IBKR- Margin vs Cash accounts
Posted: Thu Feb 11, 2021 2:30 am
Hello all,
I just opened an account with IBKR Japan because I wanted to have exposure to some ETF not available in traditional Japanese brokers. My question to you today is: should I keep the margin account I have right now or should I switch it to a cash account?
I am not interested in trading in any way. I am not interested in shorting nor in leverage. But apparently, with a margin account I can purchase US ETFs without needing to convert JPY to USD. Practically, I spare the conversion cost (which is quite low afaik, something around 300 JPY and it seems fixed).
Holding the margin account makes reading my stats less clear because of the USD-JPY conversion.
So I wonder: what's the downside, given what I said about my preferences before, to switch to a cash account except for the initial USD conversion?
I just opened an account with IBKR Japan because I wanted to have exposure to some ETF not available in traditional Japanese brokers. My question to you today is: should I keep the margin account I have right now or should I switch it to a cash account?
I am not interested in trading in any way. I am not interested in shorting nor in leverage. But apparently, with a margin account I can purchase US ETFs without needing to convert JPY to USD. Practically, I spare the conversion cost (which is quite low afaik, something around 300 JPY and it seems fixed).
Holding the margin account makes reading my stats less clear because of the USD-JPY conversion.
So I wonder: what's the downside, given what I said about my preferences before, to switch to a cash account except for the initial USD conversion?