IG Index

[TheBramble]

I was watching their Dow price one evening as the market was falling – IG’s price was about 8-10 points below the cash – clearly quite an outrageous bias..!

And this is where the SBs come in useful.

They are not stupid.

If you watch whatever instrument you're trading AND one OR MORE SBs - just see which side of the underlying they start to bias.

If they're quoting longer than the underlying - you have a good indication it's going up - shorter and it's likely to go down.

The real value is in watching them switch from below to above price (or vice versa) - you KNOW you're onto a good thing when you catch them doing that.

These guys do know what they're doing - most of the time. If you don't have a strategy of your own, follow them!

N.B. They don't always get it right either, but more often than not.

 

[TheBramble]

Tony - I still find them useful. At present I am testing an options strategy using smaller stakes than are possible in the main market.

Until they stuff you again?

Steve, what's wrong with testing your strategy on paper?

 

[stevespray]

Tony - I find that there is still quite a big step between 'paper trading' and the real thing. Playing for real money, even if it is only £5 positions, covers 90% of that step.

Steve.

 

[kbharj]

Thanks to all that contributed to the thread.

I understood that it may have been a mistake from the offset, but i just needed to let some steam off as well following the deletion of the BB.

Thanks again
Kam

 

[expertoo]

Ig were moving their prices tonight up and down and when i traded on a binary at a low level they voided the bet (palpable error)

 

[kitsu]

I too tried to close a small binary at a profit .bet was not accepted as the price had moved against me.

When I phoned and asked the dealer what would have happened if price went in my favour I was told i would not get requoted the better price as it might come down afterward leaving me with a loss.

This really annoys me as they seem to bend the rules to suit their advantage. I should know better than to moan having read about all the underhand tactics they use on this and other sites.

My loss was miniscule and am sort of happy this happened with such a small stake.


BEWARE when placing larger bets!!

Do so knowing IG may void it or delay executing the trade.
A bit like steal 4 free.However Steal 4 free at least offer a lousy requote.IG do not!

Lesson learnt

 

[donaldduke]

If you trade fast markets then you tend to get more
refused bets than trading in slower markets.

In an ideal world they would never refuse an order
at the displayed price.

However in reality you either live with having your bets
refused/requoted or you dont trade fast markets with a
bookie.

 

[stevespray]

It's hard to define a 'fast market'. Any company which enters the field of spreadbetting has to maintain a system which can reasonably handle normal market activity. As we all know 'normal market activity' can vary enormously. The facts as I see them are simple, if IG can queue any order for an unspecified period of time then the rejection / acceptance of such an order has to be based on price at the time the order was submitted otherwise the situation will be exactly as Kitsu has outlined and 'cherry picking' could clearly occur.

In the meantime, the Financial Ombudsman Service have informed me that they are still waiting a response from IG Index regarding my indepth complaint. I'm expecting a reply shortly and will keep the board informed.

Steve.

 

[oatman]

"Fast Market" is a pit or floor term/situation when officials can't keep up with the speed of trading. A "fast" light goes on and for the duration of that, fills are not guaranteed. It could mean various different levels trading in different areas of the pit. Prices can trade through your levels without a fill.
Licence to print money.

 

[donaldduke]

May be IG should have a light bulb icon againist each market.
Comes on when a market has a long queue of orders on it
and they cant garantee fills at the quoted price.

 

[stevespray]

But what about the orders that customers submit and go into loss while customers are in the queue - they'd lose out if they put customers off in that matter.

Steve

 

[Euro_d]

Hi all,
my experience with IG is basically reasonable, I did have a problem with them a couple of weeks ago on the same "delay" and they eventually closed at the displayed price on the dealer interface.
My gripe is that stops are not guaranteed, OK its in the small print but hey, they are way out!
Problem is that IG offer a superb range of markets so we really have no option.
Deal4Free stops are filled almost exactly without paying the extra spread for the guaranteed. I personally use deal4free when I can.

 

[GHUGHES690]

I have lost money in spreadbetting and was trading with Finspreads but the spreads hurt too much. They have come down recently but your story of not getting the price you expected because odf a " mis-qoute" is not the first time I have heard of this! I thought IG would have been more better than to do this but i guess they are all the same. Personally, I want to learn more about options trading

 

[Euro_d]

In my opinion you should learn how to spot opportunities before embarking on options. I assume you mean stock and futures?



These boards are full of strategies that you can paper trade and learn.

Anyway, you can loose significantly with options! Please take care.


IMHO it is much wiser to learn to "trade" successfully then branch out to derivatives if that is your scene.

 

[millsy500]

On igs side slightly.Had a stock gap down at open quite dramatically not too long ago way past stop. ig honoured the stop which i was quite chuffed about! Like you say tho there spreads are huge!

Millsy

 

[millsy500]

Tried to open a trade last night with ig with a big mover, and got 'this market is only open to close a deal'
does this mean they only trade when it suits them?

 

[stevespray]

Which market was it ?

Steve.

 

[millsy500]

It was INCX. US stocks

Millsy

 

[McStay]

Hi all,
my experience with IG is basically reasonable, I did have a problem with them a couple of weeks ago on the same "delay" and they eventually closed at the displayed price on the dealer interface.
My gripe is that stops are not guaranteed, OK its in the small print but hey, they are way out!
Problem is that IG offer a superb range of markets so we really have no option.
Deal4Free stops are filled almost exactly without paying the extra spread for the guaranteed. I personally use deal4free when I can.

My experience with IG has also been reasonable .. and they do have a superb range of markets ..

I had issues with the huge spreads, but unlike capitalspreads, after the spread is taken upon sale/purchase of your position, the market price is displayed and used to track stops .. IMHO, tracking stop loss by quoted price is a massive rip-off .. so, IG does have a fairer system than capitalspreads in that respect.

Another problem with IG is the requirement for a fairly wide minimum stop-level that could be applied to a position ....

Any recent opinions (good/bad) of d4f ?

 

[Euro_d]

Another problem with IG is the requirement for a fairly wide minimum stop-level that could be applied to a position ....

Any recent opinions (good/bad) of d4f ?

I generally trade short term and have the "luxury"(?) of being able to watch the screen so I generally do not leave it to IG to close a position. However, I do not find their stops unreasonable, a 3% stop is almost always filled.

I know many on these boards are critical of D4F due to them not filling orders at the displayed price. I too have had that problem but it is rare. As I mentioned their stops are filled almost spot on.
They also have a very useful feature of price alerts, both email and on screen, which is superb if monitoring a number of stocks while waiting for an entry to be hit, .
They have recently updated their dealer interface and have now live real time charts which are excellent.
Sorry, but I use D4F in preference to both IG and Finspreads (no experience of Capital Spreads) and have no intention of changing at the moment, the latter two have a wider range of stocks compared to D4F.
I did consider CFD's but I am still unconvinced (see my thread on this subject). I cannot see what advantage there is except that you are dealing with the market not a market maker (with SB co's. you are dealing with a market maker). That is fine but I have found that the SB co's I use the price is very close to the actual market after a few minutes following the open the bid/offer spread is very similar.
With CFD co's you need to have at least £10 grand deposited with them, OK they pay interest but I personally do not like the idea of having to put up front a sizable chunk of money.
Dave