zz, you say you were filled at 701? If that is the case you have a bigger problem than which market, ideal or pro, this trade executed on! Please see the following tick charts, one is hotspot and the other is esig generic, also I was too lazy to put it up but CurreneX is in line with the 2 tick charts. The Ever Vigilent VIPER
This was a unique situation that did not reflect IBâs superiority over other FX platforms. The price was adjusted to 1.9737.
Let's keep these claims of superiority on the back burner until NZD and NOK are available and the margin issues on crossrates are fixed.
Good job Sal, I give you the 21 viper salute and a rattle of my tail! The Ever Giving Credit Were Credit IS Due VIPER
IB Salvatore, Since banks don't accept anything under 100K standard lots, what you do with those 25k lots if you don't run a dealing desk ?
Lesson learned. Whenever you have a problem at IB that the weak customer service doesn't solve get on elitetrader.com and it will get the attention you desire. Use elitetrader as your personal IB 'elite' customer service agent and stuff gets fixed fast.
Thanks for the charts Viper. Yes I'm aware that the "true" market didn't go under 1.9730 at that time, that's why I wanted an explanation. I would like to note that IB Salvatore was very helpful with this issue and offered a price adjustment. Let's just hope IB won't pull their offer like the banks are pulling their bids and offers on Idealpro That leads me to a question: is it a standard that banks can reject the order even they are posting at ECN? I heard Currenex is similar in this. On the other hand Hotspot is supposed to honor the displayed prices. Any info on this?
Ever think of running for a political office? You've got one of the primary qualifications down already: presenting own negatives as positives.
ZZZAP, When our $ is at stake it is always good to have a healthy degree of skepticism. Human nature is good but it is also weak. And there are those among us who will yield to the temptation to steal from most of us trusting folk. There ARE thieves out there in the trading world who do not even think that their thievery is wrong!! They consider stealing 'just part of the game' in the trading business. Just look at all the ENRONS out there which have of late been prosecuted. Justice has been delayed far too long for these and other 'white collar' crooks! It is too much to think that "all the big boys" are ganging up on us in order to take our meager $100.00 trades. But it is NOT far removed from reality to be watchful of our individual brokers that they don't rip off our $. After all, THEY ARE THE MIDDLEMEN; they see our trades coming in for trades; they can delay our executions, etc. We need to be forever vigilant. Tom P.S.: Please read the following Post on this site: "FXCM may be the biggest...and they sure act like it." - theSnaggle December 12, 2006 3:24 PM "If you are a small retail trader and depend on rapid execution at market with minimum slippage, do NOT deposit your money with this broker. Even their "non-Dealing Desk" is a joke. Here is there sales pitch from a recent email: - Rapid execution even during volatile market conditions - No requotes from a dealing desk confirming your trades - No restrictions on entry orders prior to news events - Anonymity: The banks, who are the counterparties to your trades, will only see that FXCM has an order in the market whenever you enter a trade. Your stop, limit, as well as entry orders are not known to the banks until executed. They go on to say that, "with multiple banks quoting, the spreads can vary," and that "on average, spreads will be tighter." This is certainly true when compared to FXCM's fixed spread dealing station, but this is not true for the average fixed spread retail brokers out there, which begs the question -- Why sign up for their No Dealing Desk platform at all? But that isn't the half of it. The speed of execution is in fact not faster and I have experienced more slippage with this than with Oanda's platform during normal volatility. Oanda's order tickets are also much more flexible and managable. During peak volatility, Oanda's fills are much better and their spreads are comparable. This makes me wonder exactly which banks are involved in FXCM's shady little adventure. Other platforms, like EFX Group's Navigator for example, offer much tighter spreads than FXCM's, although they charge a commission each way. (It's still much cheaper to trade with them.) Only Oanda, and a few other brokers such as CMC, etc., compete with EFX's quotes, spreads, fills and fees, although EFX's Navigator has the most flexible order entries in the retail FX broker community (IMO). FXCM lags far, far behind the curve on most fronts and for them to claim otherwise is just dishonest. Given their size, I wonder where Drew Niv's priorities are. (They are probably with that trading firm out of FL, Gibraltar Monetary Corporation, Inc., that defrauded $3M out of their customers, while earning $800K in commissions as an IB from FXCM.) I recently had a very bad experience with their trading desk. I entered at market during the Dec 8 NFP surprise, was filled in a few seconds with about 14 points of slippage (not so bad), and was in profit by more than 30 pips. I then went to close the trade as price seemed to stall, and for more than five minutes my order at market was rejected because "the market moved." However, the market was not moving more than 10 pips at a time at that point and my close order was, after all, "at market." The next best price should have kicked in -- so I called the trading desk. A dealer picked up after about 10 rings and said "Trading Desk..." I provided my account number, indicated that I was on the No Dealing Desk platform, gave my name and said "I want to close my position." The position was at breakeven at that point, but I wanted out. I was then put on hold and after a few minutes an agent from customer service picked up the line. This was totally disorienting. I then asked to close the position again, not quite believing what I heard. The operator said she couldn't help me and that she was transferring me to the trading desk. My position was now 15 pips in the red. (Wasn't I just talking to the guy at the Trading Desk?) After another two or three minutes, another person at the trading desk picked up the phone and the market had moved 70 pips against me. She offered to "close at market." When I told her that is what I asked the last guy to do almost ten minutes prior, she seemed unapologetic and said that because I was on the NDD platform all she could do was close the position. I replied, "Now that the market has moved 70 points against me, I can probably do that myself [insert appropriate expletive here]." Sure enough, my latest order went through, for a close at -73. This situation is currently being audited by FXCM, so I won't know what their decision will be. However, the original call to the trading desk should have closed out the position and I am unable to say whether the trading desk's actions were due to incompetence or to some other factor. Either way, DO NOT USE THIS PLATFORM for the following reasons: - Their spreads are not competitive, - Their execution is horrible, even for volatile market periods, - There is something very wrong with their trading desk, and - Their retail fixed spread platform is even worse! I find it rather suspicious that the largest retail FX spot broker in the US does not have more reviews written about them on this site -- good or bad. I wanted to give FXCM's No Dealing Desk a try with a small $1000 account. My thumb is definitely a down on this one! I recently read what has to be a plug for them on Wikipedia by some corporate shill -- How could they get Best Retail Platform by FX Week in 2004? And the TW2 Member Choice Award as Best Currency Broker in 2004? And Best FX Specialist by S&C in 2002, 2003, and 2004? This just doesn't ring true. (I can say that the Trade2Win outfit is a sham, but FX Week and S&C? Come on! Shame on both of them.) I'm one step away from calling FXCM a bucket shop, but will hold off because I also trade stocks and futures and I know what a true bucket shop is. The worst FX brokers still don't compare to the games played by those operators. I now have a great online broker for stocks/futures and two for FX. They are out there! Oh yeah, I also traded with CMS Forex when I first started with the spot market back in 2000. Now THAT was a bucket shop! Nothing either CMS or FXCM can say will bring me back. ****UPDATE**** This is an update on the last rating. FXCM's audit team refunded the loss incurred as a result of the trading desk's error -- and on the same day of the report. While this response time is a cut above many brokers, problems with the Non-Dealing Desk remain. Something else I thought of that hadn't already been mentioned -- While the orders at market going in are filled and slippage is allowed, exit orders are Fill or Kill and execute at the price specified -- unless a price range is specified. If price moves even a pip, the order will be rejected. This process took a minimum of 20 seconds on Friday to find out whether the order went through. The average was much longer. This is simply too much time. There is no default for this setting, so the FoK range on exit orders has to be typed in every time...which also takes too much time. This is something I would expect in the futures or stock markets, but not in FX spot."