Guy,  want to ask.  I went to tradestation website to open an account, somehow during registration,  it direct me to ibkr.  Now when I login ibkr and tradestation using same login,  is it correct?  So I am opening account with ibkr or tradestation and the fees/charges follow which platform?
Anyway the account still pending approval.

Guys, i wanted try transfer fund to IBKR from my standchart account, see can pass thru or not. i already created a bank wire deposit request in IBKR and have beneficiary and bank details. when i fill i standard chartered international transfer form via online banking, most of it fields input i can find from the info from IBKR, but not sure what to fill for below. need some advise on my 1st international transfer

ID / PASSPORT NO: (is it account number)
CHARGES: (3 options to select), 1) all local & oversea charges borne by applicant, 2) all local & oversea charges borne by beneficiary, 3) local charges borne by applicant, oversea charges borne by beneficiary

by the way, i saw the beneficiary is Interactive Brokers UK Limited, address is UK, but the bank is in new york, US, is this normal?

i was curious how you guys trade US stocks. do you buy USD at our bank rate and TT to IBKR then trade over there in USD then when you want to use money or take some profit only then you exchange your USD back to malaysia bank. if that's the case does the spot USD makes any difference while you trade over there at IBKR? assuming you don't convert back to MYR everytime you sell your US stocks.

Our local bank that offer US stocks don't have withdrawal fee, inactivity fee, monthly trading platform fee.

Thanks for highlighting this. If using instarem transfer fund to IBKR. how about later for withdrawal, how it works?
and let's say i transfer USD into IBKR, if i would like to buy Hong Kong stocks, how it works? do i need to convert to HKD?

cannot use instarem to move fund to IBKR.
IBKR doesn't accept fund from third party, generally speaking. IBKR needs to get the fund from you and your bank account. 
Instarem has your name, but they don't use your bank acc to transfer fund, so cannot.

for the second Q, yes.

eh, really? IBKR accepts EUR via Instarem?? 

wah... then I've to try it lo....

i see. i will go with this path then

remittance - instarem(MYR) -> SG CIMB FastSaver(SGD) -> IBKR (SGD) -> IBKR (convert USD/HKD)
withdraw - IBKR (convert SGD) -> IBKR(SGD) -> SG CIMB FastSaver(SGD) -> (MYR)To find out more

Malaysia banks i.e CIMB/MBB can buy US/HK/IND/THAI/SG stocks minimum brokerage is USD25 or 0.30%.(correction should be 0.40%) It is high if you use to scalp or day trade. No TT fees, No monthly charges or minimum trade requirement but price quotation is not live (it's delayed). You just buy USD to trade only 1 time conversion until you withdraw in ringgit. The downside is there is 0.5% spread not at spot. I think give and take charges should be neglible depending on your trading volume and strategy. What do you think? IBKR better or local bank better? How does Malaysian fund IBKR besides using your FAST method and TT?

USD1.50 per trade at any amount? if let say i buy USD100K one order still USD1.50??

does IBKR combine same day order and charge USD1.50 or treat as seperate order?? i.e USD1.50 x 5 order same day??

CIMB don't combine same day order so USD25 x 5 order = USD125 brokerage (ouch!) 

if you trade USD6,500 on every order brokerage at 0.40% is still ok qua....i think (if below maybe not worth it)

US Stocks, ETFs, ETPs and Warrants
USD 0.007 per Share
Minimum Per Order
USD 1.5

US Stocks, ETFs, ETPs and Warrants
USD 0.007 per Share
Minimum Per Order
USD 1.5

@Ramjade does that means if i buy 5,000 shares of $2.00 stocks my brokerage/commission will be $35.00?? if thats the case the rate is more or less 0.35% of value. Which i think is not much difference compare to CIMB rate 0.40%

When you exchange RM to your foreign currency. Check again of your broker allow in house conversion or must be deposited first.

If require deposit then check and see the final amount is next how much fees.

@Ramjade they have their daily buy/sell rate (not at spot). Yes they allow in house conversion but your USD will sit in your account until you trade and no interest given for USD balances. No other fee only that 0.50% spread when exchange to MYR.

after some investigations i find that trading stocks with local banks is much easier in terms of funding and other charges, your money in different jurisdiction and even commission is so much cheaper

example :
if you buy stock A 10,000 shares at $1.00 your commission in our local bank is 0.40% which equals to $10,000 × 0.40% = $40.00

but if you buy from IBKR the same as above it will cost you 10,000 shares x 0.005 cents (which is lowest commission offered by IBKR) = $50.00

however if you buy expensive stocks (which is smaller number of shares) i.e google at $1,200++ pershare, facebook at $190++ per share) with smaller number of shares then IBKR could be way cheaper. if stocks is around $1.00 range i think there won't be so much difference at all.

But bare in mind your money will be in US jurisdiction. if there's any bank run or government confiscation occurs (just an assumption) you may need to get a local lawyer to deal with US lawyer on these complicated fund repatriation problem. (which i'm not familiar with)

and also not taking account other charges which you may incur at IBKR i.e funding & withdrawal charges, maintenance and minimum requirement charges, etc....could be more idk

most importantly is your money will be in different jurisdiction and may have implication if you passed away suddenly (inheritance issue)

just look at recent 1MDB $1B of jlow funds. we need to get them from the US and it's very complicated and not easy as well.

also maybe if you are small trader or scalper i.e buying stocks in small quantity like $1,000 worth per order at one time and a few times a day then local bank may not be suitable at all because they will calculate order individually i.e buying $1,000 of stocks in 5 seperate order your commission will be hefty $25 × 5 = $125 for a $5,000 worth of stocks.

I hope anyone with personal experience can explain how would IBKR be better?? and mind you IBKR LITE which is commission free are only available to US citizen

saw a post here that said maybank only allow funding over the counter cos BNM blocked IB is that true at this point of time?

what's the difference between these 2?

why need to download both?

edit: I'm using MAC and these two links are for Windows.

meaning, download the IB platform? cannot use directly on the web browser?

if use the website, I can log in with my own username & password. Then why they give us a new set of username and password? 

the portal uses our own username & password; not the one I got from the email.

Thanks!

I've also got some answers from them:

my mac is the latest with Touch ID and Touch bar. Honestly, after less than 2 months owning this laptop, I started to regret already. I don't use this mac 101%, just 60 to 70% of its full capability.

should have saved the money for investment. 

I used to be more stingy, now I spend money more easily.

Bro, for transfer fund from SG CIMB FastSaver(SGD) to IBKR(SGD), do able to use FAST transfer or have to use TT?
When i try create a deposit request in IBKR, only can select Bank Wire Deposit, does it mean TT?

Regarding BABA IPO, I've asked IBKR and here's the reply:

Please note, IBKR generally does not offer clients the ability to participate in an IPO (Initial Public Offering) of a US company. IBKR may offer the ability for clients to participate in IPOs outside of the US. The IPO subscription page is only available for eligible customers participating in certain Chinese and Hong Kong IPOs. At this time there are no plans to make it available for other markets. You can trade those securities through IBKR once they are listed in the secondary markets.

Also, please note that when the IPO is announced and if your account is eligible for it, you will see it in the IPO subscriptions page in Client Portal. By clicking on the relevant options, it will show you the requirements for participating in the IPO and further guidelines and procedures. In case, if you don't see any IPOs within the Account management, it means that the feature is not yet made available to your account based on the region/ account type, etc.

Very good Infos. tks

Just went through TradeStation Global account application.

Two questions that would need clarification:-
1. May I know if we need to wait until approved status then only can perform funding?


2. What're the options to fund the TSG account? Let say primarily to invest in NYSE. From thread reading here, seems like Instarem is the lowest cost choice ?

instarem(MYR) -> SG CIMB FastSaver(SGD) -> IBKR (SGD) -> IBKR (convert USD/HKD)

no ...

use instaRem, MYR > HKD. IBKR accepts HKD.

sender institution?? I wrote InstaRem. The same way I did for EUR.

I know it feels weird. I thought it had to be a bank's name.
Anyway, I still don't understand why IBKR can't accept USD from InstaRem. I tried to ask InstaRem the sending institution, they said OCBC (the same bank that accepts MYR). I was like, WTF?? That's not how FinTech works! There must be local bank in US that remits USD to IBKR.
He/she said no. It's OCBC (MY) that sends money to the US! 

Maybe I have saved the chat log somewhere. If I can find it, I'll post it.

Which one do you think is better if eventually I want to invest in US stocks?

Hello All sifu,

I am planing to open an IB account.. I'm from malaysia.
My target is to fund around usd 3k for 1st & topup to max usd10k.

I need advice as following.
1) I saw there's a lot of comment on the past forum.. May I know in present, which is the chepaest way to fund into IB account.
2) I'm holding some usd notes with me, can I fund directly to IB via any bank or agent?
3) I saw comment, inactive account in IB charges usd10/mth.. Inactive means no transaction at all or there's minimum transaction to avoid this cost?
4) what's the cheapest way to get back money from IB in MYR?
Regards
William