I am glad to see a few other futures scalpers here (e.g., rtstrading, jboydston, praetorian2). Maybe we need a separate thread Most of the time I scalp te S&P and Nasdaq e-minis. Sometimes I also scalp the Qs, SPY, DIA and a couple of other very liquid stocks. I use IB for all my scalping and I'm a happy customer good execution, low prices, satisfactory record management. In my usual day, I do 5-10 S&P trades and a similar number of Naz trades. Like others here, I often have a headache at the end of the day - I guess that' part of scalping as well However, my P&L is fine and my commisions are about 5% of the total gain, so I can't complain too much...
Does anyone have any experience with international futures markets? I tried to load GBM2 (EURO BUND), but I think IB requires that you fund a EURO account for the EUREX exchange. Can anyone confirm this?
I've always been under the impression that "scalping" per se means buying the bid and selling the offer.
bungrinder, You have it a little backwards, momentum traders buy the offer (trading with an up tick in the Spu) and sell the bid with a conversion or bullet, if you are buy the bud to establish a long position, then you are losing all the probability of the trading going your way. Scaplers trade in the direction of the stock not against it.
I have been looking for some heavy scaplers to swap ideas with. I trade NYSE only, 500,000 to 800,000 a day depending if the afternoon is busy. I pretty much do the same thing, spus tick up I buy, spus tick down I sell. I trade the stocks everyday. Conversions are a must. Bachelier, what have you been paying in bullets, or do you put on conversions? Are you listening to the Spu's through squak box?
Bungrider, The condition you mentioned is a necessary (vast majority of the times) condition but not sufficient to define scalping. In my experience, scalping is trading a specific instrument for small gains, repeatedly. The small profit target (in my case, 2 pts S&P and 10 pts Naz) and the repetitive nature of it (10-20 trades/day) is the best definition of scalping that comes to mind. An occasional headache too
Bond traders are used to moving millions of dollars of securities just to capture half a penny on par. I guess you could call what I do scalping.
I know guys who go for .5 to 1 in the ES on 4-8 cantracts and 3 to 5 in the NQ on 5-10 contracts and that is to me is scalping. I guess I figured true scalping would be trying capture the spread (most floor traders). I trade for 5-10 pts on the NQ 7-10 times a day and I don't think of myself as a scalper. Just a short term daytrader.
I am an active scalper; I trade all day long, NASDAQ 100 only. My firm trades a unheard of amount of shares per day. I am curious what other firms are producing in their scalping efforts..
If you want info on scalping give us some info to back up your claims. What firm do you trade at? What type of volume does your firm and self trade? What are these great rates you are talking about? If you want info from people here, I have found you have better luck giving some first.