Can someone recommend a broker with the following capabilities, please? #1. Direct access to post and execute orders on Instinet, Redibook, the Island, and ARCA, for both listed and NASDAQ stocks. #2. Ability to receive quotes for each ECN -- at least those above -- for many stocks via an API (preferably an ActiveX control, though a C++ lib is ok too). #3. Ability to send orders via the same or similar API, without restriction on the nature of those orders (like ECN routing, size, etc.) #4. Reasonable per-share commissions and/or relatively low or no per-ticket charges/minimums. #5. Extended hours trading from at least 7:30 AM to 8:00 PM (New York time). I've made the rounds of some of the brokers mentioned here, but they all fall short in some way. Interactive Brokers (IB) is the closest, but fails on #3 because you have to route stock orders to their SMART routing algorithm.
I've heard echotrade (pro firm) offers an API .... (For 'good' accts) Contact them if you would like to find out. RTharp on this board works at their firm and helped me out with my questions.
Sprear, Leeds, & Kellogg has a system called Redi Plus. They have an ActiveX API that can send orders (VB or C+++). If you want to send orders based on bid and ask prices from individual ECN's you have to have more than just an API because most level II data feeds do not have the capability to seperate quotes out by ECN (even though they show the ECN names next to the DATA). There are several specialty packages that are available and used by most of the professional arbitrageurs (like myself). ITG has Quantex. Goldman Sachs owns TLW wich makes Tradefactory and Flextrader makes Flextrader...lol. Now for the bad News.....I am not sure if any introducing brokers will give out the redi API. You may have to be an institution and do business directly with SLK (that's how I get it).....but you should still check around. And as for the above named software packages, they are only front ends that work with your existing prime brokerage account, and most prime brokers have minimums in the 2 to 5 million range....If that suits you then I would recommend ITG. They will help you program anything you want for free....with expectation of tremendous order flow of course!