Connection to IB

[xraptorx]

Hi

I have a IB Friends and Family master account and several (4) accounts linked to this.

I also have a Kinetick real time account and connect to Kinetick first and then the Friends and Family account.

When I open a chart and attached a strategy to the linked IB accounts, the strategy will not allow me to enable it. The strategy never activates on the accounts if I am not directly logged into the sub IB account.

That means, I can log into only one of the sub accounts and trade from that account via a strategy, but I cannot log into the master account from NT and then open different charts and strategies for the different sub accounts.

Can you advise what I am doing wrong?

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for your forum post.


Regarding IB Friends and Family accounts, NinjaTrader will see each account as it's own account. However the group account function in IB is not supported. You have to submit trades manually to each account or use NinjaTrader's account grouping feature.

You can connect to an FA account and it will pull in each account as a single account.

Please see this link for the NT Account grouping (Account grouping is only for when you want to trade once and have that trade go to multiple accounts at the same time.

• http://www.ninjatrader.com/support/h...unt_groups.htm

[xraptorx]

HI RyanL

I understand from your reply I can connect to my FA account and then open up charts and assign a strategy to each account separately - correct? I do not want to really trade just once and have that order go to multiple accounts since I want to control the risk (amount of contracts traded per account separately).

However, if I connect to my FA account from NT, then the strategies for the individual accounts are not able to be activated. The benefit of the FA is that I pay for data fees just once and thus would like to keep that structure at IB.

Can you tell me how to connect via NT to my FA account and activate strategies on each account separately?

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello,


Thank you for the follow up.


When connecting to the FA account within NinjaTrader and checking the Strategies tab are you not able to right mouse click > New Strategy > Select your desired account from the Account drop down menu?

[xraptorx]

Hello,


Thank you for the follow up.


When connecting to the FA account within NinjaTrader and checking the Strategies tab are you not able to right mouse click > New Strategy > Select your desired account from the Account drop down menu?

HI RyanL

I can do as you say, doing this is not the problem. The problem is that the strategy cannot be enabled when logged into the FA account. The strategy enabled Check box cannot be clicked when logged into the FA account and trying to enable a strategy on a sub account.

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for the follow up.


The group account function in IB is not supported and I suspect your situation is due to this. You have to submit trades manually to each account or use NinjaTrader's account grouping feature.

• http://www.ninjatrader.com/support/h...unt_groups.htm

[xraptorx]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for the follow up.


The group account function in IB is not supported and I suspect your situation is due to this. You have to submit trades manually to each account or use NinjaTrader's account grouping feature.

• http://www.ninjatrader.com/support/h...unt_groups.htm

Hi RyanL

thank you for the response. I have setup a group account now in NT.

Where do I select the group account for trading? I still need to establish a connection from Control Center to FA. Then I need to select an account on the Strategy which is running. The strategy does not list the group account name.

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for the follow up and for the clarification.


The Account Group feature will not work on Strategies. You will need to start a new instance of the strategy for each account and run them individually.

[xraptorx]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for the follow up and for the clarification.


The Account Group feature will not work on Strategies. You will need to start a new instance of the strategy for each account and run them individually.

Thank you RyanL

how do I need to do this then? TWS only allows one account to be logged into from NinjaTrader. I have tried to connect to several IB accounts simultaneously and it was rejected by TWS. What do I need to do to connect 3 different charts to 3 different IB accounts and trade a strategy?

Secondly do all IB accounts need access to data providers or can the data still be secured and paid for by the FA Account?

[NinjaTrader_RyanL]

Hello xraptorx,


Thank you for the follow up.


Connecting to Multiple IB Accounts:
To set this up please see the instructions below. In order to do this however, you must manually start TWS multiple times for each account, then connect with NinjaTrader since the auto startup functionality does not work with multiple logins.



1) Manually start TWS from the desktop, if you have two accounts start it up twice with each account logged in.

2) When platform has started, Click Configure > API Settings > Socket Port > Provide a unique value. Default is 7496, leave this as is for the first username. Add 1 to this value to be 7497 on the second account so each account has a unique port value.

3) In your NinjaTrader connection for this account, match the port with what you specify in TWS for each account connection.

4) Connect in NT using File > Connect, you will do this twice for both account connections.

Note: The Client ID can remain at default setting. Only port needs changing in our testing..


If you are establishing multiple connections that overlap in their provided market data services, the connection order you establish is critical. NinjaTrader will check for required market data services in the order your connections are established.

For example:
Connection1 - Provides real-time market and historical data
Connection2 - Provides only real-time market data

If you connect to Connection1 first and Connection2 second, when requesting market data NinjaTrader will request the data stream for both real-time and historical data from Connection1 even if you trade against Connection2.
See our help guide entry on Multiple Connections to see all the specifics:

• http://www.ninjatrader.com/support/h...onnections.htm

So in your case, if the FA account has the required real-time data and you connect to it first, all other accounts connected would use this data.