I had thought it was higher to be honest. I'm getting e-mails from AMP and I saw their day trading margins on ES is 20K. 2K for MES. I believe their regular intraday margin is still $500/50. Which still seems crazy low to me.
They're adding 20-25% on top of CME's increasing margins. Yes, I guess most platforms have suspended intraday margins, but many pages seem to be outdated. So you're trading this market with about 20-points stops?
I never thought 2 points on the QQQs would be considered chop. Folding my hands, this stuff will scratch you up! Bloomberg said one of the big algo funds is down 15-20% because it’s bots can’t keep up with the change/chop/tweets.
I'm not trading much at the moment and don't feel bad about it either. Most 1-minute bars have a 10 point range these days with the average being closer to 20. I think it's very difficult to trade with a tighter stop than say 10 points. 20 seems more correct.
Do we know if we are not trading against them? Maybe the trades stay in house because most traders lose money. At least the MES ones...
Even if they are shopping the trades, they could take the opposite side, you know as a bad signal giver.