Transfering money from Japan to Interactive Brokers LLC

[mule96]

That is strange. I used the Teleconference Booth in the end to avoid any handwriting.

[Bean]

An update : I was able to successfully transfer funds to my IB account. Thanks again to Mule96 for the information that allowed me to do so.

I did it through SMBC online banking, for those who might want to do so here are the steps:

1. Set up an SMBC account and set up online banking
2. Get on your computer and set up a foreign remittance account, it might take a few hours or a day before it starts working.
3. Register IB's account details within the foreign remittance area of online banking. Again, it could take hours or days before it starts working, in my case it took over a week probably due to the holiday season.
4. Now you can transfer funds at will, the fee is only 800 yen for this service, yen to yen.

[mule96]

Thanks for the confirmation that SMBC indeed allows a cheap transfer online. UFJ costs the same, but going to a branch office for these is just a waste of time

[RadiatorMan]

Hi, is it really not possible to fund an Interactive Brokers account by just using the UFJ ATM? I'm looking to fund mine some time this week but actually unsure of how to do it...

[mule96]

For the IB LLC Account it is definitely not possible.

[RadiatorMan]

Ok, thanks. I'll try it through Transferwise and see what happens.

[niall24]

Mizuho also a hassle for transferring to IB: although their Yen account is in Citibank Otemachi, it is treated as a foreign account.

IB Japan have a helpful telephone service - they said SMBC Trust bank (Prestia) is OK for yen transfers within Japan.

[RadiatorMan]

So, I tried TransferWise, and everything seemed to be going smoothly, but the money was "sent back" with the message "Interactive Brokers LLC's bank account can't receive USD transfers."

Anyone with experience of using TransferWise, how do you get it sent? What currency does Interactive Brokers receive from you?

Sorry for lots of beginner questions!

[mule96]

My understanding is that, IB only accepts transfers from accounts with the same name as the IB Account name. Maybe that doesn't happen, with Transferwise? Some googling also showed up, that IB accepts Transferwise only for US customers.
It's complicated...

Maybe it is easier to ask IB directly. Their support in Japan was pretty fast for me so far.

[Bean]

So, I tried TransferWise, and everything seemed to be going smoothly, but the money was "sent back" with the message "Interactive Brokers LLC's bank account can't receive USD transfers."

Anyone with experience of using TransferWise, how do you get it sent? What currency does Interactive Brokers receive from you?

Sorry for lots of beginner questions!

When you set up a deposit notification with IB you will need to specify the currency and amount that will be received.

I looked into quite a few other options for transferring funds to IB , but all of them would have ended up costing around 1% to get the job done whether that be due to commission, fees, or the spread, or a combination of any of those. That's fine for a small one-off deposit to get started but not a long-term solution for regular savings.

Consider opening an SMBC online account.