HOLD BROTHERS

Mugshot,

the deal was for $1 in and $1 out,no per share fee up to 5,000 shares,ECN fees do apply,but if you use the ATTAIN ECN you get a .0002 cent rebate.Payout is 50/50 initially,60/40 after 2 months if profitable.Reason given by the recruiter for the low payout was that they make money from the traders profits as opposed to execution costs,good deal??what else should I ask about??Are you a Prop trader??thanks Mug
 
Rope,

If they hold true to this deal it is very good. If I understand correctly, you can trade 1000 share lots for $1 in, $1 out. On that kind of deal it is very difficult NOT to make money. It just seems too good to be true. If they are willing to put it in writing I would go for it. Just be careful, something does not smell right here. As for me, I am not a prop trader but at those rates I would be willing to become one.

 
Mug,
went to the firm today to re-confirm my deal here it is in a nutshell,some details left out

>$1 in and $1 out from 1 to 5,000 plus ECN charges,but no markup on those fees,flat rate,no per share commision charges
>50/50 payout initially,60/40 after 2 months,negotiable after 120 days
>I would be a W-2 employee and not a self employed trader,therefore I get the standard benefit package,medical,dental,401k,etc.
>No desk fee,no software charges
>No amount held in reserve for losses,trader's profit share payable in full on 15th of following month
>During part of the initial training period,trainees trade live with real money,dependent on ability this determines how many shares and positions trader can begin with,average trader starts at 200 to 400 shares and can maintain up to 3 positions

Dont really know if this is a good deal,would appreciate input,thanks guys
 
Klaorman,
Saw your post in the Bullets thread, sorry can't help you there. How is the remote trading going with Graybox, specifically with regard to execution speed, downtime and use of smart and other orders. Are you feeling more comfortable with the software? How are they treating you in general?

Tom
 
tom_p,

The remote trading is going very well. Besides the couple of hiccups in the quotes at the end of last month, the datafeed has been rock solid. QCharts quotes have been very steady the past few weeks, but the Graybox quotes consistently beat them by about a half second.

I'm mainly sticking with Smart Orders to hit the inside, Blasting to go beyond the inside and ISLD to bid and offer and the executions have been consistently instantaneous.

I'm comfortable with the software only to the extent that I use the above order types. There are many more order types and interfaces available. As I've mentioned before, the SelectNet Preference box seems to be what most of the in-house traders use. But it looks cumbersome and slow to me (especially after Speedracer's description of how he uses it, with so many keystrokes), so I'll probably never touch it.

Some things I don't like about the software:

* The buying power is only correct at the beginning of the day. After every trade I do, the amount increases, even if I've lost money!

* The window layouts are still not loading correctly, even after a recent update.

* There's no protection from overselling a stock or shorting a stock on their hard-to-borrow list. Once or twice I've mistakenly sold too many shares and got short on one trade. They say I have to cover the short within 1 minute or I would get a Type D violation. I asked them why the software doesn't detect overselling and they said they allow this because their traders use bullets/conversions/hedges and this "feature" allows them to easily get short. This doesn't seem to make sense to me; aren't they just dumping their long to get synthetically short? I also have to manually check that I'm not shorting a stock on their hard-to-borrow list. If I make a mistake, I'll have to do the cover-within-a-minute thing. Every other software I've used (Tradescape, RealTick, online brokers) automatically prevent me from shorting non-shortable stock.

Their treatment of me is generally ok. The tech guy has an attitude, though. I dislike talking to him. The accounts guy doesn't service my requests quickly. For example, new traders are supposed to get their first 100 trades for free (from an Active Trader mag ad). However, I started getting charged way before the 100 trades were up. I asked the accounts guy about this and he said he would look into it. It took more than 3 weeks of needling before he finally said that he'll personally make sure that the next 100 trades (starting next Monday) will be free. We'll see. I also asked him about a cap on the commissions per trade and he said he's working on that for me. That was about a week ago.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top