Great commentary limit, thanks.. I must say that in the case of Interactive Brokers' internal trade matching (the "hidden" Timberhill orders that you get filled with) - its the fastest fills I've ever seen on any platform, and a source of extra liquidity - so I'm all for my broker trading against me in that sense. I prefer the Auto-routing done in my software (ala IB's TWS) as opposed to the routing being done by the ECN (ala ARCA). Certainly the routing being done on the back-end is considerably slower.
Well, just a minor rebuttle. I agree that "matching" within Redi can take a nano second ro two...but when we choose our destination (such as going directly to Isld) then it ceases to be an issue. With 90% of our trades going to NYSE anyway,and the balance going to Isld (or so it seems), then we don't experience that slowness at all. I won't bother debating the software at other firms, as you said, it's been beaten to death. I still feel that it all works fine, and one won't help anyone make any more money than the other, when used correctly. Good trading!! Don
We have direct links to the major ECN's, we just don't charge our traders the fees (be happy to start if that helps anyone.. ) Don
Don, What route do most of your traders use to access NYSE? While I have been trading Nasdaq for years and tens of thousands of trades, I have only done a handful of NYSE trades. The biggest downside of NYSE, from my ignorant opinion, is the slow speed. What routes do your traders find to work best? Do they typically just place market orders and hope for relatively quick fills from the specialists, or do they place a high percentage of limit orders? Are order cancellation delays a problem for them? (I understand this is one of the biggest short-comings of the NYSE Direct system.) Thanks, -Eric
I am a nasdaq trader as well trying to make it in an NYSE world because many of my former trading stocks are now single digits and NYSE still has stocks in the 40's, 50's, 60's, etc. The biggest problem I have is the spreads. Sure you get price improvement every now and then, but I was trading nsm today. It must have a had a 30 cent spread 50 plus times today. It's a 20 dollar stock that trades millions of shares. A comparable stock on the nasdaq is say lltc. When has LLTC ever had a 30 cent bid ask spread? Never? The nyse traders will come back with, yeah but try and get out of 10K lltc at one print and see what happens. And I agree, but don't trade that big. Anyway, I don't want to rant, but trading the nyse vs. the nasdaq is like night and day to me. Nyse IMO is more suited for fewer positions and bigger size. I like more positions and smaller size myself.
absolutely correct. One one contrary note (i.e. contradicting myself) there are a number of significant platform robust stability issues with Redi+ as a direct order entry platform. for example, although the footprint of the software is absolute huge and has not been compiled to take advantage of the Pentium III chipset or IV or Xeon or otherwise, especially dual motherboard configurations, the platform does have some excellent features. Instant cancel-replace-drop .01 or add .01 (used to be drop 1/16 or add 1/16) or any other fraction of value. Customizable Level I / II order entry configuration, with selected sub-keys or ones choosing. The ability to 2x click on the desired ECN and submit or prefill the order entry tabs, awaiting order submission. So, you see, I can find the good in some things.... (I think therefore I trade...)
We use "superdot" and when you are comfortable with the rules involved, the timing makes sense. We all get "time priority" and even though it may take a few seconds for the Specialist to respond, you are still entitled to the trades. Remember, we have actual people there handling a lot of this... And we get "price improvement" a lot. I get improvement on about one third of my trades daily...this really adds up. The "best market" price prevails over the greedy MM. The NX ECN works in a similar fashion. And, of course, we can route to the other ECN"s if we see a better price. Since there are more opportunities (opening only, MOC's - like this last week), we prefer the NYSE. But our guys can trade whatever they like. Don