Buyer Beware: Tradestation will flag you as a professional if you don't use gmail, yahoo, etc

Discussion in 'Retail Brokers' started by gaussian, Nov 28, 2018.

  1. Overnight

    Overnight

    Oh, I see. That vid has some preview bit with a German TV station in it. It is a video which showed what I wanted to portray, didn't even notice the blurb, heh
     
    #41     Nov 28, 2018
  2. JSOP

    JSOP

    Well they are charging commissions and that is the revenue right there. They should have no partaking in any rebates that I earn. The rebates that I earn is from the exchanges, fair and square due to my order routing and getting the order filled. If they are going to hijack some of the rebates that the exchanges pay me, are they going to reimburse me for the rebates that I pay to exchanges for getting my order filled? That's only fair.
     
    #42     Nov 28, 2018
  3. Overnight

    Overnight

    It almost seems like, in this maelstrom of pricing wars, a rebate could be considered just a discount rate on transactions?

    Methinks I am missing a piece of this rebate puzzle.

    What do they consider a "rebate" in this context?
     
    #43     Nov 28, 2018
  4. wrbtrader

    wrbtrader

    Its private school...they tend to do things differently than public schools. In addition, never said was the US.

    Regardless, no need for me to explain to you any aspect of the school policies.

    Anyways, you should be very busy tomorrow talking to a TradeStation account rep.

    Don't take it personally about what TradeStation did...most likely someone thought in error that you're associated with a financial website or firm. Make sure you specifically ask them why they think you're a "professional"...I'm sure you can get this problem fixed via one phone call.

    If not, find another broker and get a email account with gmail, Yahoo or any other free email address or use the one your ISP gave you (most let you create several different email addresses associated with your main account with the ISP).

    wrbtrader
     
    #44     Nov 28, 2018
    Overnight likes this.
  5. JSOP

    JSOP

    Anything they can get their hands on.
     
    #45     Nov 29, 2018
  6. ajacobson

    ajacobson

    Actually fairly common and it works the other way as well. Without disclosing your email - what is the domain name. Many institutional events won't let you participate without an institutional/ business domain name. Before you rush to move your account - try to resolve it first. It's entirely possible that whatever is in your domain triggered the event - will trigger it elsewhere

    On another note if you want to see if a firm interacts with some form of payment look at their form 606. Discloses a lot about routing. With the exception of a handful of institutional firms I am yet to see any retail firm NOT interact with payment. Some talk about it as only be used to break ties and some consider maker/taker as not being a form of payment. For reporting purposes M/T needs to be disclosed as a form of payment. One of the reasons the 606 was created everyone with bullshitting about payment and routing agreements. Believe no one and check the 606. The tricky one is routing to a venue that may not pay, but where you are an owner.
     
    #46     Nov 29, 2018
    murray t turtle likes this.
  7. JSOP

    JSOP

    See this is where it gets me. I thought in exchange-traded products, everything is supposed to be traded on exchanges, and brokers are supposed to be strictly acting as agents matching sellers with buyers and vice versa and earning a commission in return and should not act like principle in a transaction unlike in retail forex (I mean this is one of the primary reasons why many of us would rather pay so much exchange fees, FINRA fees, regulatory fees, this fee, that fee to trade non-forex products instead of retail forex where liquidity and potential profitability is lot higher and commission and cost is so much cheaper) but if the order routing ends up routing the order to one of the exchanges that they own, doesn't that mean they just became the principle to the trades and they just became those market makers like in retail forex which results in conflict of interest? Isn't that not allowed by SEC? So how can brokers still be allowed to route orders to exchanges or venues that they own? I mean it's great this document 606 discloses the order routing information and possible payment for order flow but it's meaningless if nobody does anything with it.
     
    Last edited: Nov 29, 2018
    #47     Nov 29, 2018
  8. ajacobson

    ajacobson

    This reminds me of the scene in Casablanca - "There's gambling in here."

    Read the 606s and if you want to use a broker without any conflicts, by all means choose one. A little homework goes a long way.
     
    #48     Nov 29, 2018
  9. Robert Morse

    Robert Morse Sponsor

    Yes and no. The ICE has no non-pro market data lower rate. The CME has non-pro and pro but allows for exception to allow more non-pro. As an example, they allow a small business entity to be non-pro.
    https://www.cmegroup.com/market-data/distributor/files/non-professional-subscribers-faq.pdf
    https://www.cmegroup.com/market-dat...it-a-to-schedule-4-non-pro-self-cert-form.pdf
     
    #49     Nov 29, 2018
  10. Robert Morse

    Robert Morse Sponsor

    Yes, of course. In general, commissions are typically 1/3 of revenues for a clearing broker. But to be fair, they are running a business to make money. When you go to a restaurant if you only order an entree and no drink or dessert, their business will fold. The entree only covers the rent, the rest is where the money is. With clearing and brokerage, it works the same way. Variable fees pay the "rent" but the profits come from multiple source like interest, short stock fees, PFOF etc. If you take that all way, your variable commission would be much higher or they could not cover expenses.
     
    #50     Nov 29, 2018
    hmcp likes this.