The big brokers who do their own clearing (members of the DTCC clearinghouse) had to immediately deposit additional collateral because of the increased volatility of GameStop and AMC.
Many of them, including our execution intermediary, which is one of the biggest brokers in the world, had to stop accepting BUY orders for these stocks for 1 day because it takes a little time to transfer billions of USD.
As soon as the additional collateral was deposited, trading was restored and on Friday our clients were able to trade GME and AMC without limits.
Spot on. @AlexK this isn’t the first time the level and speed of communication here has been criticised. I think a lot of the better versed investors in the community understood there was no mud to be slung 212’s way. Unfortunately the other 90% of folk have no clue and are just bleating because they think the noise will amount to something.
If this sort of communication can be made sooner, the fallout will always be a lot less ugly.
Monday is business as usual. Except that about 1% of the entire UK population will log in into our platform. And funds will be easily accessible. As usual.
Have you done any temporary scaling out ready for next week? Although I don’t invest in any US stocks individually it’s still a bit annoying the app basically being completely unavailable for the entire US trading day
Hopefully this rubbish dies out some time next week
I am wondering why you didnt just post this as the explanation on Thursday instead of the u precedented market volatility stuff.
Its also interesting that one of the IB board members went on CNBC and said that he will not allow buying until price reaches a reasonable price.
Seems kind of contradicting. Now I do believe you, however, do not be condescening and talk about DD and research when even people who are responsible for trading (you, IB,…) spread incomplete information.
Yeah it kinda helps if you keep people who have money invested informed about actions you take that affect their balances in good time. Silence creates that anger and t212 risk management strategy obviously is a little poor to say the least.
That’s extraordinary. And I suppose there are many logins from outside the UK too. This really is the democratisation of finance. Many accounts will be very small but at least people are starting and learning. I sincerely hope they stick with their investments are not burned by a bad experience with rash speculation or a severe market correction.
Robinhood used to build their brand/reputation since inception using this motto and this week this claim took a big hit as retail users on the platform were subjected to restricted trading. Many felt this unfair as for smart money it was business as usual.
Markets are based on contracts and agreements. I don’t expect any democracy when shared ealing - the highest bidder always wins.
I’m not overly fussed about being able to buy, as it can’t negatively affect your current net worth. However, during an incredibly critical time in the market, I was unable to SELL for over 3 hours. How can I be assured this won’t happen again?
With all due respect, posting a FT article days after the event and accusing people of not doing research and spreading misinformation is both disingenuous and condescending.
The event was on Thursday. For hours, the only message provided by T212 was that they (T212) were suspending buys due to the volatility.
A lot of headaches (and 1* reviews) could have been avoided if you had just been transparent in the first place. For the life of me, I can’t understand what made you put out that initial message knowing the loss of confidence it would cause to many of your customers.
Agreed quite new here and the last few days have really made me question if this is the right platform. I looking and waiting. The responses here can be handled by just one guy working 2 hrs a day yet even though that’s the case the silence from these guys is deafening.
@AlexK can you please remove the sell limit on GME, GS2C, AMC, etc?
It is currently capped at approximately $2,800 per share on GME and €1,800 on GS2C.
From this thread:
We have increased substantially the limits for the maximum distances associated with the pending orders of AMC and GME, and they are way higher than the current market price. No additional increases in the distances (of these two securities) will be made unless market logic implies such action (e.g., a drastic jump in the price).
It seems like a market jump is inevitable and without being able to set a sell limit above $2,800 with GME for example, we are going to be leaving potentially thousands of dollars per share on the table.
The market is moving fast and if or when those shorts are margin called, we need to have sell limits already set and not risk selling at market price or being unable to login to T212.
While I don’t doubt this is the truth, it comes across very condescending.
There was no useful communication from T212 during the fallout, and the messages that were posted at the time have now clearly been shown as false. The way T212 handled the situation was dreadful.
If T212 simply posted accurate information at the time they would have avoided a huge amount of negative response. I signed up to Freetrade the next day and although they were then unable to process any orders as soon as the market opened, their comms were instant and accurate.
Less condescending attitude and more sorry we’ll try do better at customer service next time please.
