Platform Recommendation for Automated Futures

After doing a bunch of research and trying out several different platforms, I'm starting to get frustrated and am really hoping for some help/advice. It's been a long road, so let me try to summarize:

I'm on a Mac, currently using ThinkorSwim with a TD Ameritrade account. I'm trying to set up a very simple automated trading strategy using RSI overbought/oversold crossovers in gold futures with well-defined stops and targets. ToS is great for charting and backtesting, but after figuring out my strategy, I learned from tech support that it doesn't support automated trading. (Ironic that you can develop and backtest an amazing strategy through them, but then have to sit in front of your screen 24/6 to manually implement it.) TD Ameritrade recently partnered with Prodigio, a seperate platform which does do automated trading. I downloaded Prodigio and learned the basics of how to use it last night, but, three hours in, discovered that it doesn't support automated futures trading. I've heard that NinjaTrader has very good automated trading support, but it only runs on Windows and I really don't want to run Parallels/Bootstrap etc on my Mac if I can help it. (I know, some people have had good experiences, but my own Parallels/Bootstrap experiences have been entirely negative.)

I've tried several other platforms on a demo basis, but so far no joy. I have a little bit of coding experience, but don't think it would be sufficient to code an automated strategy in C# through Interactive Brokers, as their website implies would be necessary to do automated trading through them.

Again, the strategy I want to employ is super simple, and backtests well (sometimes, better, sometimes worse, but profitable overall and without unmanageable drawdowns). I'm just trying to find the right platform to run it on.

Any help and/or advice would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance!

 

Stephen,

Our lowest cost (not low latency-no options on futures) solution for futures with an API is Realtick. They just raised their prices to $325/month plus MD but no per contract fee. We can offer up to 25% of SPAN for DT and our commissions start at only $0.60/side. https://www.lightspeed.com/trading-platforms/realtick-pro-and-express/realtick-platform-features/

Email me directly for more information. We have low latency solutions too but they cost more.

Bob

 

Thanks very much, Robert. I'll certainly have a look at it.

 

Ninjatrader now ports to TD Ameritrade...can trade gold proxy ..GLD.. currently they don't support futures trading.

 

Thanks a ton for this info, Spectre. I was just about to bite the bullet, buy parallels, Windows 10, and Ninjatrader, and would have then found out they don't support futures trading. You've saved me from that morass.

 

To clarify for future readers of this thread. NinjaTrader indeed supports futures trading, just not through TD Ameritrade.

 

Thanks Ray. Is it possible to automate non-TD Ameritrade futures trades on NT? I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that I'll probably have to switch brokerages if I want to implement this.

 

Steven,
I think one of the better platforms to execute via automation is MultiCharts with Powerlanguage. First, it is stable for execution, and from the testing that I have done, the back-testing results seem to reflect the method tested.
If you automate your program, run your program a number of times to see if it gives you consistent results.

 

Yes but the API requires $500,000 and might only be for equities.

 

If I understand your question correctly, the answer is yes, through Interactive Brokers or NinjaTrader Brokerage.