Having been established in 1987, Interactive Brokers has become one of the largest and most-established brokerage firms in the United States. Its long illustrious history of financial service can be owed partly to the provision of revolutionary trading tools and features. Its membership with multiple regulatory bodies can also be accounted for its tight market traction.
To date, it is known to service both institutional investors and retail traders across the world. While it has established itself as a reliable broker, it still seeks to better its clients’ trading experience by constantly integrating cutting edge technologies, products, learning materials, and other financial solutions into its platform. What may be the only setback are its advanced features that made it intimidating for novice traders. But even if this comes as a disadvantage, its trading conditions for professional traders remain unparalleled.
Advantages
Interactive Brokers has a long list of advantages that place its brand ahead of its competitors. Apart from its direct market access, it houses almost all premium features present in the market, and below are some of the most commendable.
- Interactive Brokers’ platform was engineered to carry out the smartest order execution. With the use of its automated routers, real-time recalibration is observed to maintain seamless trading condition. More so, this structure improves pricing rate and determines any tradable rebate.
- The broker inarguably stands as the most generous in terms of financial instruments. Its expansionary measures greatly led to its wide selection of assets, and just recently, it added a set dedicated for fixed income.
- For those in search of pocket-friendly exchange-traded funds, the platform’s mutual fund replicator produces automated results of expensive mutual funds’ cheaper counterpart. This greatly helps those with restricted budget, and those that are still new in trading. But for those who want to engage in highly-valued funds, they may select from the platform’s selection of more than 10,000 mutual funds.
Disadvantages
Similar to other brokerage firms, Interactive Brokers has its own set of disadvantages. Apart from its expertise-specific platform, below are other setbacks that may compromise its clients’ overall trading experience.
- Far from other brokers’ multiple screen streaming, Interactive Brokers does not support simultaneous screen sharing and trading. Once the system detects another account login, the one currently logged in would automatically be closed.
- While its router is heavily commended for allowing an optimal interface, it puts emphasis on payment-for-order structure, which is not properly disclosed to its clients. With this, clients are prohibited from utilizing the mobile version or any other APIs that link the account to the platform’s proprietary engine.
- Lastly, there are instances that accounts are subjected to mounting fees if they happen to be inactive for a long time. What is more daunting about this is it is not payable by cash unless, of course, the account has preloaded funds.
Interactive Brokers’ Salient Features
Interactive Brokers houses the most powerful functions and features. Checking its interface, it is impressive to see that the Portal presents everything comprehensively; from in-house bots to automated assistant, almost all can be found intact and well- organized.
As for its flagship feature, the so-called WorkStation extensively provides the most convenient setups. From customization to data management, “For You” section completely projects all the links that redirects clients to their archive and trading history. It was also engineered in a way that profitability meets excitement. To say, its interface may be customized in a manner that is very much like completing jigsaw puzzles. With the system’s innate creativity, clients will surely get a breath of fresh air.
All these are wrapped into mobile version, allowing clients to enjoy the same level of desktop experience through smartphones. This then enables transparent network sharing, with watchlists and trade reflected on desktop and web counterparts. This is heavily reinforced by additional learning instruments such as real-time news updates, which are very much essential for decision making.
Get Involved
True enough, Interactive Brokers is restless in providing a convenient and hassle-free trading environment. Its technology, for one, remains to be a solid aspect that other brokerage firms have yet to achieve. Add to that is its generous asset selection, that surely enhances one’s margin of profitability. While the broker has its own disadvantages, these are well compensated by its overall reliability, making it one of the best trading platforms in the market.