System Crashes at Prop Firms

[monistat7]

How many times per month do your systems crash at your prop firms (non-remote)? At my firm, the systems crash at least once per week. I want to know if other people experience the same problems because it costs me significant money when the systems go down.

My firm sometimes blames the data providers and sometimes blames the servers. Either way, I don't get any sort of compensation for my troubles.

 

[mnx]

it's good to know that the firm i work for isn't the only one with problems...

we didn't get trading yesterday until almost 11am, it was the first time in a while that we were totally shutdown...

as far as the software, the current version has a bug in it and my computer freezes once a day... sometimes 2 or 3 times. BRUTAL! (apparently there is a fix due very soon...)

we loose our connections to various ecns, have slow quotes or slow orders probably once a week i think... it's always a different ecn... sometimes our end, sometime it's theirs...... usually not a big deal, it's usually TRAC or ATTAIN or something else equally useless...

So I'd say we have minor problems once a week and a major problem (with downtime) once every 3 months or so...

hope that helps...

mnx

 

[TorontoTrader2]

Quote from mnx:

it's good to know that the firm i work for isn't the only one with problems...

we didn't get trading yesterday until almost 11am, it was the first time in a while that we were totally shutdown...

as far as the software, the current version has a bug in it and my computer freezes once a day... sometimes 2 or 3 times. BRUTAL! (apparently there is a fix due very soon...)

we loose our connections to various ecns, have slow quotes or slow orders probably once a week i think... it's always a different ecn... sometimes our end, sometime it's theirs...... usually not a big deal, it's usually TRAC or ATTAIN or something else equally useless...

So I'd say we have minor problems once a week and a major problem (with downtime) once every 3 months or so...

hope that helps...

mnx

It was like that when I was there in late 2002!

WAKE UP!! They don't give a shit about the traders. It's 2005 now... no investment in technology.

 

[rufus_4000]

Quote from TorontoTrader2:

It was like that when I was there in late 2002!

WAKE UP!! They don't give a shit about the traders. It's 2005 now... no investment in technology.

Interesting, it depends on how important technology is to your firm, I guess. Can you be a little more specific about the situation (I assume you guys are not comfortable naming the firms), such as whether the prop firm runs its own technology, outsource the technology to a clearing firm provider, a third-party provider, etc.

The only way to have a truly reliable system is to write your own, it is a lot of investment in time and resources, but by having the developers next to you, the chances of system outages becomes less frequent, and tie the developers' futures to the stability of the system, simple.

 

[artis74]

This is a loaded question. It isnt 100% on the firm if there is a tech issue. If you are trading on a completely inferior exchange like ICE or IPE the system crashes are exchange related and have little if anything to do with your company. If you are crashing on proven exchanges like CBOT,CME ect. then it is your firms problem and you need to find a new one.

 

[JMartinez]

Old ancient chinese secret or was it the ninja ways. "You get what you pay for."

There can be many reasons for this occurrence. Either:

a. slow quotes

b. routes don't work

c. All above.

If slow quotes depends on who they use and which service they are using from them. Example hyperfeed has about 3 different types of connection types.

Or the quotes could be all in house. Another thing to keep in mind is how your firm is connecting to the quotes and/ routes. Some have direct lines, VPN's, Internet, telecom like radianz or TNS. So it all depends on how cheap your firm is. The best connection type IMO direct lines. May cost more but you buy two, one for back up and use different carriers. You never know. 911 blew lots of networks but the smart cookies kept on ticking that day. Those might questions you might ask your software/bd to see how they are connected. VPN's or internet are kind of unstable, IMO vs. circuits.

Routes are the easiest to solve because if an ECN or DOT goes down just make sure you have a complete different ECN or DOT provider so that you can still keep trading. Also have another quote system so that you can have sometihng to look at instead of porn all day while you are down .

j--

 

[monistat7]

Quote from JMartinez:

Old ancient chinese secret or was it the ninja ways. "You get what you pay for."

There can be many reasons for this occurrence. Either:

a. slow quotes

b. routes don't work

c. All above.

If slow quotes depends on who they use and which service they are using from them. Example hyperfeed has about 3 different types of connection types.

Or the quotes could be all in house. Another thing to keep in mind is how your firm is connecting to the quotes and/ routes. Some have direct lines, VPN's, Internet, telecom like radianz or TNS. So it all depends on how cheap your firm is. The best connection type IMO direct lines. May cost more but you buy two, one for back up and use different carriers. You never know. 911 blew lots of networks but the smart cookies kept on ticking that day. Those might questions you might ask your software/bd to see how they are connected. VPN's or internet are kind of unstable, IMO vs. circuits.

Routes are the easiest to solve because if an ECN or DOT goes down just make sure you have a complete different ECN or DOT provider so that you can still keep trading. Also have another quote system so that you can have sometihng to look at instead of porn all day while you are down .

j--

would you happen to know who are the worst quote providers and what firms use them? thanks.

 

[JMartinez]

It all depends on how the firms are connected to the quotes and how those firms are connected to the exchanges/ecn's. And then it also depends on how you are connected to your software. Some people have internet connections vs. others have t1 going to the software. Lots of variables in there.

The common quote feeds providers are:

Hyperfeed
Esignal
Realtick
Reuters
Bloomberg
and a couple of smaller ones

or your firm can have their own connections to the exchanges/ecn's.

You may want to ask them.


But from the above quote feed people, there are different ways that people connect to them. Theres the cheap way and the expensive way. All comes back down to Ninja ways.

 

[Don Bright]

Quote from monistat7:

How many times per month do your systems crash at your prop firms (non-remote)? At my firm, the systems crash at least once per week. I want to know if other people experience the same problems because it costs me significant money when the systems go down.

My firm sometimes blames the data providers and sometimes blames the servers. Either way, I don't get any sort of compensation for my troubles.

We have an excellent "up time" record, but I want to make a point to those out there who think that a minute' or two is going to have a big impact on their P&L.

I tell my bootcampers that they have a 50/50 chance when a line goes down, computers crash, or whatever....half the time they make money, half the time they lose $$ (just by definition).

I rarely hear "hey, my DSL line went down, and when it came back up I made 1.35 on the trade" --- I do hear, quite often, "geez, if it weren't for the light going out (or whatever), I would have made a zillion dollars.

Have the best "stuff" - trade well, and don't sweat the small interuptions that occur from time to time (but be sure if you're encountering a repeating problem that can be fixed, that your firm fixes it...it's in both your best interests.

Don