Symbols Format Help
Interactive Brokers

1. Specify the complete Symbol

The symbol format is

SYMBOL^TYPE^EXCHANGECODE^EXPIRATION^STRIKE^PUTCALL^CURRENCY

- SYMBOL is the symbol the you see on the UNDERLYING column on the IB TWS

- TYPE is STK for stocks, IND for indexes, FUT for futures, OPT for options, CASH for FOREX.

- EXCHANGE CODE it the code you see on the EXCHANGE column on the IB TWS

- EXPIRATION is YYYYMM of the future or option expiration

- STRIKE for options type the strike price.

- PUTCAL for options type a P for put or C for cal

- CURRENCY for FOREX type other currency on the pair.

EXAMPLES

For IBM stock you will have

     IBM^STK^SMART

for the S&P Mini March 03

     ES^FUT^GLOBEX^200303

Note we use the character ^ between fields. Strike will be a strike price for an option and PUTCALL will be P for Put and C for call options. Example INTEL CALL 01/2005 25.00 strike will be

INTC^OPT^SMART^200501^25^C

Some indexes

NYSE TICK use TICK-NYSE^IND^NYSE
NYSE TRIN use TRIN-NYSE^IND^NYSE
DOW INDUSTRIALS use INDU^IND^NYSE
NASDAQ COMP use COMP^IND^NASDAQ
NDX use NDX^IND^NASDAQ

For FOREX DATA (version 58 or later)  use SYMBOL^TYPE^EXCHANGECODE^^^^CURRENCY, example: USD/JPY will be

USD^CASH^IDEALPRO^^^^JPY

For the EUR/USD use

EUR^CASH^IDEALPRO^^^^USD

You cannot use this format on Futures Groups.

2. The other way is let FT find the symbol.

Do not use this way number 2 for Options or FOREX. For options and FOREX use the way number 1 above.

Select the Exchange, the program will know the IB code of the excahnge or check the Edit Exchanges window to check this parameter. Select Stocks on the Folder, for IB always select Futures, Indexes or Stocks then FT will know if needs to use STK, FUT or IND for the symbol. Then on this case FT will create the symbol CSC and will do the correct connection with IB using CSC^STK^SMART

For the S&P Mini use the Future Groups, click on File, Futures, then on New Futures Group.

FT will create the symbols ES^FUT^GLOBEX^200303 , ES^FUT^GLOBEX^200306,  ES^FUT^GLOBEX^200309,.......

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