IB commisions are great but the software demonstration I tried seems kind of crappy... Cybertrader seems to have excellent software.. Thoughts?
chris... so far this is a GREAT THREAD!!!! I am curious . have you experimented with different equal target and stops that are larger ??? 1.5 points ??? 2 points??? another size????
Cyber Corp does have a nice trading platform , however I actually find IB's better and easier to use. It does take some getting use to however . When I first switched over to IB it took a week or so to get used to Ib's java applet . I no longer trade with Cyber because the commissions at the point when I switched were to high. They have lowered them but if you dont trade a certain amount each month they hit you up for $ 25 . My back up broker is MB trading which now has a per share commission schedule . Mb's trading platform is not as good as nice as Cybers however they do give you free level II if your balance is over 25 K or if you make 5 trades a month. If you are trading under 2000 shares then IB is the way to go and you never get hit with ECN fees.
As musicman mentionned in the above post, Cyber have a nice and reliable trading platform, but also a lot of fee if you aren't a very active trader with frequent block trading over 1000. Also, if your trading style is incremental or small block, IB is better for you.
It's probably worth differentiating between Cybers [three] trading platforms. I tried the Web based platform, but found that I could not tie the feed from that one into QuoteTracker. I then upgraded to the CyberX2 platform which IMO was just a horrible front-end. I did not try the Pro platform, but the screen shots I saw looked pretty nice. Rather than going to the Pro platform (fees are excessive if you don't trade enough, plus ECN fees will kill you) I went with IB. So far I really like IB's platform and like others have stated, in share blocks under 1000 it's really hard to beat.
With web based platform does CYBER have rapid order entry, or those links (buy,sell,short) on the streaming tools applet simpy take you to web page for the order entry? Based on the orders that you placed what is the ration of shares that go to the venues that charge less than 0.005 a share/FREE or does CYBER always charge you .005 in ECN fees? Do you find IBs realtime quotes up to the second? Please share with us your experience with these two brokers. Thank you very much.
Take a look at the MBT Navigator. New per share commissions, integrates with a number of analytical packages and good support. Also, they will soon offer futures trading.