So, they come to us because, a) our executions, they like our executions; b) they like the fact that they can see our short inventory and the rates at which they can borrow various equity issues from us. And when they compare that to their primary hedge fund, they either use our rates to bid them up into giving them a better rate or they actually ask us to borrow the shares from.Daniel Fannon Understood. And then can you confirm just the other income, excluding the movements in the one-timers that you talked about with the portfolio and treasuries, what that would be on a kind of a run rate basis going forward?Thomas Peterffy Paul?Paul Brody Well, other income includes investments and various other things. So, it’s a little difficult to say that it has a run rate.
Investments will rise and fall over time. And it’s difficult to pin that down.Daniel Fannon But I guess, just if I look historically, that there was no one-time as we look at the $19 million in the fourth quarter or the single digits for most of the three quarters before, that’s how we should think about it going forward? Those are the clean numbers?Paul Brody Yes. Let’s remember that our currency diversification strategy that we call the GLOBAL, the result of currencies versus dollar going up and down are a component of other income. Sometimes it’s a large component. This quarter, it was practically nothing. So, that’s at least for you because we disclose the composition of our GLOBAL, that’s for you a predictable number because you can imply exchange rates and make an estimate.Operator And our next question comes from Craig Siegenthaler from Bank of America.Craig Siegenthaler So, the Fed provided a nice tailwind for IBKR on the way up.
If we start seeing cuts over the next year, is there any reason that the asset sensitivity on the way down would look any different than on the way up, just given the short duration of your assets and also the large equity position that partially fund your balance sheet?Thomas Peterffy Well, on the way down, we would decrease by the same amount we increased by, except for the fact that we are getting in more and more accounts. So, to the extent, we’ll have more clients to do more trades and to keep with us more cash, it is going to be moderated. But if we went back to zero interest rates, of course, our interest income would be very similar to what it was a year ago. But I do not believe that we will get back to zero.Operator And our next question comes from Benjamin Budish from Barclays.Benjamin Budish I wanted to circle back on the introducing broker clients that are going to be onboarding later this year.
I think there’s a sort of a general understanding that as retail clients that are new to the platform join, they sort of become more productive over time. But these are generally existing clients from a previous broker. What’s your sort of expectation in terms of the activity from these customers? Do you think that you could see sort of a step up over time as they become more familiar with perhaps new options that are offered with IBKR on the back end? And as part of that, how should we think about the cash balances coming over? Should we assume that it’s a lot of fully rate-sensitive cash. Is that a fair assumption?Thomas Peterffy So, it is generally true that a new account starts at $3 and it grows to $6 in the first year and then goes to $9 after 2 or 3 years.
So, I do not expect these customers to be any different from that.Benjamin Budish Okay. That’s helpful. And then just thinking about sort of the strength in the quarter, particularly in March with futures and options activity. To what degree do you think that’s sustainable? Was a lot of that just sort of in response to the volatility created by the banking crisis? Or do you think there’s sort of a possibility for this sort of sustained engagement from retail in options and futures to kind of continue over the next several months or taking part of longer term?Thomas Peterffy Well to tell you frankly, for the past 10 days or so, our commissions are certainly lower than they were in the preceding 10 days. So, the banking crisis certainly contributed to some stronger activity that seems to have subsided now.
But generally, when markets go down, the activity increases and when they stop going down and start to slowly climb up the activity decreases. So that’s what we are seeing in the commission income side.Milan Galik And there is an additional component here. The options trading is getting generally more and more popular and the type of clientele that we attract looks towards the option offering that we have as part of our platform. So the expectation is that the options trading and derivatives trading in general is going to be growing over time, even as volatilities drop in the market.Operator And our next question is Kyle Voigt from KBW.Kyle Voigt Thomas, you started the call in the prepared remarks, highlighting the yields you’re paying on idle cash balances.
And we’ve also been noticing that you’re marketing this recently and comparing your yield to that of other brokers. I guess, have you seen evidence that clients are consolidating more cash or more assets at IBKR from other brokers or other accounts because of that yield differential and because of some of the marketing push that you’ve been making recently?Thomas Peterffy Well, unfortunately, I did not. So, the incoming moneys are about the same as they were a month ago or two months or three months ago. It’s very steady—we haven’t seen any pickup and we also haven’t seen any drawdowns.Kyle Voigt Understood. And I just wanted to follow up on the prior question. I know you’ve been quite positive on the growth trajectory for options, broadly speaking, and believe that growth is sustainable over the medium term.
But I was wondering if you could comment on some of the growth in this SPX zero-day-to-expiry option trading. We’ve seen grow rapidly over the past few quarters. I understand that your customers are one of the larger users of the zero-day products. Just wondering if you could give us any detail on which client segments you’re seeing utilize those products within IB? And then also just give us your thoughts broadly on this zero-day options trend and whether you see the volume growth in those products as sustainable as we look out over the next few years as well?Thomas Peterffy So, it is certainly sustainable because it’s less expensive for people to take a position in one-day options, one day ahead of news, right? Previously, they had to take a position that would have several days to run even though they would take the position a day ahead of the news.
So, it is cheaper for them to use the one-day option. Also, when people want to take a position in a larger portfolio, it’s easier for them to accumulate on one-day, say Standard and Poor’s options and trade the portfolio on a market on close order. And that way, it’s a lot cheaper for them to buy or sell that portfolio.Kyle Voigt Understood. And I just have one follow-up. One last question. It’s just regarding the balance sheet of the company. You now have, I think, close to $9 billion of capital in excess of your regulatory requirements. And that excess capital figure has grown significantly over the past few years. I know you’ve previously stated you wanted that excess capital to help support the prime brokerage operations and to help customers kind of feel safe custodying assets at IB.
But I guess is there some level of excess capital where you’d feel as an adequate level and therefore, not needing to continue to build that as rapidly as it has over the past few years? And just updated thoughts there would be great.Thomas Peterffy Very strange that you should ask that question at the time that many of our peers appear to have insufficient amounts of capital. So no, we are very proud to have as much capital as we do, and we hope to keep growing it.Operator [Operator Instructions] And we have one more question. Our next question comes from Chris Allen from Citi.Chris Allen Just wanted to touch on– you noted that advertising spending was down year-over-year, helping drive G&A lower. Can you just give us an update on the marketing strategy here.
