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Strategies & Market Trends : Options -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cthruu who wrote (3277)	2/20/2000 7:56:00 PM
From: Bridge Player	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 8096

Cthruu, several things have emerged from my perusal of the Interactive Brokers website that may be of interest to you or other browsers here. 1. They accept only checks or wire transfers to open an account, no transfers in of securities from another account are accepted. 2. They issue NO margin calls, by phone, telegram, or any other means. If your account falls below the minimum maintenance requirement specified for their various products, they simply will automatically close whatever positions (at their discretion) they deem necessary to bring the account up to requirements, which as far as I can tell are no more onerous than any regular or discount brokerage firm. No opportunity to add more cash. 3. All trade confirmations and monthly account statements are done electronically. NO printed, hard-copy, postal service delivery of either statements or confirms. The customer agrees to print copies of electronic documents as necessary to keep his own records up to date, and (presumably) as required to document in case of IRS audit. 4. There are minimum requirements for the computer equipment required to operate their software, including a 1024 by 768 minimum on monitor resolution. 5. Their minimums for opening an account are pretty low. Their site gave no indication of personal financial requirements that they might have to open accounts that permit naked option selling. It is possible that these requirements might surface at such time as one might attempt to open an account. 6. Interest rates on both borrowed money on margin accounts as well as the interest rate paid on cash balances seemed to me at least to be pretty attractive. 7. As I understand it (I could be mistaken here) their software does provide visibility into multiple options quotes on the 4 exchanges where they are traded and they claim to route to the best current price available. 8. There seemed to be an implication that if electronic access to your account was not possible for whatever reason it might be difficult, or awkward, to reach them by telephone. This is an impression only that I got from reading their FAQs. 9. This is not a fly-by-night firm. Their parent is a well-recognized global trading frim that has been in business for many years. 10. Finally, their commissions are low. Very low. Please understand that nothing stated above is intended as an inducement to open an account with this firm or any other. I simply report my own impressions from having spent a couple of hours reviewing their site. Although I am interested in the concept offered by Interactive Brokers, as of this writing I have not opened an account with them, and may or may not do so, depending solely on personal factors. I urge anyone that might be interested to do their own investigation and due diligence. BP

To: cthruu who wrote (3277)	2/20/2000 9:14:00 PM
From: Jill	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 8096

Girish--I went and looked at open interest, and you are of course right, 260 is overall most popular, it just so happened 250 was popular on Friday. If 260 is strong support, I always tend to sell puts BELOW the support of a trading range, to play it safe. The premiums are still juicy: over $16 for March 250. I wonder how much they were at the low on Friday, since it recovered from the low of 169 up back to 280. They are an interesting biotech. I like what they do. Altho Loffy obviously has had great success lately with HSGI, I am still sketical of the actual near-term promise of gene therapy (long term it should be fantastic).