More than one SB platform?

[Phil Mibbutz]

Actually, if you email them, they just put it in the account for you. I did this. I'm sorry to say that I just opened a limited risk with them for the £150 to see what their platform was like, and was not impressed. There is nothing remarkable about their range of instruments, spreads, margin requirements, executions, etc.

I placed a trade in cable, which lost, and I don't have enough margin left to trade anything else with them, and I don't see me trading with them in the future. It was very nice to get a paper statement and paper contract note from them though. I really should get around to closing the account since I won't be using it in the future.

Interesting... I did exactly the same thing and came to the same conclusion. Their platform (City Index with a different colour scheme, apparently) is terrible. Everything that you need doing quickly, it does slowly, and vice versa. It also didn't display properly on my screens, and the charts were pathetic. Never wanted to use it again.
If CI and FS are the same now, why do they use different platforms, anyway?

 

[ceydababy]

The best spreads are with CMC Markets SB - they are even tighter than IG and I think CMC were in forex before SB. Good enough platform as well. Margin requirements are moderate. They have 24h markets on all pairs. Capital Spreads / E*Trade have slightly wider spreads, don't quote the minors out of hours, and appear to have an unresolved issue with manifestly incorrect prices on their FX feeds. TradIndex have forex spreads wide enough to drive a bus through (6 on daily EUR/USD for example!), and the margin requirements with City Index (Barclays FST, TDW SB) are very high. IG offer reasonable spreads, but not as tight as CMC.

Executions - can't comment on IG. CMC are pretty good - if you place an order you can cancel it at any time before it is filled. Capital Spreads / E*Trade have fairly good execution, however if your trade goes to a dealer you can be waiting 30 seconds for a fill and will only be filled if the price goes against you (CS have confirmed that is policy on these boards "as that is how it works in the real market" - with CMC you can cancel at any time). Spreads are narrower on CMC vs CS anyway.

Good luck with your FX trading. You might want to look into Finspreads, etc, as I can't comment on those. I believe worldspreads quotes EURUSD at 1 pip, and there are additionally some bucket shop forex brokers you might wish to try. Let us know what you decide.

Hey Lurker....

Hope everything is well ? Just wanted to pick you up on the fact that
CS and CMC have the same spreads on all major FX pairs...The spreads do widen slightly on CS after the US close. However, from 7am - 9pm the spreads are exactly the same !!

 

[lurkerlurker]

Hey Lurker....

Hope everything is well ? Just wanted to pick you up on the fact that
CS and CMC have the same spreads on all major FX pairs...The spreads do widen slightly on CS after the US close. However, from 7am - 9pm the spreads are exactly the same !!

Thanks for the clarification. When I had my account, I think most pairs were between 1 and 3 pips wider during the day and at night vs CMC (although the difference was never more than three). It seems they've brought a few pairs in since I left them. What are they quoting on the majors? (actually, we should have a spread comparison for in hours spreads on popular instruments here on T2W!)

 

[MoonlitBay]

The best spreads are with CMC Markets SB - they are even tighter than IG and I think CMC were in forex before SB. Good enough platform as well. Margin requirements are moderate. They have 24h markets on all pairs. Capital Spreads / E*Trade have slightly wider spreads, don't quote the minors out of hours, and appear to have an unresolved issue with manifestly incorrect prices on their FX feeds. TradIndex have forex spreads wide enough to drive a bus through (6 on daily EUR/USD for example!), and the margin requirements with City Index (Barclays FST, TDW SB) are very high. IG offer reasonable spreads, but not as tight as CMC.

Executions - can't comment on IG. CMC are pretty good - if you place an order you can cancel it at any time before it is filled. Capital Spreads / E*Trade have fairly good execution, however if your trade goes to a dealer you can be waiting 30 seconds for a fill and will only be filled if the price goes against you (CS have confirmed that is policy on these boards "as that is how it works in the real market" - with CMC you can cancel at any time). Spreads are narrower on CMC vs CS anyway.

Good luck with your FX trading. You might want to look into Finspreads, etc, as I can't comment on those. I believe worldspreads quotes EURUSD at 1 pip, and there are additionally some bucket shop forex brokers you might wish to try. Let us know what you decide.

Thanks lurkerlurker!

I think I will start with Finspreads since they allow penny trade as I wish to go slow in the beginning.

Unless if CMC allows penny trade as well?

I'm also looking at GFT, any comments on GFT?

 

[lurkerlurker]

Thanks lurkerlurker!

I think I will start with Finspreads since they allow penny trade as I wish to go slow in the beginning.

Unless if CMC allows penny trade as well?

I'm also looking at GFT, any comments on GFT?

No idea about GFT, but I know CMC don't allow trades less than one pound (dollar) per point. A dollar account with an SB firm would allow you to trade effectively 50 pence per point but would expose you to currency risk. Perhaps stick with fins?

 

[JTrader]

Some SB platforms like CMC are good as you can have multiple order tickets open & ready for the instruments you trade, with an execution 1-2 clicks away.
On other platforms like metatrader brokers, worldspreads, you can only have 1 order ticket open at a time, and you have to manually click several times to select a different instrument etc. - wasting valuable seconds.

In fact MT4 is a slight pain in that to close an order you have to select "close order" - different to selling back a buy trade, or buying back a sell trade - which then sees you open up a new trade in the opposte direction, without closing the first trade - takes a bit of getting used to...good job its been on a demo account!

 

[rnl16616]

If you want to START small i.e. less than £1 per point then IG Index do allow you to start with smaller amounts as part of their TradeSense programme during a "training" period. This is real money trading i.e. not a demo account. Once the programme finishes then you will need to trade at least their minimum amounts.

If you want to find out more you can read up on it at their website...

 

[JTrader]

If you want to START small i.e. less than £1 per point then IG Index do allow you to start with smaller amounts as part of their TradeSense programme during a "training" period. This is real money trading i.e. not a demo account. Once the programme finishes then you will need to trade at least their minimum amounts.

If you want to find out more you can read up on it at their website...

i think SB co's are losing out with the £1minimum bet size, with forex brokers offering mini & microlots $1 & $0.10 repectively, some forex traders starting out small may go for the specialist forex broker.

 

[jkplay]

If you want to START small i.e. less than £1 per point then IG Index do allow you to start with smaller amounts as part of their TradeSense programme during a "training" period. This is real money trading i.e. not a demo account. Once the programme finishes then you will need to trade at least their minimum amounts.

If you want to find out more you can read up on it at their website...

The thing I really like about IG over CMC is that you can trade in decimals, i.e £2.40 per point, 80p per point etc. CMC only allow whole pounds. Is anyone else aware of any other SB companies allowing you to trade within the pound?

J-Trader - 50p is a perfectly small amount to get going, trade demo accounts if your not confident enough to start gambling. Also the transparency and simplicity of spreadbetting makes it the best way to start trading, counting points is easy.

JK

 

[jpu1978]

Is anyone else aware of any other SB companies allowing you to trade within the pound?

Finspreads have about the smallest trade amounts around, so you can place trades at any amount e.g. £3.43 per point. I am not sure if this depends on what account type you have as it does with some SB companies

 

[AndrewMc]

Withdrawals

Has anyone had any problems making withdrawals from IG. I have been asking for funds back for over a week now and nothing is coming

 

[JTrader]

J-Trader - 50p is a perfectly small amount to get going, trade demo accounts if your not confident enough to start gambling. Also the transparency and simplicity of spreadbetting makes it the best way to start trading, counting points is easy.

JK

S0 what if -
example 1
you have £2k, you trade off H12 or similar timeframe forex charts, your average stop-loss size is in the region of 100 pips, and the SBer tells you the minimum betsize if 50p per pip?
You would be risking £50 per trade, which is 2.5% of £2000 - quite a high risk per trade %age.

example 2
Whereas if you have say $4000 (£2000 ish), want to risk $40 max (or 1% capital max) per trade, with a 100 pip SL, you could trade 0.04 lots, which is equal to $0.40 per pip.

You'd struggle to manage your SB account in example 1 and get things off the ground, much more so than with the 2nd example, as you'd be risking more capital per trade in % temrs. Therefore drawdown could more easily wipe you out.

In these examples, the trader may as well go with the specialist forex broker initially, build their account up to a suitable level before switching to SB (so that they can risk only 1% max capital per trade) use up their capital gains allowance for the year etc.

 

[jkplay]

S0 what if -
example 1
you have £2k, you trade off H12 or similar timeframe forex charts, your average stop-loss size is in the region of 100 pips, and the SBer tells you the minimum betsize if 50p per pip?
You would be risking £50 per trade, which is 2.5% of £2000 - quite a high risk per trade %age.

example 2
Whereas if you have say $4000 (£2000 ish), want to risk $40 max (or 1% capital max) per trade, with a 100 pip SL, you could trade 0.04 lots, which is equal to $0.40 per pip.

You'd struggle to manage your SB account in example 1 and get things off the ground, much more so than with the 2nd example, as you'd be risking more capital per trade in % temrs. Therefore drawdown could more easily wipe you out.

In these examples, the trader may as well go with the specialist forex broker initially, build their account up to a suitable level before switching to SB (so that they can risk only 1% max capital per trade) use up their capital gains allowance for the year etc.

I disagree....

Trading below 50p per point (£10,000 cable) would be a total waste of time.

£2000 (1/5 of a mini lot) like i think you are referring too (10p per point) would mean to make £50 on any trade the market would need to move 500 points.... A total waste of time... which is why I say if you are doing anything less than 50p per point you should use a demo account until you are confident enough to actually trade.

Also calculating how much money you are risking when you place a stop trading margined fx leaves room for error and is an unnecessary task for the novice investor. I agree that you should place stops at a technical level which proves your view was wrong but you also need to know how much you are risking.

If you trade 50p per point with IG limited risk for example you only need to place as much money as where you put your stop, so building up cash via margined forex is not necessary, no advantage at all. Say you think CABLE is going to keep going, go long 50p per point with a stop at say 200 points (wherever proves your view is wrong) and a deposit of £100 is all you need for that trade. Of course that amount goes down the closer you put your stop but I think you get where im coming from.....

If your new to trading you can go down to 10p per point when you start.

JK