Interactive Brokers’ DARTs Hit Six-Month Low in October

Electronic brokerage firm Interactive Brokers LLC (NASDAQ:IBKR) said its trading volumes dropped in October from a month earlier, an indication that investor confidence in the financial market is not rebounding yet after having been fairly mixed in the third quarter.
The data shows that the trend of rising accounts number is still in play, though volumes were slightly interrupted. It is not clear whether that will be enough to preserve the revenue growth after the listed discount broker for the three months through September 2019.

During October 2019, the number of DARTs were reported at 797,000, the lowest since April and a fall of five percent month-over-month from ‎842,000‎ in . On a year-on-year basis, Interactive Brokers saw a bleaker performance in its DARTs with October’s figure dropping approximately 20 percent relative to over 986,000 transactions reported in October 2018.
In terms of equity balance in customers’ accounts during October 2019, the figure totaled $162.1 billion, up by four percent on a monthly basis from $156.6 billion the previous month. In addition, Interactive Brokers bested its October 2018 equivalent, having notched a 21 percent advance relative to the figures of the prior year.
Business Highlights
Interactive Brokers’ ending client margin loan balances also came in at $25.3 billion in October 2019, down by one month-on-month from $25.6 billion in September 2019. Across a yearly interval, the figure moved lower by 12 percent when weighed against $28.8 billion in October 2018.
Business highlights, according to the company’s press release, also showed that a total of 673,000 customer accounts were active at IB during October 2019. The figure was higher by one percent month-on-month when compared to September 2019 (666.200 accounts), and 15 percent higher year-on-year from 585,100 accounts.
On average, in October 2019 Interactive Brokers charged clients commission fees of $3.56 per order, including exchange, clearing and regulatory fees, with the key products metrics coming out at $2.19 for stocks, $5.31 for equity options and $5.19 for futures orders.
Earlier last month, the Greenwich, Connecticut-based broker reported its Q3 financial results which showed year-on-year and QoQ increases in revenues, adding $466 million compared to $439 million in Q3 2018 and $413 million in the second quarter.
as well as rivals such as  and  have recently eliminated commissions for online trading of some stocks and funds.