Going through the various sites over the last week has left me pretty overwhelmed with the number of possibilities out there and the small but important variations with each broker. I've now reached a point of analisys paralyses so need some friendly advice from those of you ouy there who have already done the work. I've been trading for several years but solely for my own gain. I have since been approached by a few people asking me to manage money for them - not large amounts. I've gone back to each of them with a maybe and that should I agree I'll only do it on condition that: I can find a brokerage that will automatically duplicate any trade I make for myself across the accounts I'm managing on behalf of others. The brokerage also has to limit access so that the clients can see-but-don't-touch. The brokerage will take care of the backoffice end of things and automatically deduct my fees. I trade Forex, the Dow and Crude. appx. 45 round trips per month. I am not registered with any governing body and live abroad as do my clients. Any suggestions as to appropriate brokers? So far I've looked on the surface at IB, Gain Capital, Intebank FX, FXCM, GFT and GCI. Please feel free to comment. Thanks in advance
If you looked hard enough, you should know that IB has all the features that you want. I think it is called Advisor account. Also you don't need a licence up to 5-10 people, depending on your state. Brokerages usually don't care about the states' requirements, so you have to check the law for yourself....
Thanks Pekelo, I saw that on IB. The only down side is that if I Go with IB I have to pay a commission whereas if I stick to Forex only and go with Gain there are no fees other that the spread
That is true but the spread is a real cost. You should compare spreads between the firms you are looking at. Many firms add a pip to their spread, take that as profit and then state they don't charge a commission. I would urge you to do a true comparison before making your decision. FYI, IB's euro/usd spread is usually 1 to 2 pips. (IB's spreads on some of the majors is updated live on the IB homepage. That would be a good benchmark to judge against).
Last time I checked, IB's powerful FA (multi-client) features did NOT work for IDEAL Pro forex trading (a major disappointment). That was confirmed by IB Customer Service. def, has that changed?
I believe you should be able to do that now (i'll double check and repost if I'm wrong later tonight).
That would be very helpful, def. Just to make sure that we're on the same page here... What I am specifically referring to is being able to enter, manage and exit a single forex trade in IDEAL Pro and have it correctly allocated to client accounts according to pre-configured Account Groups and Allocation Profiles. If this functionality is, in fact, now available for IDEAL Pro trades, that would be major (and welcome) news to me. And probably others.
Thanks Def for your IB insider contribution. If anyone has comments/info on other platforms too I'd be interested to hear - no offence Def but I don't want this thread to become an IB monopoly.
late_apex, confirmed we allow IDEALPRO trading in a FA and F&F accounts. calculted_risk, no offense at all. you should get all information available and choose whoever you think will serve you best.