Read-only MCP server for Interactive Brokers

Updated: 2026-07-18 21:05 CEST

canary mcp is intentionally a read-only MCP server for Interactive Brokers. It gives AI assistants account and market context from IB Gateway or TWS, but it does not expose a place-order, modify-order, or cancel-order tool.

The read-only boundary is what makes the rest of the platform workable. Because agents hold no order-entry tools, regime context, stress checks, the rulebook, risk policy, and statement reconciliation can use the available portfolio and market context without gaining execution authority.

This page describes the standard downloads: the installer, the Claude Desktop bundle, and the plain canary tarballs. Releases also publish a separate, clearly marked canary-trading tarball for users who explicitly opt into order management; nothing on this page applies to that variant, and it is never installed by default.

This is a capability boundary, not a claim that market data is complete. Quotes, chains, and scans still depend on the connected account's entitlements, the market session, and source freshness.

What read-only means here

Allowed surfaces:

• account summary, cash, margin, buying power, daily P&L
• positions, option legs, marks, and Greek coverage
• quotes, quote freshness, daily bars, and official market calendars
• option chains, expiries, expected moves, scanners, breadth, dealer gamma, and risk regime
• fixed-fractional position sizing as math only

Not exposed:

• no order placement
• no order modification
• no order cancellation
• no hosted broker credential store
• no remote service sitting between the assistant and IBKR

Why this matters for agents

Agentic workflows are useful for analysis: "what do I own?", "what changed today?", "which positions carry option delta?", "is the market regime stressed?", and "how large is this hypothetical trade?". Those questions need account and market data, not order-entry authority.

canary keeps that boundary explicit. The MCP tool list is generated from the same source as the CLI documentation, and the public references call out that lifecycle and trading verbs stay outside the MCP surface.

Install

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/osauer/canary/main/install.sh | sh
canary status

For Claude Desktop, install:

https://github.com/osauer/canary/releases/latest/download/canary.mcpb

For a generic local MCP host:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "canary": {
      "command": "/ABSOLUTE/PATH/TO/canary",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Good assistant prompts

• "Summarize my IBKR account and positions."
• "Show positions by underlying and include option Greeks."
• "Are any watchlist quotes stale because the market is closed?"
• "How does today's risk regime look?"
• "For this hypothetical entry and stop, what position size risks 1%?"

If the assistant tries to trade through canary mcp, it has reached outside the tool's capability boundary.

References

• IBKR MCP server for the main server overview.
• Working with agents for example conversations.
• MCP tools reference for the read-only tool inventory.