Interactive Brokers (IBKR), the online broker of global futures,
options and foreign exchange, is pleased to offer direct access
trading to Australian stocks and options via its award-winning,
multi-product desktop trading platform, Trader Workstation (TWS).
The new product offering enables clients to trade ASX-listed
options on a flat commission structure of $1.88 per contract plus
exchange fees, with no minimum to trade. It also provides a vast array
of order types, the ability to make direct quote requests, and direct
access trading for option spreads.
Australian stocks are now being offered at a competitive
commission rate of .08% of trade value, with a $6 trade minimum.
Interactive Brokers also gives traders the ability to short these
Australian stocks.
Interactive Brokers ranks among the top 20 largest U.S. securities
firms and has been honored by Barron's magazine for its
high-performance software and low-cost trade structure. Approximately
20 percent of the world's option volume passes through Interactive
Brokers every trading day.
In a statement, Interactive Brokers managing director Steve Kelsey
said the decision to introduce ASX-listed stocks and options to its
clients was driven by the company's ongoing desire to offer access to
liquid derivatives markets globally.
"The Australian options market is a dynamic, liquid environment in
which clients are keen to navigate, so it was naturally in our
interest to make this frontier available through our trading platform
- but on far more competitive and attractive price terms than the
market has offered up to now."
Last month the SEC granted certain classes of the ASX Exchange
Traded Options Market "no action relief," allowing US investors to
access the market directly through Interactive Brokers.
About Interactive Brokers
Interactive Brokers Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries,
is an automated global electronic market maker and broker specializing
in routing orders and executing and processing trades in securities,
futures and foreign exchange instruments as a member of more than 70
electronic exchanges and trading venues around the world. The company
provides professional traders and investors with direct access to
stocks, options, futures, forex and bonds from a single IB Universal
Account(SM). Employing proprietary software on electronic exchanges
worldwide, Interactive Brokers is continuously integrating its
software with a growing number of exchanges and trading venues into
one automatically functioning, computerized platform that requires
minimal human intervention.