How much latency is too much for day trading?

[AbbotAle]

As others have said, if you're using the mouse, latency isn't a problem (assuming it's half decent).

Also, have you considered changing to IB's Euro server? I think they have one in London and probably Germany, maybe more.

 

[MarkBrown]

you can always send buy and sell orders simultaneously to different geographical exchanges and use the latency to your advantage to obtain less latency than anyone can get using hardware alone. this is real hft.

 

[jharmon]

you can always send buy and sell orders simultaneously to different geographical exchanges and use the latency to your advantage to obtain less latency than anyone can get using hardware alone. this is real hft.

LOL

 

[traider]

learn programming
get colocation
latency reduced

 

[george_the_second]

As others have said, if you're using the mouse, latency isn't a problem (assuming it's half decent).

Also, have you considered changing to IB's Euro server? I think they have one in London and probably Germany, maybe more.

I am connected to IB's UK server. But for trading US products they, too, have to get data from the exchanges from across the ocean, so am I correct to be taking the latency to IB US as benchmark?

 

[Scataphagos]

Hi, guys, I live in the EU and have an account with IB, using TWS, subscribed to their real-time market data.

I am looking to trade mainly US markets due to the high liquidity. The latency to the broker's US server is 120 ms.

The style of trading I'm most comfortable with holds positions from tens of seconds to minutes. I am looking to trade mainly with limit orders, stop orders and sometimes market orders to exit positions in very fast market movements.

I'm curious of your opinion whether this latency can be used reasonably for the above trading style? Also, are there any improvements that can be made (apart from algo-trading from a US server)? Would you recommend any specific type of setup?

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Personally, I wouldn't bother with latency concerns unless they are extreme, and maybe not even then... by that I mean measured in SECONDS, not MS.

With prices fluctuating noisily as they do, you don't know whether the next tick or two will be up or down.... whether it will help or hurt your fill by a penny or two. Besides, you can't "see a trade and click the mouse" fast enough to make a difference that might be influenced by latency. Over time and a number of trades, any "latency randomness" should even out. If you perceive your success being influenced by latency, you're "fishin' in a dry hole" anyway.

 

[Turveyd]

smaller is better, because it adds to your own clicking thought speed, but 120 is fine unless your proper scalping for a tick or 2 I guess.

 

[yc47ib]

I do day trading.
In most cases, the latency is < 1 sec.

Occasionally, during the US session when there was very major US news / event,
internet traffic would be extremely heavy and
the charting software and trading platform would freeze for a few minutes to half an hour!
This is despite the fact that I have a good gaming PC and high-speed internet connection.


There is hardly any latency issue during the Asian and European sessions.
Well. hope this US election wouldn't create such a bad latency problem.

few minutes to half an hour is not right, some brokers and data feed have this issue, CQG rarely to never, you might consider switch. I had this issue with Gain Capital's data feed. Transferred out since.

 

[HobbyTrading]

Hi, guys, I live in the EU and have an account with IB, using TWS, subscribed to their real-time market data.

I am looking to trade mainly US markets due to the high liquidity. The latency to the broker's US server is 120 ms.

The style of trading I'm most comfortable with holds positions from tens of seconds to minutes. I am looking to trade mainly with limit orders, stop orders and sometimes market orders to exit positions in very fast market movements.

I'm curious of your opinion whether this latency can be used reasonably for the above trading style? Also, are there any improvements that can be made (apart from algo-trading from a US server)? Would you recommend any specific type of setup?

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

You specify the latency from the internet connection. But you forgot to mention that IB does not send every tick to your TWS. They aggregate ticks and send you an update every 250 ms (forex: 50 ms). This will add to the combined latency.

 

[george_the_second]

Ah, yes, I now remember reading about that, thanks

They do mention that there is a distinction between market data and tick by tick, and the latter is available in the time&sales window starting with TWS v969.
https://interactivebrokers.github.io/tws-api/top_data.html

In any case, to broaden my perspective, do you have any recommended alternatives for affordable tick streaming data? I have seen IQfeed mentioned in another post.