I'm referring to THEIR data link/s going down, not yours. a concern, especially if you're legging in or out of a butterfly/whatever and you execute the the short and the system goes down before you leg in the long side- certainly has the potential for disaster.
when i started with options, i went with fidelity because you can get thru to a human trader faster than any other retail broker i've tried. the commission trade off though makes it impractical- big difference going round trip on a combo and paying $100 when the same trade thru IB is $10. a dozen of those a month and you're talking real money. besides, still not redundant- if their system were down, they'd be flooded with calls.
so, what do you do to protect yourself?
of course, i have more than one broker. but, to really be covered (ie: have enough in another account to be able to short a large long position, or vis versa), you'd have to have somewhat substantial assets sitting over there doing nothing- like a nuclear fallout shelter stocked with canned goods. not an ideal solution.
i manage equities and have redundant connections (dsl, cable and, god forbid, dial up!). I also use 3 separate brokers. none of them are really set up for 1 small option trading account. besides, that's client $ and i won't be putting client $ at risk for a year or more (or never, if i fail to develop a system to earn consistent returns with my own money). anyway, my point is that i have structured my client $ so as to have multiple redundancies. would like to do the same with my personal option trading.
when i started with options, i went with fidelity because you can get thru to a human trader faster than any other retail broker i've tried. the commission trade off though makes it impractical- big difference going round trip on a combo and paying $100 when the same trade thru IB is $10. a dozen of those a month and you're talking real money. besides, still not redundant- if their system were down, they'd be flooded with calls.
so, what do you do to protect yourself?
of course, i have more than one broker. but, to really be covered (ie: have enough in another account to be able to short a large long position, or vis versa), you'd have to have somewhat substantial assets sitting over there doing nothing- like a nuclear fallout shelter stocked with canned goods. not an ideal solution.
i manage equities and have redundant connections (dsl, cable and, god forbid, dial up!). I also use 3 separate brokers. none of them are really set up for 1 small option trading account. besides, that's client $ and i won't be putting client $ at risk for a year or more (or never, if i fail to develop a system to earn consistent returns with my own money). anyway, my point is that i have structured my client $ so as to have multiple redundancies. would like to do the same with my personal option trading.