TOS futures statement

[status1]

I was wondering if anyone is trading futures on TOS
I placed my first futures trade on TOS a couple of days ago and I was surprised that I did not receive a confirmation
A day later I received a statement that looked somewhat messy IMO
I guess futures trading is handled differently that stocks or options It's also in a PDF format and it has the Schwab logo at the top Not sure how the statement was before the merger

There is 2 sections the firs section just lists the trades and shows the total commission it does not break it down to each individual trade
The second section shows the individual trades without commissions but it's sorted by price not by when the trade was placed
So if it's more than one trade in that day you have to figure out which pair of the trade goes together and apply the commission for each trade in order to figure out how much was the P/L on each trade

 

[DaveN]

Ugh, it sounds messy. I did a number of future trades through ToS before the SCHW acquisition, but none since. I generally do all of my Futs trading through IBKR or some Introducing Broker using software like Sierra Chart.

Many firms will use a separate entity (e.g. Apex Futures at TastyWorks) for back office and clearing even though it seems to be in your main brokerage account. But the statements are all different. Some I've had would send me a statement every day, even if I didn't place trades that day with them. And some are formatted, well, horridly.

My previous TDA futures trading statements and confirmations were decent and easy to read. It sounds like SCHW is using something/someone totally different.

 

[status1]

I traded futures way back in the late 80's for a while and I can't remember being so messy and out of order but that was just one trade at a time so maybe it was less confusing that way but that was with paper statements you would figure with all the software development since than that they could have come up with some improvements but I guess if no one complains they are not going to fix it
TD said they submitted a feedback to the developers but I doubt the will make any changes since I guess it's up to Schwab to fix it since it's on their statement

 

[SergB]

I assumed futures statements are similar between providers, here is example of futures confirmation from TastyWorks

 

[status1]

Thanks for showing a screenshot of that confirmation That looks better but maybe because it's an option trade and just a single leg so you can tell that one is a put and the other is a call and even so at least you have each trade shown separately with the commissions

I wonder how it would look if it was just the underlying futures or just trading with one leg only

Let's say you sold 1 /es contract at 3883.40 and closed it at 3883.50 than bought 1 at 3883.30 and closed it at 3884.60
How would that look on the statement ?
It looks something like this on the Schwab statement with just the total commission for those trades

+1 3883.30*
-1 3883.40
+1 3883.50
-1 3884.60*

Than another section with the same order without commission and just the total gross p/l
I placed a * next to the trade that goes together so you can see that it's not listed in the sequence in which it was traded but just in ascending order of the underlying price

So the statement is pretty useless as far as keeping track of each trade It's only good to confirm the fill price otherwise I am using Tom's spreadsheet to keep track of the p/l of each trade

 

[Mark17]

I was wondering if anyone is trading futures on TOS
I placed my first futures trade on TOS a couple of days ago and I was surprised that I did not receive a confirmation
A day later I received a statement that looked somewhat messy IMO
I guess futures trading is handled differently that stocks or options It's also in a PDF format and it has the Schwab logo at the top Not sure how the statement was before the merger

There is 2 sections the firs section just lists the trades and shows the total commission it does not break it down to each individual trade
The second section shows the individual trades without commissions but it's sorted by price not by when the trade was placed
So if it's more than one trade in that day you have to figure out which pair of the trade goes together and apply the commission for each trade in order to figure out how much was the P/L on each trade

I still get paper trade confirmations, but I wasn't getting these for futures trades. After inquiring, I got this response:

> Unfortunately, we do not have the ability to actively mail statements for clients. Everything we do for
> Futures is done electronically, which the client agreed to when he first opened his account.

 

[status1]

That's interesting
I can't say I read the agreement when I opened my futures account but looking at my profile there is no distinction between the futures and equity accounts so it's either all electronic or all paper Here is what it says in the agreement about the paper statements

"Although I consent to electronic delivery, you may elect to deliver communications by other means which shall not affect my consent. I will
notify you of any change in my address. I may revoke my consent to electronic delivery of communications and receive documents on paper. You have a reasonable period to effect such a change and may charge a reasonable fee for sending paper copies"
There is no mention about futures being only available electronically unless there is a separate futures agreement that I can't find

I am guessing maybe it's because it's a statement and not a confirmation so maybe it comes from somewhere else as you have to click on futures to get the statement

At Tastyworks I just got the confirmation in the same place as I get the other confirmations even though it's called a daily statement The weird thing is that I got another statement a day later showing just the realized gain which is called a journal entry I guess each brokerage does their own way of reporting and there is no standard

 

[DaveN]

I believe TastyTrade clears futures through Apex Clearing, for which they add a 30 cent charge on each side of the transaction, minis and micros both. When I traded with them a few years ago, that was the case. I got electronic statements with co-branded headers (Apex and Tastyworks) sent via the tastytrade accounts.

Because it's really two back offices, I think that's why you are seeing the different policies and practices. Not to mention formats.

 

[status1]

I believe TastyTrade clears futures through Apex Clearing, for which they add a 30 cent charge on each side of the transaction, minis and micros both. When I traded with them a few years ago, that was the case. I got electronic statements with co-branded headers (Apex and Tastyworks) sent via the tastytrade accounts.

The email alert for the futures statement came from Stonex.com which sounds like that's the clearing firm for futures but the header on the statement is Apex clearing so I am not sure how Stonex.com fits into this unless Stonex is just for futures clearing

As far as the 30 cents charge transaction that is still the case but the commission is less than TD so overall Tastyworks is cheaper than TD for futures trading $5.54 for round trip at Tastyworks vs $6.94 at TD

I believe TD has their own clearing but I am not sure about the futures or how it was before the merger
Currently I got the statement with a Schwab logo but from what I have read

"Schwab Futures and Forex does not own any futures exchange clearing memberships or self-clear any futures or futures options products. Schwab Futures and Forex utilizes two clearing firms, ADM Investor Services, Inc., and ABN AMRO Clearing Chicago LLC, to clear its futures business"

So maybe that explains why TD has to keep the futures separate and maybe why they don't send paper statements but that's just a guess

 

[status1]

Just another compare between TOS and Tastyworks on the monthly statement
On Tastyworks it shows up under Misc transactions and it's listed as Daily futures statement
On TOS it shows up as Purchase FDIC insured deposit account kind of like a cash sweep from somewhere There is no mention of futures