ramora, gft forex has a beta demo,supposedly to be released soon,that has trailing stops ,oco and parent w/contingent orders.Your stops are shown on the chart ,you can drag and drop to change the price.This is probably the best platform I've seen,bar none. The thing is I can't seem to bring myself to trust any of these forex dealers. I would rather just trade futures but I'm looking for something to trade in the evenings. I'm in Ak. and the market opens at 5:30 am. Too early for me. Quess I'll keep looking. Any suggestions appreciated. Mike
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Quote from dnaj65000: I understand and currently trade the spot FX market. Whenever I try to read up on the futures side of things, I can't find a decent FAQ. Please be so kind to answer these questions for me and for all the other non-futures traders out there. Let's just use the EURUSD for all examples 1) 1 contract is how much underlying value? 2) How much margin do you have to put up for 1 contract? 3) 1 pip = 1 tick = $12.50 is that correct? 4) How much $$ cost in commissions and exchange fees do you typically have to pay? 5) What are the trading hours since it's not 24/5 like spot. How does one trade the active London market (3am EST open) 6) Do you get paid interest (Long Euro) as well as pay interest (Short Euro) 7) Is there liquidity concerns like lock limits? Thank You in advance for your answers. DNAJ65000 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hmmmm, you could have easily founnd the answers to all this at cme.com. So for more info: http://www.cme.com/prd/overview_EC2465.html 1) underlying = 125000 USD 2) margin: initial 2498 maint 1850 overnight; with IB from 2:20 PM CET to 8:45 PM CET you need half of this. (i dont know where you live so i used my own hours) 3) yes; it's logical with underlying 125000 USD 4) depends on broker, i pay 2.4 usd with IB per trade, so 4.8 rt 5) Globex is open 23/24, so no problem there, i trade london time, just sit behind your screen and push the right buttons 6) the concept of futures is so that the cost of carry (intrest) is calculated into the price of the future, so the price adjusts each day reflecting intrest rate changes over the days. The difference between futures-price and spot is called the basis 7) no hope this helps, and if now enough people would switch to futures, then at least the money stays among us traders instead of giving this away to those fx-brokers. two things i like to add, when the pit is open fx-futures often even have only 1 pip spread. and regarding hotspot: i have seen there demo, no use sitting on the bid and ask when no-one else is in the market and the dealer is quoting a four pip-spread.
Any of the brokers who are offering even 3 pip spreads (except for the one I mentioned Commerce) are still out to make sure they get their cut. You will often find you buy or sell is not accepted and you get a message asking if you want to accept the new price (unless it moved against you since you placed your order in which case you will be filled soooo fast. The forex brokers can set the rates they want, it is nothing like futures where you are routed straight to the exchange and your broker can get no more than his commission. the forex brokers don't even charge commission because why should they when they get much more by playing their spreads. It is is a real money spinner, big bucks. Sure some forex brokers will talk about 2-3 pip spreads. it is called advertising or marketing. Sometimes they can only get 2 or 3 ticks out of you on a trade. Still more than futures broker gets on commission. This should be made clear to all traders.
I have one major problem with these fx shops. They strongly imply you are trading the actual interbank FX market, but that is simply not true. You are trading a submarket they are making. It's kind of like betting on games, only you are dependent on the bookie to learn the scores. I have no idea how much they are off the actual interbank market, but how could you trade with them without this data? Of course they are happy to give you "free" quotes, because they are not market data at all but rather their dealing price. Is there even one of them who provides an actual interbank feed?
Please pardon my ignorance: Is there a bid-ask spread with currency futures? Your statement makes it appear as if there is not one. (I'm playing around with a couple live spot accounts now that have 3 pip spreads.) Any suggestions on a currency futures simulator or demo?
I compared CMS' bid prices with interbank EBS bid prices and found no remarkable difference. Of course nearly all brokers use the interbank market to hedge their customer's positions.
It appears that the currency futures market is lot better and way to go. It may not be for 24 hours but it's available during the prime time anyway. Cheating appears to be not there but I have a few questions - 1) Do the futures brokers offer real time charts? 2) Are mini lots available? And, are there options with nominal size of mini lots? 3) Is on chart trading offered? 4) It's practically a 24 hours market, how can we traders close our positions during off-hours? If GLOBEX is used, will there be a premium to trade during those hours? 5) How can we find the brokers who charge less? Sorry, my questions may appear very elementary but need to know before putting real money. Thank you guys in advance - Sukhen