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MIG stop hunting my demo account? Check this out

  • #1
  • First Post: Jun 14, 2007 5:40am Jun 14, 2007 5:40am
Here's a little talk I had with the MIG guys today, let me know what you think, especially if you have a real MIG account and was trading GBPJPY last night:

Quote
Ahmed: Price descrepancy on GBPJPY?

You are now speaking with Chérif of Support.
Ahmed: Hello

Chérif: Hello Mr. Ahmed
Ahmed: I have a question about your quoted prices..

Ahmed: running a demo account at the moment

Chérif: Yes please
Chérif: Ok
Ahmed: Are your real accuonts getting quotes from the same servers?

Ahmed: as the demo accounts I mean?

Ahmed: because yesterday i successfully made a trade that closed at 242.66 GBPJPY

Ahmed: today when I look at the chart

Ahmed: I found that 242.66 was never reached.

Ahmed: Now I know it was reached because the trade was successful..

Ahmed: please explain

Chérif: Yes. The prices are always of the bid on your chart. The decripency you are talking about is related to the spread calculation during the news and the difference between the bid and ask
Ahmed: 40 pips spread?

Chérif: 40 pips spread?
Ahmed: why is the price not shown on the charts

Chérif: The charts show the Bid price
Chérif: so it will not show the ask nor the highs and lows
Chérif: and on a demo account you do not see the market gaps and spikes and wrong quotes.
Ahmed: ok, this is what I was talking about

Chérif: It is a demo to show you how the real one functions and for beginners to learn how to manage calculations for their accounts.
Chérif: Can you please explain what you are talking about?
Ahmed: The ask price is always higher than the bid, so even if the bid reaches 242.66 thus closing my trade, the ask price must have been higher

Ahmed: the only possibility is a misquote

Ahmed: in which case it was a 40 pip misquote

Ahmed: because the price never reached anything above 242.20 according to my charts today

Ahmed: I am not unhappy

Ahmed: in fact my trade closed

Ahmed: I am just wondering what could happen in your real accounts in this situation

Ahmed: say I have a stop placed there and it is triggered

Chérif: I will transfer you to our dealing room Sir
Ahmed: ok

Chérif: I guess it is the best way to talk to a professional trader and my colleague will help clear your inquiry
Chérif: I wish you a goo day
Please hold while being transferred to Altug of Support.
You are now speaking with Altug of Support.
Ahmed: hello

Altug: hello
Altug: how can i help you?
Ahmed: Can you see the previous conversation with your colleage?

Altug: yes
Altug: let me read sir
Ahmed: take your time

Altug: so you are saying that your buy position was closed with a take profit at a price which you do not see on the gbpjpy chart?
Ahmed: yep

Ahmed: ill give you the demo account details if you like

Altug: it is so strange
Altug: yes, if you can give me i can check sir
Ahmed: 277549

Ahmed: magdi hamza

Altug: let mecheck sir
Ahmed: go ahead

Ahmed: I am not accusing you of stop hunting, but others would

Ahmed: it's the last trade in the history

Altug: it is a bit slow the demo manager here
Ahmed: ok..

Altug: ?
Ahmed: so..?

Altug:
Altug:
Altug: ok iam in
Ahmed: check the last trade

Altug: your account number is 277549
Altug: ?
Ahmed: yep

Altug: ticket: 6588087?
Ahmed: yes

Ahmed:

Altug: ok
Ahmed: Can you see the TP

Ahmed: it was clearly reached

Altug: i see
Ahmed: so..stop hunting?..misquote..? server error..?

Altug: the price jumpped up 60-70 pips
$
Altug: and then the chart was corrected
Ahmed: very well

Ahmed: but in a real account if I lost money due to this

Ahmed: what would be your response

Ahmed: ?

Altug: in the real , your take profit and stop loss at this price would not be activated
Ahmed: why?

Altug: on the demo we do not have a control on the prices
Altug: because this is not a correct quote
Altug: the market never gave a price like this
Altug: there was obviously a filter problem on the demo server and it gave a quote like this
Ahmed: so the prices that the client uses on the chart are different from the prices that the client uses to make the trades?

Altug: ?????
Ahmed: or you mean the demo server uses different quotes from the real server?

Ahmed: this is actually the first question i asked your colleage

Altug: the control i mean
Altug: we are not controlling every order activation on the demo
Altug: that is why your ticket was closed
Ahmed: and on a real server this "control" is automated, or manual?

Altug: we have a manual control on everything
Ahmed: Im sorry I ask, but there will be many hundreds of thousands risked here

Altug: how can this control be automated??
Ahmed: through an algorithm

Altug: the price feeder is a computer program
Altug: the computer thing you know
Altug: on the real if you had a sl or tp, they would not be activated
Altug: ok?
Ahmed: ok, thanks for your time

Virtue finds and chooses the mean. Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea
  • #2
  • Jun 14, 2007 6:40am Jun 14, 2007 6:40am
P,

I'm not 100% sure this would be stop hunting. You're saying that you traded a demo account and that the price never reached a certain level, but you're TP got taken out. In a real account, it probably couldn't have been justified, but here is the MAJOR problem with MT4...and I have this same problem with other brokers who use MT4...you have no ASK data whatsoever. Grant it, comes through on the tick, but there is no historical record of it on your side. So unfortunately, you're stuck...this gives the broker completely power over almost any situation, involving the ASK (which would either be a buy entry point or short exit point) so every trade will be affected on at least one side. Absolutely blows...but you gotta live with that risk or move to another broker that does keep the historical ASK around.

Perhaps we can create enough clamour with the dudes at MetaQuote and ask them to be able to store that data...I mean, honestly, if they can store historical BID data, why can't they store historical ASK data? just my beef with MT4.

Quoting Plutonite
Here's a little talk I had with the MIG guys today, let me know what you think, especially if you have a real MIG account and was trading GBPJPY last night:
  • #3
  • Jun 14, 2007 7:06am Jun 14, 2007 7:06am
Quoting mrmikal
P,

I'm not 100% sure this would be stop hunting. You're saying that you traded a demo account and that the price never reached a certain level, but you're TP got taken out. In a real account, it probably couldn't have been justified, but here is the MAJOR problem with MT4...and I have this same problem with other brokers who use MT4...you have no ASK data whatsoever. Grant it, comes through on the tick, but there is no historical record of it on your side. So unfortunately, you're stuck...this gives the broker completely power over almost any situation, involving the ASK (which would either be a buy entry point or short exit point) so every trade will be affected on at least one side. Absolutely blows...but you gotta live with that risk or move to another broker that does keep the historical ASK around.

Perhaps we can create enough clamour with the dudes at MetaQuote and ask them to be able to store that data...I mean, honestly, if they can store historical BID data, why can't they store historical ASK data? just my beef with MT4.
Thanks for the reply. However, I think this is irrelevant as I explained to the first guy, because the ASK is always higher than the bid, and the bid itself never reached anywhere within 40 pips of the price. Also, the TP is executed at the bid price, so ASK is totally irrelevant I think.

I want to know from other veterans of the dealing desk if it is standard practice to check manually every single market and limit order (how does this work with 10000 traders in real time?). My experience with MIG so far is very decent, but this got me a little worried.

Also the support was not very funny at the end. "The computer thing"? I wanted to tell him I was a comp.science graduate student, but I decided not to.
Virtue finds and chooses the mean. Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea
  • #4
  • Jun 14, 2007 10:01am Jun 14, 2007 10:01am
Quoting Plutonite
Thanks for the reply. However, I think this is irrelevant as I explained to the first guy, because the ASK is always higher than the bid, and the bid itself never reached anywhere within 40 pips of the price. Also, the TP is executed at the bid price, so ASK is totally irrelevant I think.

I want to know from other veterans of the dealing desk if it is standard practice to check manually every single market and limit order (how does this work with 10000 traders in real time?). My experience with MIG so far is very decent, but this got me a little worried.

Also the support was not very funny at the end. "The computer thing"? I wanted to tell him I was a comp.science graduate student, but I decided not to.
checking manually such order is humanly impossible or the broker have at least 1 employee / 10 accounts. Imagine a company with 50000 account would require 5000 employee...
  • #5
  • Jun 14, 2007 10:01am Jun 14, 2007 10:01am
P,

How is post irrelevant? you were looking for experiences with MIG, and I was merely giving you my take on the situation. I just added the section about the ASK and how it's difficult to determine stop hunting when you don't have all of the pieces of the puzzle.

The ASK is irrelevant to your particular trade, but as a whole, the thread started was a question about MIG and their tactics. Obviously from you're response, you intended it to be much more narrow in scope...that or you were looking for people to agree with you.

So here's the deal...if the BID hit a price and you don't see it as a spike on your machine which means you didn't get a historical tick on it, the company could STILL argue issues with the feed. That means that if there really was a spike (which would be doubtful), then you'd have no cause for a trade retraction. If there wasn't a spike, then in most cases, you would have a reprieve.

This is the first mention of the problem (phantom spikes) that I've really ever heard of, although I suppose it's entirely possible given that a packet could have dropped or a fat finger on a price quote (ala the Japanese guy who made tens of millions on a single trade because some bonehead entered 1 billion shares for 1 year instead of 1 share for 1 billion yen) and they got some screwy data on their side...IF they're reputable, and from my dealings I have no cause to believe they wouldn't be, they will fix the problem if they can't prove to you that there wasn't a spike...now you have to realize, that it would be nearly impossible for a spike to be hidden on your chart if it was a real spike, because a real spike would probably last for more than 1 tick as the market would have to adjust. A single tick would show up, but the chances of a price anomoly occuring for more than 1 tick is very low...in that particular case, the spike would probably be a REAL price.

SO, the solution is this...IF it happens to you on live and you don't see the spike on your chart, you take a screen shot and you dispute the call. From my 1+ years experience with them, this has NEVER happened to me.

Quoting Plutonite
Thanks for the reply. However, I think this is irrelevant as I explained to the first guy, because the ASK is always higher than the bid, and the bid itself never reached anywhere within 40 pips of the price. Also, the TP is executed at the bid price, so ASK is totally irrelevant I think.

I want to know from other veterans of the dealing desk if it is standard practice to check manually every single market and limit order (how does this work with 10000 traders in real time?). My experience with MIG so far is very decent, but this got me a little worried.

Also the support was not very funny at the end. "The computer thing"? I wanted to tell him I was a comp.science graduate student, but I decided not to.
  • #6
  • Jun 14, 2007 4:03pm Jun 14, 2007 4:03pm
Quoting mrmikal
P,

How is post irrelevant? you were looking for experiences with MIG, and I was merely giving you my take on the situation. I just added the section about the ASK and how it's difficult to determine stop hunting when you don't have all of the pieces of the puzzle.

The ASK is irrelevant to your particular trade, but as a whole, the thread started was a question about MIG and their tactics. Obviously from you're response, you intended it to be much more narrow in scope...that or you were looking for people to agree with you.

So here's the deal...if the BID hit a price and you don't see it as a spike on your machine which means you didn't get a historical tick on it, the company could STILL argue issues with the feed. That means that if there really was a spike (which would be doubtful), then you'd have no cause for a trade retraction. If there wasn't a spike, then in most cases, you would have a reprieve.

This is the first mention of the problem (phantom spikes) that I've really ever heard of, although I suppose it's entirely possible given that a packet could have dropped or a fat finger on a price quote (ala the Japanese guy who made tens of millions on a single trade because some bonehead entered 1 billion shares for 1 year instead of 1 share for 1 billion yen) and they got some screwy data on their side...IF they're reputable, and from my dealings I have no cause to believe they wouldn't be, they will fix the problem if they can't prove to you that there wasn't a spike...now you have to realize, that it would be nearly impossible for a spike to be hidden on your chart if it was a real spike, because a real spike would probably last for more than 1 tick as the market would have to adjust. A single tick would show up, but the chances of a price anomoly occuring for more than 1 tick is very low...in that particular case, the spike would probably be a REAL price.

SO, the solution is this...IF it happens to you on live and you don't see the spike on your chart, you take a screen shot and you dispute the call. From my 1+ years experience with them, this has NEVER happened to me.
Thanks mate, i was just talking about my particular situation in which the ASK doesn't matter, but if your dealings with them for an entire year have not shown any dirty maneuvers in general then they must be pretty good, 1 year is a VERY long time if you trade every week.

The problem I have is with their response, which I agree with melpheos is not quite possible. Either that or they are still very small in terms of client numbers.

The algorithm I was talking to the guy about would involve waiting for at least 2 ticks of relevant prices before executing trades with a stored original quote, and alerting the staff if large moves in the spread occur (as per each currency pair).

Now do yuo have any other comments about them mrmikal(or anyone else)? Server downtime, gaps..etc? This stuff doesn't show on the demos.

Regards,
-P
Virtue finds and chooses the mean. Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea
  • #7
  • Jun 14, 2007 4:54pm Jun 14, 2007 4:54pm
P,

I still have a tiny account with these guys, although I had in upwards of $50K with them at one point. My biggest beef with them was the time it took to get my wire into and out of the account.

I'm not much of what you would call an active trader. I'm very passive and longterm, so most of my trades deliberately avoid low-liquidy/high-volatility periods.

Unfortunately, because of the size of my trades, I had a feeling that my execution time suffered...often, it would take 10 seconds or more to place a trade. Again, it didn't matter much to me, because I was always placing entries at times when I would maybe get 1 pip of slippage...

I can tell you, though, if I were trading that account actively, I'd be a little wary...not so much because I believe they were being dirty...but because in their attempt to be prudent, my active trading would suffer.

Other than that, I really can't think...I don't think they're the best broker in the world, but I told you, it's probably not completely their fault...some of it is my disdain for metatrader in general. As "neat" as it is to program trading strategies with readily available indicators and stuff, I find the platform itself just attrocious...but that's totally my opinion. So take it with a grain of salt.

Quoting Plutonite
Thanks mate, i was just talking about my particular situation in which the ASK doesn't matter, but if your dealings with them for an entire year have not shown any dirty maneuvers in general then they must be pretty good, 1 year is a VERY long time if you trade every week.

The problem I have is with their response, which I agree with melpheos is not quite possible. Either that or they are still very small in terms of client numbers.

The algorithm I was talking to the guy about would involve waiting for at least 2 ticks of relevant prices before executing trades with a stored original quote, and alerting the staff if large moves in the spread occur (as per each currency pair).

Now do yuo have any other comments about them mrmikal(or anyone else)? Server downtime, gaps..etc? This stuff doesn't show on the demos.

Regards,
-P
  • #8
  • Last Post: Jun 14, 2007 5:07pm Jun 14, 2007 5:07pm
Hmmm, that might indeed be a problem with larger numbers, although with institutional accounts above 100K you could call them up for orders. Have you tried anyone else with big accounts (50K +) or do you know anybody who has traded even bigger accounts (6 figure) with a retail broker?

About MT4, the accounting/book keeping is not exemplary, but I like the charting on it and prefer to trade on the platform I make my decisions on, so that's why I use it.

Thanks,
-P
Virtue finds and chooses the mean. Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea
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