amp review

B

ballsofgold

Just opened an account with amp. Was skeptical about them for a while but the initial impression has been good so far. The account opening process was smooth.

I really like their client web portal and live chat. This is compared to IB's site which is burdensome. You know that there is a human at the other end of the web portal, whereas IB felt like it was run by ariticial intelligence robots.

I have not yet started live trading, but plan to soon...i choose the xtrader transactional option as i dont want to run 1200 pounds of fix cost given that my holding period on auto-spreaded strategies are longer now.

They are a bit more expensive than IB...but i don't regret it so far.

Will come back with more comments on how i get on with autospreader fills and connectivity.
 
I don't know anything about AMP, except they are VERY small. See attached CFTC report.

Good luck, I hope it works well for you.

Bob
 

Attachments

As ballsofgold mentioned, AMP are good if you want to test out TT because of their transactional option. However, you will be charged a 50cent TTnet clearing fee which isn't capped. So, if you trade over 2400 contracts per month, it is probably worth looking for a new broker (assuming the commissions are the same). AMP should cap the TTNet clearing fee at $1200. Then it won't be an issue. (If you are not doing 2400 contracts a month, this doesn't matter)
 
rmorse said:
I don't know anything about AMP, except they are VERY small. See attached CFTC report.

Good luck, I hope it works well for you.

Bob
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Yes, that sounded most sincere.

rmorse said:
Funny, until you typed out his member name, I did not notice it. ballsofgold? That must be heavy.
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It would be most recommended that you insert your comments in more appropriate threads and not on a competitor's. It would make you look much prettier.
 
rmorse said:
I don't know anything about AMP, except they are VERY small. See attached CFTC report.
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They are small and they are self-clearing. Would your concern be somewhat alleviated if they cleared through a larger clearing-FCM?
 
I have no concern with a smaller FCM. They often offer a competitive product for retail traders. They have to try harder. The only issue you may come across with a smaller FCM is that they can't handle large overnight positions. They have to match your margin requirement with 8% of their capital.

I have nothing negative to say about them.
 
rmorse said:
They have to match your margin requirement with 8% of their capital.
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This statement above is inaccurate.

In Futures Markets - CFTC Rule 1.22 - it is now T+1 and the FCM has to cover the difference between customers account balance and the exchange required margins to carry the position.

Here is full description:

Effective November 14, 2014, however, the final implementation of CFTC Rule 1.22 will directly impact client activity.

There are two important aspects to CFTC Rule 1.22 of which you need to be aware. First, the rule prohibits FCMs from using one client's funds to cover the margin call of another client. This has been expanded to include the posting of margin at the respective exchange's clearinghouse. Under the rule, clients will have until 5:00 PM Chicago time on the day following the generation of a margin call (T+1) to deposit additional funds sufficient to resolve the call. The FCM will be required to utilize its own capital to meet the total of all clients' margin deficiencies that are not met by a deposit of new funds on T+1. Please note, this means that the FCM faces this requirement even if the margin call is resolved on T+1 by liquidation or market action.

The second change imposed by this rule is that the time allowed before an FCM must take a capital charge for an under margined account is reduced by two days. Currently, this action is necessary after a margin call reaches "5th day" (close of business T+4). Under the new requirements the FCM must compute a charge against its capital for the under margined account when a margin call reaches "3rd day" (close of business T+2). This capital charge is in addition to the capital utilized to cover client margin deficiencies as described above.

In addition to these two changes within CFTC Rule 1.22, it should be noted that under current exchange rules, a client with a margin call which has reached "5th day" (close of business T+4) is considered to be "under margined an unreasonable period of time" and is prohibited from initiating trades which are not risk (margin) reducing in nature (i.e. liquidation only). At this time, the exchanges are not changing that timeline to coincide with the close-of-business T+2 capital charge requirement in CFTC Rule 1.22.
 
jeb9999 said:
Please point to factual information that AMP is a clearing FCM.

They are not listed as a clearing firm by the CME.

http://www.cmegroup.com/tools-information/clearing-firms.html
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Another correction to these recent post: AMP is a Non-Clearing FCM. We use multiple clearing firms for exchange clearing. We offer 3 different data connections - CQG, Rithmic and TTnet. We route our customers trades through our clearing firms based on pricing and available trade routes.

By having multiple clearing relationships, this allows us to offer all of these exchanges:

CME, CBOT, NYMEX, COMEX, ICE-US & ICE-UK, EUREX, Sydney (SFE), Singapore (SGX)

And yes, our day trading margins and pricing are retail trader friendly.

Full Margins List: http://www.ampclearing.com/margins_req.html
Match or Beat Commissions: http://www.ampclearing.com/commissions.html
 
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