Interactive Brokers Reports 23% Rise in Daily Average Revenue Trades for August

Interactive Brokers Group published its electronic brokerage performance metrics for August on Tuesday, reporting 4.276 million daily average revenue trades (DARTs). That marks a 23% increase over the same month a year earlier, though the figure slipped 3% from the prior month.

Client equity closed the month at $962.8 billion, up 35% year on year and 6% higher than in July. Client margin loan balances ended August at $101.5 billion, a 41% annual increase and 1% above the previous month's level. Client credit balances reached $185.6 billion, including $6.4 billion held in insured bank deposit sweeps, representing 27% year-on-year growth.

The broker reported 5.46 million client accounts, 35% more than a year earlier and 3% above the prior month. That translated into 168 annualised average cleared DARTs per client account. Interactive Brokers also said the average commission per cleared commissionable order was $2.52, a figure that includes exchange, clearing and regulatory fees.

Execution costs

On the cost side, the company said IBKR PRO clients' total expense for executing and clearing US Reg-NMS stocks through the broker came to roughly 2.1 basis points of trade money in August, measured against a daily volume-weighted average price benchmark. That compares with 2.5 basis points on a rolling twelve-month basis.

The results, which cover only electronic brokerage activity, are released monthly ahead of the company's full financial reporting cycle and are closely watched as a gauge of retail and institutional trading activity. Interactive Brokers, which operates as an automated global electronic broker, has seen account growth outpace trading volume expansion over the past year, a trend reflected in both the annual rise in DARTs and the larger percentage increase in customer accounts.