I wonder if you, or your friend have ever looked at the mini's, Dow, S&P, Russell, Nasdaq. This is a good way to start out with futures, and if you want to learn about them, www.advancedfutures.com has a good education section. Need further explanation? Give me a call.
ElectricSavant, good point about going direct. Although by dealing with the affiliate site you may be able to get a better commission than directly. I tend to agree with tdichiara he has offered good advise in the past. It is worth looking into. I have been in the situation where I can not day trade anymore since my account is not quite over $25K. I have been using SpeedTrader but they have been restricting my trading activities when my account drops below $25 because of that. I noticed that there was a link on their website to alliancetrader.com so I went to the website out of curiosity even though it says non US accounts. I went through the website thoroughly, their main company's website and Securities Commission of Jamaica's website. In short, I did my research. I didn't think it is a scam or illegal. So I followed up by calling the firm and sure enough not only can they take my account but give me 4-1 margin intra-day. They wouldn't budge when I asked for more than 4-1 margin. Something about higher risk to the firm. My other concern was insurance on my money such as I would get at any US broker dealer. They said the omnibus funds is insured by SPIC and FDIC but my individual funds wasn't. So I asked what guarantee do I have that you are not going to run off with my money or that the firm will go bankrupt? They said because the omnibus funds are insured that investor would not lose their money and they had 60 million dollars in managed asset. I assume that means that my funds by itself is not insured. Their main company apparently has been around for five or six years. I am impressed since there aren't many firms still around after Sept 11 when the market took a big dipped. I know I was not day trading then. I did alot of buying of stocks that were trading at its lowest. Got my hands on a large number of CSCO for under $12. I made a nice profit when it hit $24. Anyhow, their fee structure was pretty much the same on the commission end at SpeedTrader. However, I was able to secure a lower commission on a per trade basis. Don't want to broadcast here but the point is if you ask you might get a better deal. And it was the exact same software I was using at SpeedTrader as well. I am willing to be the tester here. If I don't like what I get and I will simply close my account and try that e-mini suggestion. I will be transferring my account over to them this week. They told me they could easily do that. Saves me on the wire fees. I will let you guys know how it goes next week when I start trading with them.
TickRader, Users like you is what makes ET a useful site. I would very much appreciate it, if you would report back, and I am sure there are others reading this thread with the same interest. Funny, you must handle yourself better than I, on the phone. When I tried to get the plan B minimum rate reduced, the girl said I needed to E-mail a request. She said that it was rare for that fee to be reduced, but in plan A, it might be possible, but I had to E-Mail. Michael B. P.S. I am a Futures Trader. I trade options too. I trade equities but on a smaller scale, but I find the 4-1 Margin attractive without tieing up too much capital. Here lately, I have spread myself rather thin, trying to trade and diversify too much.(It's just that everything sounds so good) I opened up 2 traditional IRA's, and will open a Quadriga hedge fund account in January 2005, and plan on trading the YM E-mini Dow Future soon. I trade equities through a folio type of broker, and really need to get that changed, as I can only go long there, and Alliance seemed to be one of the alternatives for equities trading, without putting a big chunk of my money there.
Sorry, don't know who posted a somewhat edited of my original message on Yahoo, perhaps someone who works at that firm. I should call them and ask for a paycheck since they apparently like my message so much. As far as I'm concerned I don't really care who anyone else trades through. I day trade for my own account... that's it folks. I just thought it was an interesting subject when I heard about it. Regardless I've been positing here on and off for about 2 years 110+ posts. I believe I have offered some level of insight on various subjects. I am going to try and have my friend join elite for himself, since he is the one who's actually using the alldaytraders site.
Hey Hotshot don't take what these chowder heads say personally. I've know you through ET and About.com and everything you've suggested and passed on has been on target. I myself still use Realfast but I do refer some of my students to Alliancetrader.com . Take it easy and good trading to you.
I respectfully pull myself from this thread. My friend with the AllDayTraders account will be joining ET and you can ask him questions directly. His name is Russ. Good luck to all.
From what I've seen of brokerage studies, an account opened with less than $25k has a probability of less than 2% of being profitable one year later.
That was a study done on non-daytrader accts as the PDT rule was valid. The study might reflect higher or lower results on this type of acct. If these #'s you are citing would hold true for these type of acct's this would be a bad business model, Don't you think? Michael B. P.S. I am not condoning or supporting this brokerage. I have not decided yet.