I've come to the conclusion that YM (CBOT's Dow futures) is untradeable for swing traders. Without native stops on the exchange you have a situation where YM move through your entry stop limits and through your exit stop limits without getting a fill. The difference is the time it takes your brokerage to trigger your order and send it to the exchange. The only way you get filled is if price back fills to hit your limit (usually only in low trend conditions). This is a shame because it was nice to trade YM when it was out performing ES or NQ in relative strength - to the upside or downside (you can make 20% + more when this happens). Its like the CBOT is one big specialist where the only way you can be sure to be filled is to submit a market order. Not for me.
Yep... I concur. It is quite sad as YM is a great swing trading vehicle, save for the E-CBOT specific order execution problems. When they first launched it the initial problem was liquidity. Just as liquidity was picking up, they stifle the contract's viability with a poor execution platform. Maybe EUREX US should just trade all the CBOT contracts.
One problem with YM is it needs a very wide stop. Unfortunately this leads to big losses. I am finding I like trading Ym better than ES but it is hard to stay ahead with big moves against one. Also with IB when there's is news we have a quote breakdown problem. Never the less I do believe YM is a vehicle for considerable profit.
I will look forward to trading YM again when they get native stops (assuming there is liquidity left).
You don't get filled? I don't understand. Which broker are you using? Unless you are talikng about moves during announcements there is no reason you wouldn't be filled even if the stop is not native. Have you tried placing your limit at least 20 points away from the stop?
I am trading it a lot. Just have to work out my own adjustments. Obviously IB has problems with the feed when busy. Both last speeches by Greenspan and their was no quotes . When the quotes came back we were all down bigtime.
I belive the original poster's point is that the YM order execution platform just makes traidng more difficult- not impossible, just difficult and maybe for some trading styles- difficult enough for a trader to decide to use an alternate vehicle e.g. ES/NQ.