was no "risk" to IB. And the reason that they gave was they ran a 30% extreme scenario stress test that with 30% adverse price change, my positions would be affecting my capital too much. And they refused to take into account my current profit and my hedging position saying that they only evaluate the principal position and principal position only regardless of any hedging endeavours.
I ended up losing $60K in potential profit due to having been forced to liquidate a portion of my positions. After this, I don't trade as much with IB anymore and I make sure everybody knows my story and be aware of IB's unscrupulousness and incompetence. IB doesn't have small traders' best interest in mind; they are just there to make $$, very much like Goldman Sachs only on a smaller scale. You want to still trade with IB, that's fine but just be aware they WILL screw you in one way or another, sooner or later and I am not the only trader that IB screwed over.