Quote from NickBarings:
Ddunbar,
You don't have that problem with futures ?! you gotta be kidding ?
daymargin for mini S&P of 500 ; 500$/71850$ =ONLY 0.69 %
That's a lot riskier that 2 % for forex in regard to debit situations

Quote from ddunbar:
Now you're talking about S&P e-minis? LOL.
First of all, That risk will be born by the stupid brokerages that offer that kind of DAYTRADE margin and don't have safeguards in effect. BUt they do, I'm sure. If your position drops 2.5 points, they'll probably liquidate your position. Those brokerages, if you notice, say nothing about a margin call. And that's b/c they won't call you for margin, they'll just liquidate your position.
Secondly, The S&P doesn't have nearly the volatility that currencies do either on an intraday or daily basis. So the probabilty of an account going negative trading S&P e-minis is remote.
Thirdly, there aren't any cross margining setups possible with the E-mini like there is in spot currencies. Eur.usd, Jpy.eur, usd.jpy, etc, that can easily wreak havoc given their correlation on margin should the positions go awry .
Quote from NickBarings:
Ddunbar,
5 % spike in the S&P in a few seconds
http://money.cnn.com/2001/01/03/markets/markets_newyork/
