What do you trade with them, just futures or do you trade spot as well? Have they sorted out FX Trader yet?
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Your Broker Is Your Enemy?
- Thread starter DRiSsT
- Start date
What do you trade with them, just futures or do you trade spot as well? Have they sorted out FX Trader yet?
Quote from DRiSsT:
So which Broker do you all think is the best one out there that doesn't screw you as much?
Right now there are very few choices for retail traders:
if you are a rapid in/rapid out trader (common misused term is scalper) then you want to look at one of the ECN shops out there. An ECN doesn't take the other side - they only try to match it up either thru existing orders on their system or thru their interbank liquidity partners. They don't care about your trading because they have no vested interest - they make their money on the commission. The top 2 are IB (which allows you to trade spot vs futures) and HotSpotFXr, a division of Knight Trading. The hotspot platform is one of the top platforms of choice on many hedge fund and bank and brokers desks. A third choice is MB trading, but I have no direct recent experience to forward an opinion. There are enough people here and elsewhere to give you their assessment on this broker.
If you are more of a swing trader and trade smaller sizes, then the MM house may be your best bet. GFT and Oanda are the top 2. Yes there is an Oanda thread here that is not too complimentary but it may be that the style of trading leads to conflict with the broker's system. There are others here, and elsewhere, who can offer their opinion of these firms.
Firms to avoid: FXCM (unless you are just starting out and in the learning stage - they have a great visual platform and you can open account with as little as 500); Saxobank (also rebranded CitiFx), just about any metatrader platform broker (they are great for charting, but contrary to what anyone claims on their webpage, if they use metatrader then there IS a dealing desk behind the the platform - it is part of the software)
Also, check out the recent financials of the broker you wish to work with here:
http://www.cftc.gov/marketreports/financialdataforfcms/
You can get an idea of the financial health of the firm from these figures.
You say you are new to fx trading - I suggest you take your time to feel the market. It takes time to learn this market and it is best to use little or no money until you feel confident to risk a greater share of your assets.
Also, get good with TA. No other market is as affected by TA than fx, imo.
Regards.
Quote from cvds16:
I trade spot and SIF's
If you use the FX Trader 'bolt-on' does it all work ok now because when I used it a couple of years ago there were all sorts of problems (I actually had an order filled on Eur/Usd when I'd clicked Gbp/Usd, I'm serious!), and position and p/l tracking was a nightmare. I quite liked the platform so if it works ok now it might be worth another look.
Thanks
Quote from cstfx:
you want to look at one of the ECN shops out there. An ECN doesn't take the other side
ECNs *ARE* the real Forex marketplace, not the buket shops that use Metatrader.
I totally agree. Search for "metatrader fraud" on google ...
Firms to avoid: ...just about any metatrader ...
You say you are new to fx trading - I suggest you take your time to feel the market. It takes time to learn this market and it is best to use little or no money
I think this is the BEST tip someone could give to you: DO NOT USE REAL MONEY !!!
Spot is the best place to simulate: request a long term demo account, and trade as if you put real money on it. This is the only way to start and survive.
Quote from operator:
really....there is no "real" market place for retail forex. just have to pick your poison...
Maybe the right marketplace to play in is the one where all these guys play:
Aareal Bank
ABN AMRO
AIG
ANZ Banking Group
Banca Nazionale di Lavoro
Bank of America
Bank of Ireland
Bank of Montreal
Bank of New York
Bank of New Zealand
Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi
Bank One
Banque Cantonale Vaudoise
Banque Générale du Luxembourg
Barclays Capital
Bayerische Landesbank
Bear Stearns
BNP Paribas
Brown Brothers Harriman
Business Development Bank of Canada
Calyon
CDC IXIS
CIBC World Markets
Citibank
Commerzbank
Commonwealth Bank of Australia
Credit Suisse First Boston
Danske Bank
Deutsche Bank
Deutsche Postbank International
Dexia Bank
Dresdner Bank
DZ Bank
Fifth Third Bancorp
Fimat
Fortis Bank
Goldman Sachs
Handelsbanken
HSBC
HSBC Trinkaus & Burkhardt
HSH Nordbank
HypoVereinsbank
ING
ING BHF-Bank
IntesaBCI
JPMorgan Chase
Jyske Bank
KBC
Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen
LBBW
Lehman Brothers
Lloyds TSB
Macquarie Bank
Mellon Bank
Merrill Lynch
Metzler
Mitsubishi Trust and Banking Corp
Morgan Stanley
National Australia Bank
Nordea
PNC Bank
Rabobank
Rand Merchant Bank
Royal Bank of Canada
Royal Bank of Scotland
Scotia Capital
SEB
Société Générale
Standard Bank of South Africa
Standard Chartered Bank
State Street
Sumitomo Trust & Banking
Swiss Union of Raiffeisen Banks
Svenska Handelsbanken
The Northern Trust Company
The Travelex Group
Toronto Dominion Bank
Trust & Custody Services Bank
UBS
UFJ Bank
Wachovia Securities
Westfalenbank
WestLB
Westpac
WGZ-Bank
Zürcher Kantonalbank
Is it real enough or I'm missing someone ?
I thought the ECN v Marketmaker Bucketshop issue had been debated to death, obviously not!
Bucketshops have their place, ECN's are not automatically the best place for every trader, it depends on what you need.
There was a good thread about it here
Price manipulation aside, one of the plusses about companies like Oanda is you can place and manage trades over the weekend, you can't do that with an ECN! Another plus can be across volatile data like NFP, a bucketshop just fills your market order up to 10m no problem whereas you're quite likely to get partial fills at best on an ECN. Minimum account opening balance and trade size is smaller with a bucketshop, ideal for someone just starting out.......need I go on?
If the bucketshop you choose is reasonably honest then why bother with the 'real' market, personally I don't really care who's on the other side of my trade as long as they stay solvent! A lot of the ECN-style NDD hype is just a marketing exercise by companies looking for new ways to increase market share in a competitive business. A lot of these companies aren't truly brokers anyway, they're counterparty just like a bucketshop, with the same conflicts of interest and motives to trade against clients.
Why fix what ain't broke? If they fill your orders at the price you want and don't manipulate price too much or run your stops then what's the problem?
Bucketshops have their place, ECN's are not automatically the best place for every trader, it depends on what you need.
There was a good thread about it here
Price manipulation aside, one of the plusses about companies like Oanda is you can place and manage trades over the weekend, you can't do that with an ECN! Another plus can be across volatile data like NFP, a bucketshop just fills your market order up to 10m no problem whereas you're quite likely to get partial fills at best on an ECN. Minimum account opening balance and trade size is smaller with a bucketshop, ideal for someone just starting out.......need I go on?
If the bucketshop you choose is reasonably honest then why bother with the 'real' market, personally I don't really care who's on the other side of my trade as long as they stay solvent! A lot of the ECN-style NDD hype is just a marketing exercise by companies looking for new ways to increase market share in a competitive business. A lot of these companies aren't truly brokers anyway, they're counterparty just like a bucketshop, with the same conflicts of interest and motives to trade against clients.
Why fix what ain't broke? If they fill your orders at the price you want and don't manipulate price too much or run your stops then what's the problem?
Quote from GabrieleV:
I think this is the BEST tip someone could give to you: DO NOT USE REAL MONEY !!!
Spot is the best place to simulate: request a long term demo account, and trade as if you put real money on it. This is the only way to start and survive.
Using a demo is great to learn this market, but sooner or later you have to drop the trigger on a real trade that has YOUR money at stake. Trading demo and trading live can be 2 very different experiences as psychology can play a strong role in how it affects your trading decisions.
So demo for a while and then try your own money with an account that allows to to trade small sizes, i.e 10,000 bcu as opposed to the standard 100k. If you can succeed in this environment with real money on the line only then are you able to move to the next level.
There are SO MANY people who have traded this market and made mistakes and either learned from them or failed. I strongly suggest you seek out this information and try to take it to heart. It is all on the net. You just have to take the time to look for it and read it.
Learn from someone else's mistakes - don't repeat the same thing if you could have avoided it.
Good Luck.