yes, that is another reason to prefer YM over ES that ridiculous ES spread. why people scalp ES when they could scalp the YM is beyond me. at least SPY has a decent spread spread on ES sux but as long as people trade it, what incentive do they have to change it? fwiw, the pit S&P contract has a narrower spread than the ES.
=============== jnet; William O Neil likes barcharts. Prefer candles. Much , much easier to read, much faster to read, less eyestrain with candles, & candle charts are much more pleasing to my eyes.
I would take the ES over the SPY in a daytrading setup. The SPY may be more appropriate for longer term plays. Just depends on what you need.
murray, in re: ES vs. YM that's certainly possible. depends, to an extent on your setups the main advantage of YM is it is more cost effective due to the spread. but certainly one could have setups that work better on one than the other based on extensive testing, YM has better expectancy for me
Hi chud, First of all, keep in mind that the thread starter put limits (an if scenario) on which is better via specially stating that the usual differences between ES and SPY don't exist and wants someone to explain why one is better than the other. Simply, I think he just wants us to talk about the differences via the price action only. Therefore, to prevent any confusing statements... I didn't say ES was too efficient for Japanese Candlestick pattern traders. I say the following... ES is too efficient in comparison to SPY for day traders that mainly get their pattern signals from Japanese Candlesticks. Thus, I'm comparing ES to another trading instrument (SPY) to determine which is more suitable for trading via Japanese Candlestick pattern analysis. Therefore, I'm not saying ES is not suitable for Japanese Candlestick pattern analysis. In addition, I'm only talking about day trading via the lower chart intervals. ES when compared to SPY... ES produces less Japanese Candlestick pattern signals for day trading. In other words, ES has fewer trade opportunities in comparison to SPY if your only getting your pattern signals via Japanese Candlestick pattern analysis. Therefore, if everything else is equal between the two as the thread starter suggested even though we know that's far from the case... We really are only looking at the price action and the generated trade opportunities. As a Japanese Candlestick pattern trader that has no preference between the two (ES or SPY) if everything else is equal... I would select SPY. However, as I stated before, if I do prefer to trade ES instead of SPY (in reality I do because every thing isn't equal) as a Japanese Candlestick pattern trader... I would have ES and SPY on my monitors side by side and if SPY has a valid pattern signal when ES does not... I would take the trade in ES due to their high price action correlation. Summary, if your day trading and your mainly getting your pattern signals from Japanese Candlesticks... Watch both considering more often than not one of them (SPY) will have more pattern signals than the other (ES). Yet, if your using a different methodology in comparison to Japanese Candlestick pattern analysis and if all other things are equal... ES may be more suitable. I'm just staying on topic to an if scenario given by the thread starter by stating that for us to determine which is better to trade... Our strategy, trade opportunities and trade management will be the deciding factors. Mark (a.k.a. NihabaAshi) Japanese Candlestick term