Non-US Investing • What is the "right" way for a US expat to sign up for Interactive brokers?

I am a US citizen living/working abroad in Norway. I would like to sign up for IBKR for moving money between countries and for investing in US ETFs. I am a little confused about the right way to do this though and I was wondering if anyone with more experience with IBKR could give me some advice.

I currently have a Schwab account that I created before leaving the US and it is associated with my US address. I would like to have a similar setup for IBKR. It seems they have two products: IBKR Lite for US residents and IBKR Pro for everyone else. I thought Lite would be the right choice and I tried creating an account by providing my US address. However, they ask for employer information and my employer is (obviously) based in Norway and the application asks "Why do you say you are a resident of the US but have an employer in Norway?"

I have seen in some other threads that IBKR will not sell US ETFs to EU residents so I am concerned that this will lock me out.

So, what is the right thing to do here? Should I submit my US address with EU employer for the IBKR Lite plan? Will this lock me out of trading US ETFs? Should I be instead applying for the "Pro" plan which is for people outside the US? Or am I SOL and I should have done this before leaving the US (like I did with Schwab?)

Thanks!

Statistics: Posted by broseidon — Sun Oct 27, 2024 2:41 am

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