Absolutely, it depends on trading style, etc. and of course those things matter. For the record, I am just trying to research the most efficient way to trade FX. I have no vested interest in anything but trying to get the facts to decide what format to use for myself. The only FX trading I have done is MM style and I just don't see any upside to it when I can now use IB or whatever and pay a lot less per R/T. When Cable/OandaShill is attacking everyone's efforts to put out factual info and alternativs to what he/she/it believes, it clouds the issues.
I use IB for trading my personal account and use hotspot to feed my analytics and Excel sheets. At work I have access to Reuters and EBS, trading small size on EBS and larger orders usually over the phone...
The numbers are in. For IB DealPro, it costs $40 to turn $1M. For Oanda, it costs $100 for the EUR/USD 1 pip spread and then you also lose the ability to sell at the ask/buy at the bid which will probably cost another $100 in the real world. For other MM forex shops, it costs $200 - $300 for that same million traded. Now it would be great if some others could report on stability issues. As in who has the most rock-solid platform?
If you go strictly after your "requirements" then yes, Interactive Brokers is NOT for you, you should go with Forex.com, fxcm, oanda, gain, dbfx,........BUT...... a) why do you need exotic pairs where the spread is sometimes 50-100 pips for retail clients? Even USDNOK or EURNOK on Oanda is >20pips wide spreads. Its a losing proposition the first second you get into a trade. b) why so much leverage. It kills you its a 100% guarantee to lose. Everyone who trades larger than 50:1 is set up for a loss, no exception. Its a fantasy and lie when brokers promise riches through high leverage c) Lastely reputation. Well this speaks for itself. Do you want to go with an established broker that has been in business for 25 years or so, such as IB or you want to go with some bucket shops where you can entertain yourself over the regulatory complaints, law suits, and other mishaps that bug each and every one of the market making brokers, including Oanda??? True, spread is not everything, here some additional points to consider 1) liquidity. Can you easily trade 1-10 million without re quotes and other funny things happening 2) stability of platform. Does the platform not break down, interestingly often during the most important times? 3) Can you scalp if you are a scalper? I am not, but many are, and most brokers slow down your feeds, slow down execution, increase slippage, and other funny games and that does not only apply to MT4 brokers. Oanda was one of them but I have to praise them in this regards they have become much more reputable in comparison to fxcm, for example when it comes to such games. 4) price feed in general, not just spreads. How close to the institutional market is your broker's price feed? Most market making brokers make their own price feeds, meaning, they can run your stops by showing an additional 20-50pips or sometimes even 100pip spike on volatile market moves. Cabletrader CANNOT know because he only trades retail (if at all, his screen shots are highly questionable) but guys, think what I may have to sell by saying the above: NOTHING! I only say it to warn the beginners of you, take it or leave it. I have nothing to prove to Cabletrader or other trolls who seemingly have an interest, for whatever reason, to kiss up to Oanda and the like.
While I agree with your earlier post to be very critical about mm platforms I dont fully agree with your commission comments. I trade with IB for very long time so... IB charges fixed commission which everyone can check out on their web page, no more comments on that. You also implicitely pay for the spread which is similar to what Oanda or some of the other "leaders" in the MM camp show, DURING QUIET TRADING HOURS. When things get heated up nothing beats IB or other ECN based brokers, imho. Just run those platforms next to each other and you will see how wide Oanda and the like suddenly get. So you should also account for the spread when quoting IB's commission, thats all I am saying. In regards to stability I have not had issues with IB's trader work station in months. No breakdown, no crash, no nothing. And I run it virtually 24/5 except for the one daily re-login. I have run Oanda in demo mode now (I use it as an additional charting platform besides Amibroker and Smartquant) for several months and on average the platform crashes on me every other day. I get disconnected and most of the time when I click on reconnect it takes several attempts, sometimes up to 30 minutes to get back onto the platform. I can only mention those two because those are the ones I am running on my home machine. Its a blatant lie to state that Oanda has been stable for months now. I can at least not imagine that the demo platform is unstable while the real trading platform is stable.
All been said before a dozen times ad nauseum, and replied to. Anyone interested can just read the thread and make up their own mind, deciding on a broker depends on so many things and as I've said before it's not one-size-fits-all, anyone who's been around the markets a while knows that. I'm out of this thread, I've made my point and backed it up with plenty of trade blotters whereas you're all just theory and hot air! lol, but you keep going IluvVol, you're doing a great job convincing the likes of slapstick
How many self righteous zealots there are? This reminds me of mormons or other people who knock on your door and try to explain to you that what you believe in is wrong and if you don't follow their teachings you will burn in hell. You don't know how I trade. I have been in the trading business long enough to understand what suits ME. I pick gft not because I am not aware of other options but because they offer a lot of pairs. Trading opportunities are frequently proportional to number of choices. I cannot trade EUR/USD every day or even every week for that matter. I need to jump from pair to pair all the time. This is how I do it. I am a nomad. I still have my FXCM mini account and the reason I switched to gft was because I found myself not seeing anything among the pairs offered by fxcm. Now if I don't see anything on the majors "I can pay a visit" to something like GBP/PLN for example.