If your stop is so close that a small firm like IB can trigger it at will, then your position wasn't a good one in the first place.
Quote from BlueStreek:
The CME document shows that during the sell-off and subsequent rally, other active traders in e-minis included Jump Trading, Goldman Sachs [GS 143.23 -1.42 (-0.98%) ], Interactive Brokers, JPMorgan Chase [JPM 39.89 -0.92 (-2.25%) ] and Citadel Group.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/37151476
Is there anyway IB trades against its own clients like GS? Any thoughts
Quote from BlueStreek:
The problem I am worried about is an inherent conflict of interest, if IB engages in a heavy dose of trading their own capital, and they know that a large percentage of their clients portfolio is leaning one way, and they can run a bunch of client stops just because they see an easy opportunity, this is not what I want in a broker.
I want a broker to represent my interests first and foremost, I want their primary business to be in providing best in class access to markets, with platform tools to trade these markets.
If I wanted a firm that specializes in trading, I could open an account with GS, JPM.
I expect GS to potentially trade against me, but they don`t have access to wether I am heavily levered up in a position, and could be easily shaken out by an "artificial market move".
The crux of the issue is whether there is a "chinese wall" between any proprietary trading ib may participate in, and their own clients position data.
timber hill was one of the forerunneers in developing the computerized option models that would take all option trades that were pennies over or under valued and hedge everything back to 0,if IB is running a few 100 million or over a billion in traders sum positions,not to mention there own positions,they would be foolish not to have a hedging dept just to minimize there risk if shit hits the fan,if they didn't,you might find it hard to close your acct and collect your cash,should a black monday event wipe out several,maybe hundreds of accounts,first options corp had one trader blow out for 50 million in 87,50 million debit on a 3 million dollar llc accct, they had to eat itQuote from Specterx:
I know that IB (through Timber Hill) makes markets in various options, but for them to be doing huge volumes in the Eminis is a bit more of a surprise. That is, unless the trades referenced in the article were client trades attributed by the author to IB itself.
As a client, it'd certainly be a concern if IB or its subsidiaries are engaging in substantial speculative prop trading activity, especially given the schizo market that seems to only be getting worse. IB's competitive advantage IMO rests on a) diversity of markets accessible from one account/platform, and b) reputation for risk management. This potentially calls the second bit into question.