Excuse the ignorance, but why do you need Tradestation as well as Bracket Trader? I read both websites and it seems like both can have rules set up to do your trading? What benefit does tradestation provide that makes it worthwhile to pay a monthly fee to have (versus i know a free website that gives me real time / capturable forex quotes)? Not trying to offend, in the least, ! I am a well seasoned programmer in about 15 languages and would love to know what tools I can look into to developing my own system (my main hold-up has been coming up with a way to interface with IB to send orders and such)
Bracket Trader is just an order entry interface to IB. You can conveniently enter OCA orders with single clicks, adjust your targets/stops easily. With Tradestation, besides charting in real-time, you get clean historical data and backtest your ideas very easily. I think you can get Tradestation for free if you have a brokerage account with them and exceed certain volume. I'm an old TS customer so I'm paying less than new customers.
One thing I have noticed that ticks me off at times is that dailyfx.com is what I use my realtime charts for, is not at the same price level as IB... i guess with tradestation the nice part about it is that it matches IB prices? also, do you have a tradestation account /and/ IB account? which do you do the majority of your trades on?
For the electronic contracts that I follow, TS and IB match. For the EURUSD spot, there might be 1-2 pip difference sometimes. I only have IB account. IB has much more capability in terms of order types.
It can't go on forever. When China and Japan stops buying US T-bonds, you will se rates go to the moon. And the stock market will crash. And the dollar? Well, I think the higher rates will save it.
DailyFX.com is FXCM - so you get the spot prices they offer. Every spot dealer will "tweak" their spreads and price levels - as they are the "market makers" towards their customers. With IB - they say they don't take the opposite side because of the obvious conflict of interest but use commissions instead for IDEAL PRO spot EURUSD etc. That might mean it's closer to real EBS/Interbank quotes - but don't take my word for it - and no good information has been divulged on that subject. Therefore you see some differences between price levels many times because of different customers offerings as well as market making; this would be true for any of the spot FX dealers. You can get the exact same Netdania Java-based chart from a whole host of other spot FX dealers - Refco FX included. You will see differences between RefcoFX and FXCM as well - even they seem to share a lot of "structure" in their businesses. IBG/Timber Hill probably is a market maker in many of the CME futures contracts according to themselves - although I don't know if they are the principal market-maker on EuroFX. I have no Globex User ID snooping capabilities right now, so I couldn't say if there was some EuroFX vs IDEAL PRO "patterns". BTW - I use the differences between spot dealers as one of my considerations and "signals" - although it's of little practical use - but shows "anomalities" at some time.
I have been waching IB IdealPRO quotes in EUR and GBP for last hr....quoted about 3pips wide most times. Is there volume go thru there? they haven't posted day's HI/LOW, I couldn't tell.
chin nice job remmenber when I asked you to stop at 60 pages? lol. we are going to be dead for rest of the week. anyone wants to read my summary http://www.refconews.com/main/WeekAhead.pdf happy holidays.
jbt, Yes, it just kept growing. Do you think the FX markets will be slow next week too? Happy Holidays!