Razor, look at the upper left side of the home page; Broker Ratings. People are posting good and bad with regards to brokers there all the time. Maybe you could post your two cents there. One of the best ways to get your broker to take some action is to expose the issue and the responsible party for all to see. If I were a broker, I might feel my pocketbook is threatened and that's what speaks the loudest in our society. It's completely ridiculous that they expect you to suffer a potential blow out because they didn't hold their end of the contract. By that I mean any reasonable individual would agree you must have visibility to the positions you have on.
this idea of 'voting with your feet' is useless you merely go away taking the immediate problem with you the idea of 'no liability - buggy code' is not acceptable what about bugs in food, a company sells a product/s that's infected with listeria which causes dozens of people to become ill and a couple die. doesn't that company have the responsibility and liability for the illness - losses ?
OP is lying? No proof whatsoever! No chat records with broker. No execution statements screenshots. Wheres the proof this really happened! :eek:
i wonder if ninja trader has these kinds of bugs? x-trader seems a bit too expensive for me at this stage.
You contractually agree with your software provider that you will hold them harmless in the event that software issues cause you losses. Not so with food producers. Further, there are economically viable and scientifically proven production methods to reduce or eliminate the possibilities of contamination in fodostuffs. They work well enough often enough that people can trust they will not become seriously ill. Not so with bugs in code. You do take the immediate problem with you. The software vendor loses a customer and others are made aware of the problem. I would not use a platform which is known for giving ghost fills. That is the best choice for the individual trader and their business - do not use software which is proven to be unreliable. On the basis of reading this alone I would not be interested in strategy runner / gstrader. I wouldn't use NinjaTrader because of prior bugs and issues which have not been fixed, such as the stop-limit offset issue. The market will drive competition between vendors, and if the software is unreliable no serious trader will want to use it. Unfortunately a lot of these firms get by as enough people will tolerate sub-standard products. This is the same everywhere. I agree that it is extremely unfortunate and ought not to happen, but there are bugs in software. Some developers are better than others. It is for the market to figure out the risk. Perhaps use something which is one of the "industry standards" if you like, which trades so many contracts on so many configurations of hardware that bugs ought to be spotted quickly. If it is a decent product backed by decent support at a decent firm then problems should be fixed pronto. The real world corollary to this is you (or more likely your clerk) failing to record a fill for you on the floor. At the end of the day you think you are net flat, but find yourself in a position when trades are reconciled. You can fire your clerk (ditch the software) or berate yourself for making an error / not paying attention, but you don't get your money back. It is a cost of doing business. Same as if you suffer a power cut, or your internet goes down, or you make an order entry error. All part of the risks of electronic trading. Trading desks at institutions are not immune from these risks either, and while efforts are made to mitigate risk, bad things do happen. Having experienced it myself I understand it is not pleasant. It is very sudden, unexpected, not due to personal fault, and completely unappealable (presuming that the trades were done on an exchange at a fair price). We are not accustomed to such outcomes and find them difficult to mentally process. If the amount is significant it may be best to take some time off. Unless there has been conduct which rises to the level of a tort on the part of the broker or software vendor I would put this unfortuante incident behind you.
it wasn't a blowout it was a small loss compared to the acc. but from what i have heard so far even IB which is one of the biggest brokerages has similar situations where the only thing that can be relied upon is the actual statement. Every broker has these electronic agreement statements so there is no way of getting around that shit.
I know you didn't blow out...this time. That's why I said "potential". But what if it were May 6 and you were long before the flash crash when you thought you were flat? I guess that would just suck.
ye that would be an epic screw up. but i am looking for a more stable platform since this whole experience is quite sobering.
How much do you think Toyota makes on a gas pedal??? The fact is that in the legal system it makes no difference how much the profit is on a product that fails. Imagine yourself as MacDonalds being sued by someone who just spilled hot coffee on their lap and was burned. How much does MacDonalds make on that cup of coffee? So the bottomline is that you rationalized why a broker may not want to take a loss. But legally that argument does not hold any water. Likewise, signing a document which waives your rights, may not in fact stand up in court. It all depends on the circumstances. The broker in this case looks like they screwed up based on what we've been told. I'd be all over that if it were me. But it looks like the broker has got a free pass here because they're dealing with a wuss. But one thing for sure, you told him the party line. LOL. OldTrader