A problem with Trading the NQ using the dome

eternaldelight · Jul 29, 2020

@SammyJ TT allows the dom to be zoomed in or out on. "50 percent" zoom allows you to have 35 points (or 140 ticks) worth of levels visible on a standard laptop screen. What platform are you using btw? I find auto centering really ruins the feel of the price action and harms my read on things. Also with the rate at which the NQ moves you really need a high quality DOM to avoid certain glitches/lags. CQG is known for their quality but their desktop platform's DOM definitely ran into some issues when the market really got moving I can't see ninja trader or any of those kind of platforms being better than CQG desktop which is definitely behind TT in terms of quality. I heard that Sierra chart's DOM is up to snuff though and I'm aware of one guy on here who scalps the NQ using it. Haven't personally used it though.

@DarthSidious I'm guessing that's why CQG has to keep their DOM crazy wide? You can practically fit a coke can in between the bids and the asks lol. Hurts the read on the DOM imo. A lot of scalpers using TT will move the numbers for the levels off to the side and have the bid and ask columns right next to each other so they can better keep both the bids and the asks in their field of vision.

and to clarify im sure a lot of platforms are suitable for swing trading the NQ but for a hold time of seconds when the NQ is moving fast I really only think a few are probably suitable.

edit: for some practical advice to the OP outside of "ditch your platform" just go to "view" and then "zoom out" and you'll be able to see way more of the dom albeit not just locally like with the TT DOM.

DarthSidious · Jul 30, 2020

@SammyJ what's the actual platform you are using?
@eternaldelight I use CQG feed, but not using any of their platform. I have taken a look at their web platform, and it is okay, and good to know I can bypass Sierra if the need ever arises to close position etc., but I don't use any of CQG's platform. Use Sierra only for charting and trading. My broker AMP provides it at no cost, and I have been using Sierra for a long time. Can't complain about the DOM issue. I do have my complaints about Sierra, and the devs can be cunts, but the DOM is okay

DarthSidious · Jul 30, 2020

So basically what I do is something like this:

I always input orders in the chart window, in the ladder that you see attached to the chart. This one feature of Sierra makes it a killer product. The bid/ask will always be in that ladder. And you can place / move / cancel orders in one click, just like DOM. The only issue is of resolution. Sometimes, it is hard to place order in a specific price. You can have a low resolution chart to deal with it. I just put in a order kind of sort of in the correct spot, then use the DOM window to the right to fine tune it, if needed.

eternaldelight · Jul 30, 2020

DarthSidious said:
So basically what I do is something like this:

View attachment 236310

I always input orders in the chart window, in the ladder that you see attached to the chart. This one feature of Sierra makes it a killer product. The bid/ask will always be in that ladder. And you can place / move / cancel orders in one click, just like DOM. The only issue is of resolution. Sometimes, it is hard to place order in a specific price. You can have a low resolution chart to deal with it. I just put in a order kind of sort of in the correct spot, then use the DOM window to the right to fine tune it, if needed.

Nice. Yeah, that's the same set up ET poster CALLumbus uses (Sierra with CQG feed) to scalp the NQ and I know he swears by it. I don't think the issues I saw with CQG desktop were due to the data feed but rather the platform itself. I believe CQG uses the same feed for their rather pricey "integrated client" platform so I'm sure it's top notch. CQG desktop is still decent though, it would definitely be good as a back up platform like you mentioned. Definitely need to try out that combo of Sierra w/ CQG one of these days. Didn't know about that feature you mentioned, thanks for sharing that info.