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Help me to understand please. I want to stocks (i.e. VOO). I have several thousands in cash on my account. But when I submit an order I get this message

Why does this happen? Why I can't buy when I have cash?

enter image description here

Maybe someone knows why my cash is blocked?

---- UPDATE -----

I found that there's a difference between Cash and Buying Power. What does it mean? enter image description here

Yura
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  • IBKR doesn't think you have cash. Are you sure you do? They seem to think you only have $642.28. Could it be that you're relying on proceeds of a recent transaction that hasn't settled yet? – littleadv Sep 09 '22 at 16:53
  • Aha! I see that I have a difference between cash and buying power. What it is? I've updated original post – Yura Sep 09 '22 at 17:14
  • Do you have other pending orders? – littleadv Sep 09 '22 at 17:20
  • Nope. On Trade tab there are only filled and cancelled orders. Is there any other place to look at? – Yura Sep 09 '22 at 17:30
  • In Portfolio -> Positions I can see 4 of 5 positions. But I can't find how to see all of them – Yura Sep 09 '22 at 17:38
  • I think this is because of settlement. But how can I see which positions await for it? – Yura Sep 09 '22 at 17:57

1 Answers1

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In a cash account, you can only make purchases with settled cash. That means T+1 for options and T+2 for equities. Do you have any such pending closed trades?

There's a contradiction in your numbers. The number below says that you have $11,558.37 in Settled Cash. If that were the case then there should be no problem trying to buy $1,117 worth of VOO.

However, the other number states that you have $642.28 of Buying Power which if true, means that you don't have enough cash to buy the shares (see the rejection message).

There's no way to reconcile this for you until you determine the reason for this discrepancy.

Plan B? Call IBKR and ask WHY?

Bob Baerker
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