I have experience with them both. What kind of trader are you? How often will you trade? Are you generally a do-it-yourself person or do you like to have customer service just in case?
Dear Jood, there are a lot of posts about both of these companies. Do a search (upper right hand corner) for each one and you'll see. Personally, I would stay away from FXCM (see my past posts and others). I haven't used OANDA. Some people here like them, but if you are an "extreme scalper" (like some of our traders are), you will get kicked out. Good luck.
definetely go with FXCM. not only they have great execution but also awesome service. the most options any other broker has, ever.
Y'all and your news trading, after all that has been written here about this failed strategy and still there are posts like this, amazing. The Ever Amazed VIPER
actually, i saw that 200 pip spread you're talking about last NFP...i watch various price feeds...it was 200 pips on GBP. i don't trade with Oanda for this reason: either their bank relationships are limited or poor quality or they're just too small (client base-wise) to not be able to maintain a reasonable spread on a Major currency pairing no less...NFP or otherwise. i trade my hard-earned capital only with bigger firms that, in my opinion, more often than not give me solid pricing/execution. still, i find that their (Oanda) pricing is good to watch just to get another perspective of where retail market makers might be pricing relative to each other. if you watch any other decently sized market maker's pricing you'll see a fairly stable fluctuation in spreads (assuming it's a multi-bank/no dealing desk feed). nothing obscene like 200 pips...can you imagine how many people may have been margin-called or stopped out on a 200 pip widening of the spread? crazy.
To be fair, you have to mention that oanda admitted that the 200 spread was an operator error (meant to be 20 pips, bad enough tho), and that trades that were executed at this time are being reversed.
hi Pippi, that's very promising to hear...i'm glad you looked into it and got that detail from them. still, i'm a bit skiddish of their size and how they make a market... just eyeballing their pricing for example day-to-day i see that they shade their prices. this is not uncommon and not illegal...it's simply a tool market makers use to help avoid taking on financial risk if they don't have enough liquidity to necessarily fill their client orders at more favorable prices. for me, this is anecdotal evidence of market maker's size. again, for the time being i'm not comfortable keeping my money with them...maybe one day if they get bigger relative to the leaders in the industry. it's one thing to take risk everyday trading, it's another thing altogether to have to worry about the staying power of the firm i keep my money with.