Newbie: ZB, ZN, ZF & ZT Regular Trading Hours?

FT79 · Mar 23, 2008

Hi,

I'm from Europe and familar with the RTH of ES, NQ, etc (RTH is when the cash is open) but what are the RTH of the Interest Rate Products? You can use the Open Outcry hours (07:20 till 02:00 CT) but before 07:20 you have a lot of volume & activity.

I'm thinking of using the Bund hours for the Interest Products in the USA because you see volume & activity picking up when Europe Interest Rate products are open.

What is your opinion?

Thanks,
FT79

suburbantrdr · Mar 24, 2008

When I started trading treasuries a few years ago, my prop shop started all of us in the European trading session (1am to 730am ct). There has always been decent volume, etc but it really is the minor leagues. For a new guy the risk/reward profile is probably the best in that market.

My bosses now have the newest guys trading from 530pm to 3am ct (the Asian trading session) which to me is like watching paint dry. I guess the guys do not lose money very often but wow! Talk about low volume and low volatilty.

Its really up to you, but my opinion is that trading the European session will let you learn the treasuries while letting you make a few newbie mistakes.

FT79 · Mar 25, 2008

Quote from suburbantrdr:

When I started trading treasuries a few years ago, my prop shop started all of us in the European trading session (1am to 730am ct). There has always been decent volume, etc but it really is the minor leagues. For a new guy the risk/reward profile is probably the best in that market.

My bosses now have the newest guys trading from 530pm to 3am ct (the Asian trading session) which to me is like watching paint dry. I guess the guys do not lose money very often but wow! Talk about low volume and low volatilty.

Its really up to you, but my opinion is that trading the European session will let you learn the treasuries while letting you make a few newbie mistakes.

Hi Suburbantrdr,

Why aren't they trading during the US session? Don't they need some kind of liquidity and activity when trading. I would rather trade during the US session because you can easily increase your size.

Thanks,
FT79

suburbantrdr · Mar 26, 2008

There is plenty of size at night and since banks generally stick to their our business hours when working orders... there is enough paper to move the market around

The big issue of night versus day is risk/reward. If you are ready for the high risk/high reward time of the market (the day session) then for sure trade it. There is clearly more money to be made during that session.

However, if you are working on learning a system to trade (or programming one), running it at night will let you really learn that system without the absolute brutality of the day trade. For example; a big move in the bonds at night is 20 ticks to a point. During the day that can happen in 15-20 min under the right circumstances.

FT79 · Mar 26, 2008

Quote from suburbantrdr:

There is plenty of size at night and since banks generally stick to their our business hours when working orders... there is enough paper to move the market around

The big issue of night versus day is risk/reward. If you are ready for the high risk/high reward time of the market (the day session) then for sure trade it. There is clearly more money to be made during that session.

However, if you are working on learning a system to trade (or programming one), running it at night will let you really learn that system without the absolute brutality of the day trade. For example; a big move in the bonds at night is 20 ticks to a point. During the day that can happen in 15-20 min under the right circumstances.

I live in Europe and can only trade from 01:00 EST till the end. To be honest, risk is an important factor for me. I have traded the ES but currently trade the ZB/ZN. I can increase my size without increasing the risk and have the possibility to scale in and scale out of my position. I would rather have a small profit (and perhaps missing a big move) than let a profitable trade to become a losing one.

When do you trade and what do you look for? I watch the 3m charts of ZB, ZN, ZF & ES incl. the Market Depth and Time&Sales. I look for Swing setups (Fake Out, Shake Out kind of setups).