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I hate talking about what firm I trade with because I don't want to be a shill for anyone, but I put this same message in a post and since for some reason Echo has had a few negative reviews figured I should copy it here. I trade remotely and am very close to full automation, about 90+% of what I do is automated these days. I don't really know how anyone who has not hired a programmer and built some sort of automation can keep up anymore, it is just the way the business is these days.
Having been around the block in this business, can say I don't know why anyone who does automation would be anywhere but Echo. You get the leverage of prop plus very good support for developing your code. I can't tell you how many times I have been stumped trying to figure out a problem and they will have the Echo programmers send over a bunch of sample code that I can pretty much cut and paste into my app that fixes the prob.
Some of the recent reviews of Echo have been negative, and I can pretty much guess they are from the small traders that are getting squeezed out by the automated guys. There are only 2 real negatives to Echo, the new Merrill sheets that show you your positions and balances pretty much stink. The info is there, but it is not very pleasurable on your eyes to read it. And a couple times a month I find myself having to quickly log out and back in because a quote server I am on clipped me, which logging in fixes but with my program takes me 5 mins or so to get it all back up and running. I have experimented with back up quotes, but scrapped it because they've been good lately.
As for everything else, the back office support is very good, and it seems they really have morphed the firm into a place that almost specializes in remote traders with black boxes. If you have light to moderate volume (would guesstimate under 1 mil shares a day) they will want you to use the Active X through Echopro (Sterling) - Sterling works great but the Sterling support is lacking - however Echo programmers can troubleshoot Sterling issues better than Sterling can I have found. Once I found my shares increasing past 1 mil per day they offered me some even better connectivity options, they have FIX connections and even let you house a server on the exchange if you are so advanced that you need that kind of speed.
If you are a brand new trader who needs to learn how to trade, you might be better suited somewhere else. If you know how to trade and just want to be at the best place possible where you can have the best support and tools to make money, Echotrade is the place. |
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For years I felt confident and secure working with Echotrade, a firm that has now morphed into an entirely different animal: Bank of America-Merrill Lynch-Countrywide-clusterf*ck, inc. The blue skies of yesterday have been replaced by a growling mass of bad-karma clouds. Anyone else feel that storm coming? |
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