Not necessarily. With no volatility (i.e., no NFP numbers being announced) you're getting ****ed if you have ANY slippage, much less over 20-pips. With as much liquidity as there is in the forex market you can get in and out of trades on the pip. Somebody pocketed a sh*tload of your cash, dude. If you don't like the slippage, drop that broker! Unless you're trading with IB for other reasons, i.e., they are better in other categories than, say, Oanda. Oanda NEVER has slippage, unless it's a high-volatility or fast market. Compare these two brokers side by side, trade by trade for a couple months, then decide who's better. Iconoclast
I had 30 pip slippage on EUR (globex futures) when i used to teade forex about 2 years ago. I expected slippage around news, but i got that one afternoon, the market just moved really fast, no news. GBP is probably worse than EUR. This is the main reason i wont trade Forex. Its a bit disorderly compared to the orderly exchange traded stock index futures.
I've had this happen to me in currency futures, mini-sized oil, Ag futures, bond futures, and spot forex. Not the way you describe though. Each time it happened the price gapped against me in a new session and my stops didn't take me out the split second the market reopened. TWS would wait several seconds, and by that time, price had already raced in the direction of the gap by 10 to 30 more pips. Funny thing is, I've never had this delay work FOR me (i.e. have the stops execute after the gap has partially filled). Another example of how murphy's law will always get you. All execution errors will happen to your detriment, not your benefit. 100% of the time. Whenever I take a market-system pair to live trading, I always discount the backtest results by 10% to take into account unavoidable execution errors (and, no, I don't mean slippage) every now and then. I automate systems running on over 25 markets, and automation technology is not foolproof. Execution errors such as missed entries and exits will happen, and must be accounted for accordingly. Your one instance of 21 pip slippage can be considered an unavoidable execution error. Nothing to do but move on in this situation. RoughTrader
I tend to agree. Once in a blue moon a pair will move suddenly for no apparent reason 20, 30, even 50 points. If your SL was near market when the price spiked like that there could be slippage that'd be "normal." Depends on the broker, mostly. I've hit zero slip trades on NFP-type spikes on EUR/USD, that cable is close to, spike-wise. I still think the slippage issue in this thread is not the "norm" in the forex. Iconoclast
Allow me to back up a bit. Please elaborate and tell me exactly what you mean by stating "It was just a function of the market at the time?" Are you saying that: 1) There were no tradeable prices during that time 2) My stop was executed too slowly and that's why I got stopped out at a worse price, OR 3) Something else?
That was on wednesday 4:30 EST during UK retail number news right ? What did you expect ,dont you know that important news can create 30-100 pip gaps That would be like you are buying GOOG at 400 before the closing bell and just before the earnings report and then wondering the next day when GOOG gap down to 350 why your 399 stop is not filled. I was watching oanda and there was also 60 pip drop
... far from being a loser, friend siki. but there are a lot better markets to trade that are regulated and in which traders can do quite well. but i will leave this one to you fx experts ...
The forex trade was on Tuesday, GBP.USD 2006-08-15, 04:30:08 USD DBKFX. I'm well aware of the effects news can have, but I don't believe there was any news, and do not recall there being a 60 pip drop at that time. Speaking of Oanda, I also have an Oanda acct, and their stops are never executed that far away, except perhaps during news time. So, I'm wondering if it's "just the market", then why can Oanda execute a stop closer to the price than IB? NOTE: This is not the first time my stops while trading forex at IB have executed far away from the price. It's just one of the last ones that I noticed.