Neither. My spending an extra $500 daily in commission or 125k/yr. vs. paying zero commission is not debatable. It is my trading. That is money I don't have to expend. If you feel paying commissions gives you better results than a zero commission model than continue to do so What I dislike is that you want to outlaw a practice that I and ten of thousands of traders are satisfied with.
Well what I dislike is that you want to condone an almost fraudulent and unnecessary practice where tens and thousands of traders are not satisfied with when they are cheated out of cheaper prices and profitability, something that you don't want to admit and instead choose to defend it by using your fictitious commission savings. There is no way that your DAILY commission savings would amount to $500 under PFOF. LOL If you do such high volume of trades that just your daily savings in commission would amount to $500, you are losing tons more in profitability due to higher/lower prices and lost opportunity for tp and stop-loss there is no way you would tolerate that. LOL I used to trade retail forex and I know the games brokers under a zero-commission MM model play against the traders and I see the same shit that MM's play especially in options trading, delayed quotes, requoting, unfilled orders when our bid/offer is even better the NBBO. No traders who have ever traded under the MM model which is what PFOF is would ever embrace it. The reason why you defend it is either because you are a noob and naive that all you can see is the commission savings and have no idea the bigger pie that you are missing or you are actually a MM yourself and is disguised as a trader to participate on this forum. If you are a MM, I've got news for you. Exchanges in the majority of the countries do not allow PFOF and they operate perfectly fine. United States is pretty much the only country that allows PFOF and the futures exchanges don't even allow PFOF. Your MM days are numbered. You better learn to trade like the rest of us.
If a traditional broker charges me 2.50/ stock transaction. 200 transactions is $500 . That is 100 opening and 100closing actions for day trading. That is 125K/year. Is that difficult to understand?
If you lose on average $4 per trade, opening and closing because of PFOF, multiply by 250 days of 200 transactions per day deduced from your calculation, you lose $200K a year. Is that difficult to understand? Sure you save $2.50 per transaction so your net loss is still $75,000 a year. That $75,000 is your lost profit, profit that should've been in your pocket but instead went to the MM's pocket. Think about it. If the MM's losing money on every single trade even after paying for the order flow, how can they still be around? They would've been bankrupt long time ago. WHERE does their profit come from? They keep saying they pay to the broker for the orderflow and then they give us price improvement so how do they make profit? Where is their profit coming from? Remember they are MM's. They are not long-term investors. They make two-way market so that means as soon as they buy or sell from one party they flip it simultaneously or quickly afterwards. So if they gave us a good price, a price supposedly better than the market price, how are they going to flip it higher(lower) when the spread is so tight? And remember they still have to cover the orderflow payment cost that they paid to the broker and everything else. I personally use both PFOF brokers and non-PFOF (supposedly) brokers and I can tell you from my personal experience my orders get filled faster and at better prices with non-PFOF (supposedly) brokers. All of the PFOF MM's have been asked to provide more transparency about their business model. So far, all of them refused. You wonder why. If they are giving us so much price improvement, why are they so reluctant to show us?
I will say this...At least sent it to the/an exchange. The MM is NOT the exchange...They may be creating the market, I get that. But if orders do not find their way to an exchange...The MM becomes the exchange, rather than the true exchange. There is a reason why the SEC is looking into this issue. It is not "the big bad SEC". Like almost every other country, use an exchange in the correct way (at least for price discovery). You can still have MMs (they do create the market...Even still use dark pools). Just have the SEC create common sense laws where the exchange is used to a greater extent... Again believe me, as a non active trader, I do benefit from low brokerage fees. I save thousands each year, compared to the older days. I do also benefit from price improvement. Just let the exchange(s) do what they do in most other countries. Thinking this through (yeah, I could be wrong), send the order out. Have the broker fill (if it's in house). Then send it to the MM...Look for a fill. After a few seconds (a minute with low volume) send it to the market and keep it there. Wasn't it done that way about 10 years ago with brokers and MMs? This is from an investor's (non day trader's) point of view...
Just an update...The saga continues. I didn't bother to put in the order again today (during market hours). Late this afternoon, I reentered the order. VERY TRICKY wording from Fidelity as I worked my order. When it came to routing it said "auto". Auto may mean something very different to you and me vs Fidelity!! So I chose CBOE...All exchanges had the same bid/ask. Bid was 75 cents, so I put my bid in again for 65 cents...We'll see.
You tell me if I trade stocks or forex. You really look like you are a MM that PFOF, the way that you defend this fraudulent practice.
Not all brokers allow you to send orders directly to exchanges. For some brokers like Robinhood, the only counterparty that you can send your order is to the MM that PFOF. So I guess I would just stick with the brokers that (supposedly) send your orders directly to exchanges.
Stocks trade in penny increments. Orders are only accepted in penny increments. I pay zero commissions. with PFOF. Furthermore my orders are executed to 4 decimal places which gives me additional savings. Did you know that fact? The stocks I trade are liquid and the best NBBO are a penny between bid and ask. Citadel and Virtu etc. are as far I can see are always at the best NBBO. Forex and options are not nearly as liquid. I gave you my numbers for actual commissions saved and you reply with some hypothetical cost. which would make my transactions seem to be losers. That is a separation from reality. From my previous post:If a traditional broker charges me 2.50/ stock transaction. 200 transactions is $500 . That is 100 opening and 100closing actions for day trading. That is 125K/year. Is that difficult to understand? I don't care what you think but you are trying to impose your thinking on me by banning a practice that I and hundred of thousands of other traders have found to be advantageous. Publicize your opinion and see if you can motivate investors/traders to move their accounts from zero commission to commission brokers