Not too long ago, I discovered that Interactive Brokers had a new desktop application.
For those of us who have been around long enough to remember Interactive Brokers, they have had a desktop application called Trader Workstation for the longest time (TWS, in short). TWS is currently still around today.
In a way, Interactive Brokers developed its hard-to-use reputation because TWS was meant to be used more by finance managers than retail investors. It is fine if IB wishes to serve mainly the fund managers, or the traders doing serious trading work. However, they have to be more personal if they want to attract more retail investors to use their platform.
Since then, they have done quite a good job with their online web access platform, but most of us are likely users of their mobile application platform on iOS or Android. Even then, there are who finds IB difficult to use and Interactive Brokers came up with a much more slim down mobile access called Global Trader.
Which brings us to their new desktop platform.
Those of you who would like to give it a try can download the latest version of the software here.
Like Global Trader, Interactive Brokers design and craft the whole application from the ground up to provide a more expansive desktop experience.
However, as a retail person, I struggle with how useful the desktop application is.
Some of my friends don’t even use desktops so often. They share that most of their stuff, including crafting Instagram posts or editing videos, can be done over a powerful smartphone. Outside of work, we are mobile-first, desktop second.
And that is my struggle with it because we prefer to be able to monitor or execute our trade, review our trading position
