Man's risk-manager is(was) in London when I cleared them... terrible firm for trading short gamma. I would have to jump thru many hoops to carry a 100-lot short straddle overnight when I was well-within my haircut. riskarb
A few years ago our firms position was short gamma (we got long about 75-85 big S&P futures down 30 pts. We were probably pushing our margin at the time, but when the clearing firm rep called in the morning to ask what we were going to do, I was the only one in the office at that time (partners got there later). Knowing that we would be buying in some of the downside vol that we were short , I said "Don' t worry Kevin, we're gonna buy some of the 1025 strike this morning to flatten that out." He replied "You're long futures down 30, you have to buy puts not calls." At 6:00 AM I was not going to get into the whole "A call's a put and a put's a call" thing. So I said, "Ok, I tell to buy the puts Vega
www.thinkorswim.com and the new www.tosliquidity.com are the top platforms available for this type of trading. PLUS the commissions are fully negotiable.... surf
===== Sounds like she lied like a persian rug on ''give us the best price the first time''... That Morgan Stanley lady might have mixed in some truth on that ''our institutional customers dont like to sell options priced under a dollar'' Good points around that point.
Very interesting thread! I don't understand most of it but I sure would like to. Time to start reading one of my option books.
That's interesting, I recall them telling me (in a nutshell) they couldn't (or wouldn't) beat OX active trader rate ($12.95). What are you paying surfer? With respect to spreads, they would be the better broker since their margin requirements are much better than OX's ultra-conservative 100K rule: TOS does have a nice looking platform, reminds me of the screens you see on Star Trek.
it depends on your size/volume as to how low they will go on commissions. yes, they by far, have the best margin requirements due to their intimate knowledge of the option market. TOS understands what you are talking about and the ramifications of each strategy, unlike the other brokers. surfer