I can't speak for working in Singapore but I assume you'd have to get a work visa, perhaps form a company, etc. With the level of access to global markets via a number of brokers, including IB, you can trade from anywhere in the world. Thus I do not know if the advantages of going CAM route are worth it.
Question for Def or others One characteristic I notice when trading HSI on IB is quite a large number of high volume bars with the volume generated by a small number of "off dom" trades. These are often in the 100+ contracts range. I ask this question because there have been quite a large number today. 1) are these actually back end trades somewhere? 2) who is doing them (either who exactly or what type of entity)? 3) any idea what the timeframe of these entities is? 4) are they also trading against us in the "normal" market and are they, thus, likely to be pushing price around to attractive points to unload? 5) if they do trade against "us" do they have any noticeable repeat behaviours (like pushing price 5-6 points against themselves before pushing it back)? They don't seem to have negatively affected my trading but I they do stuff up any volume based reading (I think)? Any thoughts or advice much appreciated.
FGBS, I trade out of Singapore - but through a fund and not as an individual. I can tell you that personal income tax is very low (~15%) and I believe the IRS was/is offering tax breaks for futures traders. Singapore is quite agressive about attracting liquidity providers to the SGX. They issue work permits for traders to work as locals (including off the floor). There are also a number of futures trading arcades - Man, ABN Amro, Saxon Financials, UOBC Schneider, and possibly others. As for what contracts are traded locally - primarily the Nikkei 225 and MSCI Taiwan on the SGX. The Eurodollars contract has decent volume, and there is an emini JGB. You can also trade markets in HK, Korea, Japan, and Australia - more or less the same timezone.
Expiration is Thursday. The trades you are seeing are roll trades of the Jan future into the Feb. Volume in the today might have exceeded 20K contracts. The exchange novates and reports each leg as a separate trade and that's why you see the volume. You can participate and trade the roll two ways via IB: 1. Just enter outrights. The exchange will not allow the rolls to trade through a listed market. 2. Enter the combo directly. You can add the ticker to your screen via HSI chose <COMB> and then buy Feb/sell Jan. These orders have no impact that you can't see on the out right markets and normally won't impact the market.
kiwi, More than likely what you're seeing is roll-overs. I only have 1 trade > 100 lots on eSignal today?? bolter
Globex Euro, Pound and Yen futures are easily the most liquid and profitable in the PM. This is if you use hourly charts for moves since the markets don't move real quickly pricewise and this way you can catch a few more ticks
Thanks Buy1Sell2 Sounds like you prefer Globex major currencies to FX cash for PM trading? How many lots do you find you can easily move?