IB: Data & Backfill Servers

[OnlyIf]

IB,

It used to be that if you wanted to trade asia you homed off the HK server for minimum latency. Similarly off the US server for US markets. And if you homed of HK it was assumed that your US data went via HK.

Now though, when homed off HK, I see server connections opened in the US for data and for backfill. Does this mean that we get our US exchange Data directly from a US server now without the HK server being in the data path? Similarly, does this mean that our US exchange backfill comes direct from the US?

If so, is there no penalty for hosting off the HK server to trade the US markets?

 

[OnlyIf]

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[OnlyIf]

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[OnlyIf]

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[def]

Quote from OnlyIf:

IB,

It used to be that if you wanted to trade asia you homed off the HK server for minimum latency. Similarly off the US server for US markets. And if you homed of HK it was assumed that your US data went via HK.

Now though, when homed off HK, I see server connections opened in the US for data and for backfill. Does this mean that we get our US exchange Data directly from a US server now without the HK server being in the data path? Similarly, does this mean that our US exchange backfill comes direct from the US?

If so, is there no penalty for hosting off the HK server to trade the US markets?

I'm a bit reluctant to respond as this isn't my area of expertise however I'll give it a shot.

I don't think it makes a difference which server you are on as long as you are not on the foreign server and trading the local market (ie. live in HK, on US server, trade HK). The key is your ISP. If your overseas connection is excellent it shouldn't matter. If however, it is slow you want to get into the IB network as quickly as possible and that would be via the local server.

For example, I've seen cases where a neighboring country's ISP had large delays into HK and thus the US server would have been better (calls/comlpaints to the ISP to fix their routing solved that problem).

Hope this helps with a start to your answer.

 

[OnlyIf]

Thanks def,

Thats half the answer and reflects how I think IB used to behave. It seems now that you connect to US servers even though your home exchange is HK. What I'm trying to understand is "does that mean that I now get my US data direct from a US server or is it still coming through the HK server?"

I might set up some sort of snoop software and try to see where my eurfx feed is now coming from.

 

[def]

Quote from OnlyIf:

Thanks def,

Thats half the answer and reflects how I think IB used to behave. It seems now that you connect to US servers even though your home exchange is HK. What I'm trying to understand is "does that mean that I now get my US data direct from a US server or is it still coming through the HK server?"

I might set up some sort of snoop software and try to see where my eurfx feed is now coming from.

data in most cases comes direct from the API into the exchange. That API naturally resides in the local market/server farm. From there it enters into our system and it disseminated accordingly. There is really no difference than before other than the additional resources that are continually poured into making the server farms faster and more robust.

 

[OnlyIf]

Thanks Def,

I set up PRTG Traffic Grapher and winpcap3.1 ( free and very good for anyone who wants to look at traffic usage ).

My Sierra Chart setup collects data on HSI HHI and SGXNK normally. In that situation my connections were to gw1.ibllc.com.hk and mktgw1.ibllc.com.hk (the majority of the data goes to the latter).

I then added 6EU6 to TWS. At that point a connection opened to mktgw1.ibllc.com (which is on the east coast of the usa) and data collected at a rate that seemed proportional to the 6EU6 activity.

So the very good news (other than finding PRTG Traffic Grapher) is that if your server is IB Hong Kong you suffer no double hop delays to get data from the US (I am in Australia). Well done IB

 

[kostia00]

The market data is now distributed from the server farm located in the same region as exchange. The orders submitted by TWS, however, go thru the region where your initial connection is made. Hence if you trade Asia products, and first connect to US servers, your orders for Asia products would be making unnecessary round-trip to US server and back.

 

[OnlyIf]

Thanks for the clarification - can you advise the round trip delay from the HK IB server to the US servers that would place the order.

My rtping to HK is 178ms vs 350ms to the US so I might still be better going through HK than the circuitous route Telstra uses to reach your US servers.