Hmm anyone try trading just the minimum needed to get the platform for free then switching all your trades to IB or something cheaper? Like trading 50 RT e-mini's using Tradestation then using IB for the rest of your trades for that month. IB's commission is a lot cheaper than Tradestations but with this system, you can get the best of both worlds. The only problem would be if you do automated trading which would be kinda hard to switch to IB unless there are third party tools I don't know about.
YUP. There are 3rd party tools to trigger TS generated trades with the "other" broker; some cost and some are free. DS
What are the 3rd party tools that let the users to automate trading with Tradestation's software with IB's brokerage?
I use both IB and Tradestation. I have my own charting package that I wrote using MFC/C++ for IB which is very fast and just what I want. Tradestation hangs up if you are displaying more than a few charts, T&S or the matrix. (Yes I have a fast machine...) 3 times last week (when I was in a position) as the market started to rock, Tradestation stuck. My IB client worked fine (IB does not deliver every tick as TS does). I do not need every tick, IB's sampling works great in a fast market. TS hangs at the exact times I want to trade when a move is being confirmed by volume... TS resumes rendering after the volume has slowed and the data model & rendering catch up... Late. Move is now confirmed over. I am not scalping, but I still want to get the best entry and exits possible. I will trade TS 1 day a month to save the data fees. Good news, but I am still moving away from Tradestation as each release just gets slower and slower. Instead of asking users to upgrade their hardware with each release, they should be looking at improving the antique drawing and data model. They should freeze all new features and focus on performance. I like TS for prototyping and backtesting, it has been worth the data fees for that alone. It is also my backup system if anything goes wrong with IB. The motivation behind the fee changes; they are losing customers and the money is in commissions. Good luck,
I did not say they are not making money. The Microsoft software model works. To say that Tradestation is the Microsoft of trading systems however is not a complement. I am not an investor in Tradestation, I am a user who wants the best trading software. Customers that use IB because it is faster, has an API, a range of add-on front ends, more tradeable markets and cheaper commissions could possibly be TS customers. The market is growing, TS could have done even better in this space with more attention given to technology instead of marketing. TS would not be reducing its data fees if it did not feel pressure from customers and competitors to do so. It is easier to cut data fees than to address performance, chart rendering engine, data model and add new tradeable markets. There are satisfied customers that will use Tradestation to trade. I am glad to get free data for a few hours of trading when the market is slow. Then I will use something better for the majority of my trading. No problem here. Good luck,
There have been some comments from TS that seem to indicated they finally publically acknowledge the snail like performance and that they are fixing it. Maybe it was when some to their most prominent users complained that instead of taking under a minute to load their charts it was taking near a half hour. Whether they do anything about it remains to be seen and their track record in delivering on promises is poor at best. DS
from slacker "Tradestation hangs up if you are displaying more than a few charts, T&S or the matrix. (Yes I have a fast machine...) 3 times last week (when I was in a position) as the market started to rock, Tradestation stuck. My IB client worked fine (IB does not deliver every tick as TS does). I do not need every tick, IB's sampling works great in a fast market. TS hangs at the exact times I want to trade when a move is being confirmed by volume... TS resumes rendering after the volume has slowed and the data model & rendering catch up... Late. Move is now confirmed over. I am not scalping, but I still want to get the best entry and exits possible." I have TS for charting and haven't seen the lag in a month, and only couple times before that. On Esignal I see many more lags. I can't say I've noticed a definite difference between TS and my X-Trader either, which is surprising. The computers I have running are all over 1 yr old, and have 512 of RAM. My load time for 2 desktops and 4 workspaces(2 per desktop), and 3 -4 charts per workspace as well as a quote list of about 50 index and equities is under 2 minutes for sure. Next time I'll time it to double check because I often am running through email as it opens so don't pay close attention. Not arguing with you guys, I always think this stuff can be done better and would most assuredly like lower commissions, although TS is my backup, but I will make sure and hit them for 50 trades regardless.
I got fed up with TS for a number of reasons, not the least of which was the sluggish performance. I felt they were nickle and diming by charging $20 a month for ECN books. They promised a decent SERVER based scanner for 2 years, Never delivered. Just few of my not favorite things.