Anyone know a good FX platform?

[trademaker]

Hi,

Im looking to trade FX on an execution only basis. Im looking at a few platforms. Can anyone suggest any good ones?

 

[SAINT]

Hi,

Im looking to trade FX on an execution only basis. Im looking at a few platforms. Can anyone suggest any good ones?

Try searching previous posts for reviews/comments.

fxcm.co.uk, gftforex.com are usually praised. (cmcforex.co.uk/oanda.com)

or if you want to try spreadbetting: deal4free.com have tight spreads,
capitalspreads.com..

Hope this is a start..

 

[gus]

No slippage on stop orders - excellent service - free trial - old dependable trusted firm.
http://www.rjofx.com/index.htm

 

[josbarr]

Take a look......
Trading from Chart: Buy/Sell toolbar has Real-time Prices
Multiple Time Series: Intraday, Daily, Weekly and Monthly
Multiple Chart Types: Bar, Line and Candlestick
Powerful Drawings: Fibonacci Fan, Gann Fan and more
http://www.proedgefx.com/gp_demoreg.aspx?ref=JBAR

 

[divert]

Also try fincial betting:

http://mercury3.tradeodds.com/d/linkto_cbet.cgi?l=GB&w=CR&n=12279&skin=PORTAL

 

[JP1966]

No slippage on stop orders - excellent service - free trial - old dependable trusted firm.
http://www.rjofx.com/index.htm

This is false. Just checked the website and orders are not guaranteed when the market is volatile etc.

 

[BroadSword]

Quick question: Are there any retail "brokers" where the broker is not the counter-party to your trade? Do you think this matters? It seems to me that most of the retail shops like FXCM etc have a beneficial interest in the client losing, which is the standard gripe about the SB companies.

Also, a bit off topic, but any sugestions for reasonable cheap back testing software for forex?

Cheers!

 

[Torch]

www.cbfx.com will not trade against you being the sole actual bank you can use just like a retail shop .
Their platform is fast, and their fees are upfront-
FEES?? --well yes, real ' what you see is what you get '. comes at a (reasonable) price.
However, you do not get the negative balance protection that the big retail shops give you. No way!!

The urban myth/widespread disease is that the retail shop as counterparty 'pushes' the quote manually a pip against your interests when you enter a trade; ie 3 pip spread becomes 4 pip spread in reality.
Some don't discuss this, some loudly proclaim that others do but 'not us, guvnor'.
Where lies the truth? Suck it and see if you're a scalper. Bigger fish to fry if a swing trader, I'd have thought.

Speaking of www.proedgefx.com, they are offering pattern recognition on their platform and ten years of currency chart history.

Having your marketmaker identify patterns for you seems a bit surreal to me but fair play to them for trying to do something different.

Careful though as they tell you in the really small print that you are not guaranteed protection from losing more than your initial deposit, while trumpeting 400-1 leverage on their main page . There'll be tears...

 

[gus]

This is false. Just checked the website and orders are not guaranteed when the market is volatile etc.

The language on their web site is as follows:

Zero slippage on orders* (on trades up to 20 million currency units. No slippage during normal global exchange trading market hours Sunday 5:00 pm ET until Friday 5:00 pm ET, with the exception of periods of extreme market volatility).

http://www.rjofx.com/index.htm

In my personal experience I have not had any slippage. But they do carry a disclaimer as noted. I find these folks to be very nice - usually answer the phone quickly and are extremely friendly.

gus

 

[JTrader]

Torch -
Also RJOfx will not pick up the tab if your account falls below zero.

I find this to be a valuable facility that should not be underestimated when choosing a retail broker, and is something I will keep in mind when I select a retail broker.
I only trade intraday - but if I were a swing trader, or any type of trader who holds overnight - this negative account balance protection would certainly help me sleep much easier at night!

jtrader.

 

[JTrader]

RJOFX Representative -
RJOFX is based out of Chicago
Your FX account will be a zero debit account. Your positions will be liquidated when you hit 1/4 of your 1% margin.
RJOFX does not charge wire fees on outgoing wires. The only fee that will apply is if your bank charges wiring fees for incoming wires.

Hi

an email response I received earlier.

It seems that RJOFX DOES have a policy of protecting clients from owing money beyond their account balance.

Sounds like a pretty good set-up all in all. And of course RJOFX is the retail fx broker used by tradestation securities.

Cheers

jtrader.

 

[Torch]

Hi

an email response I received earlier.

It says that RJOFX does have a policy of protecting clients from owing money beyond their account balance.

Sounds like a pretty good set-up all in all. And of course RJOFX is the retail fx broker used by tradestation securities.

Cheers

jtrader.

Hi jtrader
That's interesting. If this is the case then that sounds like very similar wording to the GFT approach. I wonder why, when GFT rightly promote this aspect does RjoFX' main page carry
the disclaimer

[font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Trading Foreign Exchange carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for all investors. There is a possibility that you could sustain a loss of all or more of your investment therefore you should not invest money that you cannot afford to lose.


[/font]and do not then balance that in any way with information about this debit protection.

More seriously perhaps, section 3 of the actual contract states expressly as follows--

RJO’s margin policies require that additional funds be provided to properly margin Client’s account and that Client is obligated to immediately meet such margin requirements. Failure to meet margin calls may result in the liquidation of any open positions with a resultant loss. RJO also reserves the right to refuse to accept any order.


This was the basis on which I felt my post was appropriate.

 

[JTrader]

RJOFX representative -
The client acknowledges in the account agreement that they may be liquidated if they drop below the margin requirement. We do guarantee that client accounts will not go debit regardless of market conditions. We also have a more lenient policy than most of our competitors because we do not liquidate clients the second they are on margin call. We wait until the clients equity drops to 25% of the actual margin requirement before effecting auto-liquidation.

Clients can however go deficit if they have subscriptions for different pay services if they owe for a service and the market liquidation causes their account to have a $0.00 balance, they could go debit upon withdrawal of the fee for additional services. We will be offering multiple advisory services in the future that will be fee based, these are the types of services I am referring to.

Hi Torch. The contradictions are puzzling . Here is a later email response from today.

Cheers

jtrader.

 

[BroadSword]

www.cbfx.com will not trade against you being the sole actual bank you can use just like a retail shop .
Their platform is fast, and their fees are upfront-
FEES?? --well yes, real ' what you see is what you get '. comes at a (reasonable) price.
However, you do not get the negative balance protection that the big retail shops give you. No way!!

The urban myth/widespread disease is that the retail shop as counterparty 'pushes' the quote manually a pip against your interests when you enter a trade; ie 3 pip spread becomes 4 pip spread in reality.
Some don't discuss this, some loudly proclaim that others do but 'not us, guvnor'.
Where lies the truth? Suck it and see if you're a scalper. Bigger fish to fry if a swing trader, I'd have thought.

Speaking of www.proedgefx.com, they are offering pattern recognition on their platform and ten years of currency chart history.

Having your marketmaker identify patterns for you seems a bit surreal to me but fair play to them for trying to do something different.

Careful though as they tell you in the really small print that you are not guaranteed protection from losing more than your initial deposit, while trumpeting 400-1 leverage on their main page . There'll be tears...

Thank you for this - the negative account guarantees are an important factor worthy of consideration.

I too am a little sceptical of MM's who offer analysis / courses etc...It can't be in their interests to inform their punters too much can it?

Perhaps (am I being too cynical here?) they provide enough stuff to give the illusion or possibility of some useful tools, but know that the same are not going to work consistently. However if the customers follow them with a false sense of security, then eventually these same customers will empty their accounts into the market makers account??? I tend to think the same about all the charting stuff you get on the SB platforms.

Any comments on this?

 

[JTrader]

BroadSword -
I too am a little sceptical of MM's who offer analysis / courses etc...It can't be in their interests to inform their punters too much can it?

Hi
if you examine this on the basis that the retail broker makes their profit through the spread and financing, and is happy to keep customers - and the only way they can do this is if the customers are winning customers - then the idea that the marketmaker/retail broker wants to improve the traders skills set seems acceptable.

jtrader.

 

[ERA]

Agree there Jt, profitable traders are good for business and a good advert to attract 'fresh meat'. Even if a trader is bad, they would rather he bleed to death slowly than see him blow his account on one or two trades resulting in only one or two spreads deals for them. Reckon thats why there is such a proliferation of FX dealers, lends it self well to traders bleeding to death slowly.

 

[JTrader]

ERA -
Reckon thats why there is such a proliferation of FX dealers, lends it self well to traders bleeding to death slowly.

Hi ERA

is the point you are making that it is easy for retail fx brokers to make money through the spread and financing alone, therefore that is why there are so many of these retail fx brokers?

Cheers

jtrader.

 

[ERA]

Hi ERA

is the point you are making that it is easy for retail fx brokers to make money through the spread and financing alone, therefore that is why there are so many of these retail fx brokers?

Cheers

jtrader.

I think so Jt, if you look at the stats for FX spec trading 40% are day trades, 80% last less than a week, I think this obviously includes the DT's. FX for the the majority of retail traders is is TA based often on 5 min and 15 min. You only have to go sit in a live FX chat room during trading to see how often some traders are switching long, short, long, short to realize loads of traders are making multiple scalp trades aiming for small pips every day. And the dealers are getting a spread on each one of those. After the daytrading craze of the late 90's and 2000 when that tailed off FX filled the gap with tight spreads, free charts and low margin based trading.
I think their proliferation is testament to its profitability.

 

[BroadSword]

I think so Jt, if you look at the stats for FX spec trading 40% are day trades, 80% last less than a week, I think this obviously includes the DT's. FX for the the majority of retail traders is is TA based often on 5 min and 15 min. You only have to go sit in a live FX chat room during trading to see how often some traders are switching long, short, long, short to realize loads of traders are making multiple scalp trades aiming for small pips every day. And the dealers are getting a spread on each one of those. After the daytrading craze of the late 90's and 2000 when that tailed off FX filled the gap with tight spreads, free charts and low margin based trading.
I think their proliferation is testament to its profitability.

If the business model is profitable just on deal volume and the spread then this is very encouraging, as it dispells the idea that these counter party brokers have to hunt stops, bias prices etc to make money.

So if that is the case, then that's good...

 

[ERA]

But Forex being an unregulated OTC market place I am sure does from time to time lead to bouts of 'dealers discretion' .