Common Data?

It seems to me that if the CFTC wants to do something to prevent fraud and make forex trading safe for all they would introduce a common data feed that all banks,brokers,IBs etc. would be required to conduct their trade b usiness by.

I cannot believe the differences in the quotes from one broker to another. This is one area that traders can be exploited.

Pooch

I think its one area that Brokers exploit. Most would agree in regulation need not be put on the end user, but instead placed on the brokers. Though there are a lot of trusted brokers in the market it still seems most new traders trade with scruples unregulated-overseas brokers and when you put together an untrusted broker with an unexperienced trader then its the CTFC that has to respond to this broker, whether this broker is regulated or not.

End users are just that ... end users. We trade what we are allowed to trade based on what our broker has to offer. The average retail trader isn't doing any "illegal" business, we do what we are allowed to do. Brokers on the other hand has the upper hand on most/all of their retail traders. Even the biggest broker "fix/adjust" prices from time to time or the availability of the broker's platform is hindered during major News. In addition to pending orders not being honored. Now as traders we know the risk going in so none of this should be a surprise. So even a regulated broker can get by with these unfair practices but if there were more regulation on the brokers side then maybe we (traders) can have a level playing field and the CTFC wouldn't hear so many user complaints. A lot of concerns and problems would have been avoided if the CTFC would have just done the job it signed up for. It's funny in that a lot of the same broker problems we fx trades put up with are the same problems that Futures and Equity trades deal with also .... just because the regulators option the choose it's fight instead of actively monitor, fining, and regulating all brokers in it's district.

how exactly do you think traders can be exploited by differences in price feeds?

Traders can be exploited by stop-hunting.

Traders can possibly arbitrage when there are price differences (read: diverging feeds), by buying at the lower price offered and selling at the higher price offered. Of course slippage, requotes etc. make this case somewhat harder.

yes they can be. if they place their stop at an obvious place and if the broker actually stop hunts. as for the arbitraging, thats actually the TRADER exploiting the BROKER. not the other way around.

I pay for a charting service apart from my broker, and I also occasionally check charts at Daily FX dot com. The three always seem to move in sync, although the numbers can be a few pips off. In other words, maybe I'm lucky, but I've never seen significantly divergent data between these three providers.

Stop hunting occurs on a much bigger scale than the broker.

Rob