Best Thread Capital Spreads

[capitalspreads]

vorbis

sometimes the bid/offer in the market goes incredibly wide on some shares (even normaly liquid ones). Therefore 'our quote' will then reflect this sudden widening. When 'our quote' triggers a stop level in these events in equity markets we wait for a confirmation trade before executing the stop. Occasionally in the rush of executing activated orders a stop that is fairly triggered by our terms (as all orders are 'our quote' / NOT MARKET QUOTE) gets filled.

We can always go back and look at price action from our various feeds to see what happened.

Simon

 

[Vorbis]

Thanks for the reply Simon.

I've been researching a bit about spread volatility today and I think I've been under-estimating how much it can vary. Still, we live and learn and I will be adjusting my SL placement strategy accordingly.

 

[romik]

Been advised on this Alpari with Metatrader 4 via a demo account, real-time charting for reference purposes, OK so far. If anyone needs a reference point, here is the link http://www.alpari-idc.com/en/metatrader4/index.html

 

[capitalspreads]

vorbis

in general in equities you will only be stopped if the market trades at (or the normal market spread reaches) a level which would equate to an 'our quote' trigger.

romik

thanks, but remember these are meta's prices which come from their quoting banks which may not be the same as ours. In general highs and lows should be very close but may not be exactly the same.

simon

 

[romik]

vorbis

in general in equities you will only be stopped if the market trades at (or the normal market spread reaches) a level which would equate to an 'our quote' trigger.

romik

thanks, but remember these are meta's prices which come from their quoting banks which may not be the same as ours. In general highs and lows should be very close but may not be exactly the same.

simon

The problem is that your charts lag at times and so does your site/quotes, separate charting feed/platform is essential for intraday, doesn't matter FX, stocks or futures.

Earlier today I went short S&P500 March and closed it straight away after looking at my external feed chart and realising that in fact that March in fact was tracking December contract, I called in and you changed it. At first I thought I have pressed the wrong trade button, then I realised that there was no December contract on my selection of FIs, only when I looked on my charts, which still track Dec I've realised that there was an error on your part. If I was looking at your charts and there was no separate feed, perhaps I would never have realised what has happened.

 

[capitalspreads]

romik

the prices on our indices follow the 'front month' contract (this 'front month' status changes for US indices about 5 days before the expiry of the contract, in the FTSE the status only changes on the day before the expiry date) . My dealers had not realised the change in 'front month' emphasis. Has havent CNBC as of this morning.

Simon

 

[romik]

It seemed like a glitch, as it said March daily, but the price corresponded to Dec. If you ask your customer support, they will tell you that there was an error yesterday, I still have a fill ticket from CS for open/close. It's not a big deal since I had external feed for the chart and closed position asap. But, it could have been a problem for you, as there are ~10pts difference between the 2 months. All I am saying that a separate feed is important, especially in cash FX as it is not regulated like futures.

 

[capitalspreads]

romick

sorry i misunderstood your original point. Yes a definate error on our dealers part. They obviously changed the name of the daily december future to march but failed to change the feed. Obvious pricing errors such as this are easily dealt with as they come under the 'Pricing Error' part of out terms.

The more difficult ones are where 'our quote' gets to a price but the actual market does not trade there. A classic case would be if Vodafone on the LSE was at 139.75-140.00 and then buyers took out the 140.00 offer and went bid to 140.00-140.25 but then sellers immediately hit the 140's and sent it offer again without any prints at 140.25 . 'our quote' gets to 140.00-140.25 and therefore any stops at 140.25 get activated. Clients then ring to complain that they have been stopped even though the market never traded at the level.

It is always advisable for any client to not only have seperate chart information but (if possible) different accounts as well with a few SB companies. In this way he/she can take advantage of the best price available. Because SB companies run 'books' some will occassionally quote above or below the current price in an attempt to tempt trades in the opposite direction thus reducing the risk on the companies books. This is annoying to clients who may have a position the 'wrong' way round. The same effect can be seen on any number of market maker stocks where one broker will be quoting a higher spread price than another as they may be looking for sellers to offset a short position.

the answer, as with the 'real market', is that you attempt to trade with the company which has the best price at that moment in time.

we are looking into the chart problem as a matter of urgency. Until two weeks ago our charts were fine but they appear to be lagging at busy times. Our IT guys are trying to fix this as I write.

Simon

 

[fxwinner22]

Opinions on this please - make your own judgements

trades short for nfp with 7 brokers - cap spreads being one of them

all The trades had a stoploss at 1.9646 and all were significantly large trades - one alone was 50 lots in the market (no, not mini's) - all these results are verifiable

Here are the results of stop hits

Mig Investments - 4 lots 1.9646

Interbank FX - 25 lots in 3 accounts 1.9646

CFG Smart Trader (bank feed) - 52 lots 1 account 1.9646

IG Index - £384 per pip 4 accounts 1.9646

Oanda 9 lots 2 accounts 1.9646

CMC Markets (deal 4 free) £50 p pip 2 accounts 1.9646

FXLQ Multibank Feed - 17.5 lots 1 account 1.9646

Capital Spreads £155 per pip 1.9659


according to Simon 59 was the first price they could get - opinions please, and it would be good if any bank traders or trading desk people could add to this discussion.

no comments??

 

[wasp]

no comments??

I'm still trying to get over the fact you have that much capital and trade at that size yet your still testing SB's and haven't settled on a broker or three allready. If I was at that size, 'testing' brokers would be something I'd have done along time ago. Well, it is, but we're not talking about me.

 

[capitalspreads]

fxwinner

sorry, I thought you were looking for comment from other contributers.

wasp

this seems odd to me too ... the point about all good trading strategies is that nobody else knows about them. If you spread it over 8 brokers then your system will break down as the market will begin to watch for it.

Simon

 

[wasp]

wasp

this seems odd to me too ... the point about all good trading strategies is that nobody else knows about them. If you spread it over 8 brokers then your system will break down as the market will begin to watch for it.

Simon

I don't use 8, I use 3 and I don't trade in too larger size that my presence becomes known. Certainly not enough for it to make a difference. Nothing has changed for the worse in the past 4 months so I'll keep on with blissful ignorance till it does.

 

[romik]

What I think is total BS is the copyright issue concerning data providers. If the end user's chart does not show a certain price level, though a quote can "very briefly" touch that level, well I would want to see proof of that. But for some reason there is a copyright issue there, "Sorry, we can't show you the bank's data, due to copyright regulations". That's the only issue with cash FX, it would be great if CS could offer currency futures, perhaps alongside the cash market.

 

[fxwinner22]

fxwinner

sorry, I thought you were looking for comment from other contributers.

wasp

this seems odd to me too ... the point about all good trading strategies is that nobody else knows about them. If you spread it over 8 brokers then your system will break down as the market will begin to watch for it.

Simon

so what you are saying Simon, is that if your method of play becomes visible that it fails to work- if that is the case then Fibs don't work, Pivots dont work etc etc - they dont 'not' work, they become self fulfilling.

Wasp, Ive traded with CS for 2 years now - when you get to win and get to a certain level Cap spreads don't want your business anymore, even though they serenaded you in the first place.

basically to quote someone "we don't make anything from your business"

we were slipped again today by 11 pips despite the market remaining at my level for plenty long enough..

you tell people on here that you dont treat winners and losers any different at cs Simon - well we are proof that you do.

 

[wasp]

Wasp, Ive traded with CS for 2 years now - when you get to win and get to a certain level Cap spreads don't want your business anymore, even though they serenaded you in the first place.

I 'traded/bet' with them for a year or so but never seriously, rather just a place to test ideas. I can't imagine actually putting large sizes down as I had enough problems with them just trying things out. All that is in the past and IMO, at your size, I wouldn't SB full stop. When I trade I like to actually 'trade', not bet against a house that gets it in their back pockets when I lose, I'd rather be in the real market and lose to other traders.

No offence meant, just my opinion.

 

[romik]

so what you are saying Simon, is that if your method of play becomes visible that it fails to work- if that is the case then Fibs don't work, Pivots dont work etc etc - they dont 'not' work, they become self fulfilling.

Wasp, Ive traded with CS for 2 years now - when you get to win and get to a certain level Cap spreads don't want your business anymore, even though they serenaded you in the first place.

basically to quote someone "we don't make anything from your business"

we were slipped again today by 11 pips despite the market remaining at my level for plenty long enough..

you tell people on here that you dont treat winners and losers any different at cs Simon - well we are proof that you do.

Some FX brokers consider client's margins as 100% profit, would they still be 100% if loser/winner ratio was to change from conventional stats to prevailing winning numbers. It's no secret why there is no tax on income derived from spread/betting. If the government relies on majority losing, so do the brokers. I know they all say that win or lose makes no difference to them, I call this BS. It depends what size and how consistent your winning trades are.

 

[RunTheNumbers]

wasp

this seems odd to me too ... the point about all good trading strategies is that nobody else knows about them. If you spread it over 8 brokers then your system will break down as the market will begin to watch for it.

Simon

Simon

I'm not sure I follow this line of thinking. If you have a successful trading strategy then surely spreading it across 8 different SB companies is likely to hide it, rather than alert them to it.

Also I am a little uncomfortable with the idea that you identify larger traders and work to counteract their success.

I'd be interested to know what constitutes large.

Ben

 

[fxwinner22]

anything below £25 a pip tends to sit below the radar.

 

[RunTheNumbers]

anything below £25 a pip tends to sit below the radar.

I assume you mean index bets and/or forex?

Ben

 

[RunTheNumbers]

anything below £25 a pip tends to sit below the radar.

Also I would have thought £25 per point on the FTSE100 would be quite small given the maximum individual bet size is £300 per point. My guess is that the "large" bet size changes as the exposure of the SB company changes.

However, some bets must be large enough to be just "large" whatever the pooled position (in the sense that one does not necessarily need to know someone's weight to know they are fat). It would be interesting to know what this rough threshold might be.

Regards

Ben