my first impressions of some future brokers...

For the last few days i ve been shopping around trying to find a broker. I want to move away from the bucket shop forex providers and start using a futures broker.

Anyway here is my list and my thoughts on what I ve found out so far...

Interactive Brokers:

I rang up and gave the guy my details. Very bad first impressions. But they seemed to get alot of praise so thought I would try them first.
I had lots of questions to ask, but the guy could nt wait to get me off the phone. He took my details and said he would send me a demo and some info. I checked my email and off course nothing came and nothing was sent.
So I ticked them off my list. I have certain subjective criteria I m looking for and one of them is customer service. They came out the worst, and it made me not want to follow it up.

Global Futures:

The guy here in contrast rang me back to save me money. he spoke for about 10 minutes and explained things and recommended the best charting and instruments to use when I explained my needs. Overall very good service. he has sent me 5 emails since with info and checking up how I m getting on with the strategy runner platform.
The drawback is that there commissions are higher and I dont like the SR platform. This in some ways has put me off.

Open Ecry:

Again great customer service. Tried the charts system, but didnt have one of the basic indicators I needed. I m not a massive fan of the charts they provide. they remind of oanda charts which are useless. Good commissions. Alot cheaper than Global futures and not much more than IB, but I think the customer service makes up that over IB.

proactive futures:

This is the one I feel that I m going to go for. Good service and quick response. The charting system which is acatually sierra charts is great from what I can see from the demo. Just what I m after. It costs $25 a month but I think its a price worth paying for.
Their commissions are about $4.80 RT I think, so thats ok for me as I m more medium term trading and maybe only make 3 trades a day.


This is just my first thoughts. I ll let you know who I go with and how they perform.

It was interesting that all the brokers I spoke to said that IB has become too successful for the own good now. This is why their service is bad. Maybe if they hired more staff who could give more time to the customer then they would be a great choice, but I do think that their are other options with better platforms, only little bit higher coms and much better customer service.

Excellent post - thanks tradewinds.

This is all well and good if it gives a nice warm feeling, but there are so many other considerations that many people (though obviously not all) find important:

1. Free open API
2. Range of markets
3. Universal account with automatic margin lending. ie hold one base currency in your account and trade markets in other currencies without separate accounts.
4. Margin lending rates
5. Financial stability of broker.
6. Platform speed and stability.

It is in a way regrettable that no other broker can match the whole package from IB as some more competition would no doubt benefit clients. IB is successful for good reasons.

Thats a fair point Dcraig. proactive futures does offer a whole range of charting applications and auto trade.. I m not sure about multiple currency accounts. I must check that.

reveiws of proactive seem to be nearly all good as far as speed goes. For me they do offer a good range of markets, enough for me to get started anyway or have a diversified portfolio.

as far as coms go its only a matter of 20/30 cents different between IB and PA. For me this is fine because their customer service is better and I really like the trading platform which is great value at 25$ a month and a free data feed. I believe that Ib costs $50 for the data feed.

Global futures charge $50 for strategy runner which I m not fused on.

I know that IB might be better all rounder but I find that starting with PA feels alot easier.

Good customer service, in my opinion, just means that broker is a crook. He is nice to you until you put the money into the account. After that you are on your own to discover what doesn't work.

I think that the most important thing is how quickly you can close the position over the phone when their servers are down. Then you'll be loosing hundreds by the minute and their phone lines will be jammed. Think about that.

cheers, dejan

speed

Speaking of quickness: as far as my experience goes Global Futures has no match. The phone does ring no more than 3 times and somebody on the other side is ready to help you out in case of trouble, taking you out of the market quickly and my english is far from being perfect....
regards
orchidea

Interactive Brokers

Interactive Brokers is an excellent broker for an experienced trader.

But they do not do hand holding.

I seem to recall seeing that their mission statement included fast, low cost, global markets and computerized innovation - but did not include customer service. They're the broker for someone who knows what they're doing just like Brown Brothers (who wouldn't take me at the time) used to be for Stock traders. You really shouldn't consider them while you're still asking lots of questions. Some one like Fox futures would be better during that stage.