Do not invest more money than you can afford to lose.
US-based forex broker Interactive Brokers said on Monday its daily average revenue trades (DARTs) somewhat recovered to 651,000 in September 2016, after in the preceding month they fell to their lowest since the end of 2014. Last month’s figure represents an increase of 13% from the previous month and a slight decline of 2% from the same period a year earlier.
Annualized cleared DARTs also increased on the month to 413 per client account, compared to 370 in August.
Total client accounts continued to increase, reaching 370,400 in September 2016, the highest since the beginning of the year. This is slightly up by just 1% from August, but represents an increase of 15% year-on-year. The broker added 5,100 net new accounts last month, which was the second largest number for 2016 after August when such accounts were 100 more.
The account metrics are a little surprising, having in mind that as of 1 September the broker discontinued offering leveraged forex trading services to US retail clients with less than $10 million in deposited assets. It seems the move, which was the result of regulatory restrictions, does not affect sensible the Interactive Brokers’ operations.
The broker’s ending client credit balances stood at $42.0 billion in September, or up 1% from August and 20% from a year earlier. Ending client margin loan balances stood at $18.1 billion at the end of last month, posting a double-digit increase both over the month and on an annual basis of 11% and 15%.
More details about Interactive Brokers’ monthly metrics since the beginning of 2016 follow:
Traders with Interactive Brokers paid in September an average commission of $3.93 per cleared order, up from $3.77 in August. This includes exchange, clearing and regulatory fees, which for some instruments could reach up to 57% of the total commission. More data for the commissions the broker’s clients paid in September on the most popular trading instruments follows:
September 2016 | Average commission per cleared client order | Average order size |
Stocks | $2.16 | 1,829 shares |
Equity Options | $6.06 | 9 contracts |
Futures | $6.68 | 3.8 contracts |
The broker published for the first time data regarding client costs related to stock trading. The cost of execution and clearing of US stocks traded on exchanged within the National Market System (NMS) averaged last month 0.9 basis points of trade money as measured against a daily VWAP2 benchmark (0.4 basis point for the rolling twelve months).
Connecticut-based Interactive Brokers is a broker and a market maker. Through its numerous subsidiaries, the company offers online automated trading in stocks, options, futures, forex, bonds, contracts for difference (CFDs ) and funds. It serves traders, investors and institutions in over 100 market across the globe. The brokerage has offices in the North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. The group companies hold licenses by the relevant authorities in the US and the UK.
