The real problem this whole thing shows is why futures accounts can not have a sweep to an FDIC insured interest bearing account. When i started opening accounts I asked all the futures brokers and they said laws were created that wanted to separate the futures industry from the securities industry. I should be able to open a bank account and use that as backing for my account to satisfy margin requirements and losses. People should also be allowed to sweep excess profits to the FDIC account. In the end I'll have to keep doing what I'm doing now with a bank account and wire transfers and never putting all the $ in the trade account, that way a "freeze" would have limited negative impact.
Apex, May I suggest a solution to this problem of people failing to distinguish between the various Refco entities? Why don't you make and post an organizational chart of all relationships between Refco companies? Perhaps you could color code each node on the chart. I suggest you use white for the legitimate businesses, black for the racketeering enterprises, and maybe grey when you aren't absolutely certain. Maybe you could update the chart whenever more information becomes available? If that's too burdensome, maybe you could update the chart weekly? I think this would be very helpful to us simple folk who have so much difficulty distinguishing between the fraudulent and legitimate companies.
yes that is incredible. why is one's money that sits in cash nightly not insured? also why does one not recieve interest on there sitting cash in a futures account?
All this from a guy who made a number of posts last month about whether or not 768k DSL would be sufficient for trading and meet his "cheapness" requirements as opposed to paying a few extra dollars more per month for 1.5 or even 3.0 mb's of download speed. And all this from someone that has admitted that he has never traded a futures contract in his life because they are far too risky for him. All this from someone that uses a computer that is running on 256mb of RAM trading TWS and yet blames Interactive Brokers for lousy fills in the SPY and QQQQ. You certainly are a legend in your own mind, aren't you? May I suggest a greater dose of Haldol.
Apex, You are a liar. Your last posting states that I have admitted that I never traded a futures contract in my life, and that my trading computer has only 256MB RAM. You were lying. The truth is that I never said any such thing, and that I have traded futures, and that my machine has far more than 256MB RAM. You lied in an effort to retaliate for my ridiculing your efforts to defend the Refco brand. I suppose you are attacking me personally because you are unable to present any rational arguments in support of Refco.
Apex, Again you are lying. After I made my last posting, you edited your own post, to which I had been responding. You added a false accusation that I blame IB for lousy fills in SPY and QQQQ. Let me set the record straight. I don't get lousy fills from IB. I have repeatedly stated, on ET boards, that I am not aware of any retail broker giving better fills than IB, and IB is especially good for electronically liquid securities like SPY and QQQQ. I did get some lousy fills in the past, and then, my detailed analysis and bug reports resulted in major improvements to IB's order routing and execution logic and features. None of those past bad fills were connected to any inadequacy in my machine. I do know of further specific improvements which could still be made, but as far as I know, IB now gives the best fills. The improvements which IB has made have prevented me from getting any lousy fills in a long time. The last time I did get a lousy fill, months ago, IB acknowledged that it was due to a bug in their new feature for excluding electronic quotes from SMART order routing. Apex, you have repeatedly put words in my mouth that I never wrote or spoke. I think this demonstrates that nothing you say can be taken seriously. Shame on you. Don't you see that your blatant dishonesty can only hurt the reputation of the Refco brand, which you are trying so hard to defend?
A simple search of your previous posts states the following: "I have repeatedly observed that when I submit a marketable TWS order, in a rapidly moving market, (I currently only trade SPY and QQQ), I sometimes get an extremely poor execution, which could have been avoided had TWS been designed to execute in rapidly moving markets. These problems, when they occur, either prevent an order from executing at all, or delay it substantially, for up to 90 seconds, costing perhaps 10 to 20 cents more per share than if my order had been handled correctly. Island time and sales proved, in each case, that if an appropriate INET DISCRETIONARY or INET PEG MARKET order had been routed to ISLAND, it would have executed almost immediately and avoided the aforementioned loss; but IB does not provide these native INET order types, and IB canât explain its failure to do so." And . . . "Can anyone advise me as to the following options as to DSL for trading? I am only concerned with trading for purposes of selecting the speed of my DSL. I can continue with my current speed of 768K, at a lower cost. Or I can upgrade to 1.5M for higher cost, or to 3.0M for higher cost still. Will it matter for purposes of trading? For trading, is 768K just as good as 1.5M or 3.0M?" And . . . "I am running a 1ghz Athlon with 256MB RAM and W2K and a RADEON 7000 dual monitor display. I trade with IB's TWS. If I also try to use medved's quotetracker, then QT gets too slow, both lagging the IB data feed, and responding sluggishly and slowly to my comands. If I try to use Interactive Brokers charts, then I don't have a speed problem if I only need 1 chart, but if I need to have 2 charts displaying at the same time, the machine definitely gets fairly slow, and if I need to have 3 charts displaying simultaneosly, then the machine becomes unusable, at least for trading." And . . . "thanks for the idea, oldtrader, but shorting futures won't work for me. I am shorting stocks because I need to trade small, as a risk control device, at least while developing my strategy, and because I need to be able to vary my position size, which would require use of multiple contracts if I used futures (way too much risk for me). So futures really are not a viable choice for me at this point." Who's lying now my friend???
Apex, You quoted one of my postings about SPY and QQQ from well over a year ago (May 2, 2004), before IB made many of the critical improvements I am talking about. Your exploration of ancient history, as to SPY and QQQQ, is totally consistent with everything I have said, and with my belief that you are telling lies, to retaliate against my ridiculing your promotion of Refco. Your quotes of my postings regarding DSL, and re: my reasons for trading equities, instead of futures, contain nothing to support your accusations, and present nothing to contradict anything else I have said. I was very surprised to find, from your last posting, that I did make an erroneous posting saying that I had only 256MB RAM in my machine. You got me - I made a mistake! My RAM was 3 times that number, but I absentmindedly and erroneously said it was 256MB. IB has greatly improved the speed of its charts, so that I only experience problems with charting combination symbols. QT has been getting worse for me, but Medved at QT has been more than willing to work with me to diagnose the problem, and I am sure we will be successful, because he is extremely capable. Our progress has been delayed on my end, not Medved's end. Apex, for god sake, do you really think this type of debate helps your promotion of Refco? I was disgusted by your comments about Refco, but I think they were at least more interesting than your ridiculous scrutiny of my old postings. I can't believe anybody on ET really cares about your accusations against me.
I have traded with 256M of RAM on a 128Mbps adsl circuit with IB and been entirely happy with the result. I currently have more but it costs me less. I use less than a lot of people who get far worse trading results. Apex, I think that your personal attacks on JR based on his being frugal with ram or cct speed make you look like a complete dickhead. Most (all?) CFOs in corporates will commend frugality when applied without degradation of the outputs of the business. I'm sure that your are not a complete dickhead so why not stick with rational defenses of Refco.
I am not here promoting REFCO. God knows that they can defend themselves. I have simply been pointing out the mechanics and fundamental relationships between the FCM, REFCO LLC and that of the CME and Exchange Clearing Corporation that make the segregated futures accounts at REFCO LLC safe, with no threat by any liquidity related issues that have to do with the Capital Markets Group ( a division of REFCO HOLDINGS ) which needs bank credit lines in order to conduct its transactions and Prime Brokerage business. I'm sorry that you have been unable to see the distinction that I have spent the better part of the day making in regards to the woes of REFCO. In any event, please forgive me if it has appeared that I have tried to demean you and your trading by using the ET search feature. I wish you all the best in your trading. Good Luck Sir.