MB Trading Futures - Introduction

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There's plenty of people on this board that like MB, that's why they are here. There's no question left to any of us that MB is a legitimate broker that truly handles FX the way that we prefer to see it...as an STP firm that also loads customer orders directly into their quotes for ECN interaction. There's nothing left to prove in that area. Now, you can argue about whether that is the only model that traders should be using or not, but for those that prefer to know that there are no "hands in the pot" at the firm in terms of preferential treatment or execution of a trade, MB is obviously the legit broker. Spare us with trying to single someone out and also keep in mind that not everyone has the same needs out of a broker, so you aren't going to be able to "disprove" what MB is. I've been around this board a long time and there are probably 20 names that post here regularly that I would vouch for as having been here for a long time and knowing what they are talking about.

As for anyone's "world view" of politics, yours already sounds pretty jaded so we'll keep that in mind as you go. Can't wait to hear your findings!

By the way, if you are referring to wanna's comments about Trailing Stops, they are correct, MetaTrader client software handles Trailing Stops so you have to leave it running. However, if you prefer server-side pip-for-pip trailing stops (the way it should be), use Desktop (formerly Navigator). You have much more order control with their order types there than in MT4.

It would seem the exchanges probably have it right, the CME has been doing it right for some time. Obviously offering 500:1 leverage on a micro account to a person who has never traded and has only the brokers how to literature is being setup. They probably do need some protection, and perhaps it will force out the scumbag shops and force brokers to compete honestly.

Justin, if this is the case, why wouldn't I just open an account with TD, what is the MB advantage?

LOL. Wow, this should be fun to watch. You really are new here.

I try to change my password every few months (for security purposes), but for some reason I have been unable to today after several tries. I'm sure all of my personal info is correct, but the server keeps telling me that I have entered "invalid personal information." I can log into my account without any problems.

I tried contacting MB Trading through the website, but I get an odd message saying that due to some kind of "error," my message was unable to be sent.

Is there some kind of technical/server issue going on right now that I am unaware of, or is it just a coincidence that I can't seem to change my password OR contact MBT via the website?

Will try again tomorrow or later in the week ...

Thanks for the reply. Well, just let me say this, honesty and broker is the truest oxymoron. I didn't mean to single anyone out, but I just read this entire forum and a few pages back had been going through a section with a lot of wanna's comments.

Having worked for many brokerages, including Cantors and Merrills, and in many countries, including Japan, China, and Singapore, I did find rather laughable his comment wherein he guaranteed the whole world would follow lock step with whatever the US mandates into its law for the financial industry. I can just see the Fed and People's Bank a singin' down the yellow brick road. Well, no, five years in China, two of them in Beijing, and believe me, there is no love for American politics in that country, quite the opposite indeed.

I also learned what good fun it is to the broker community to screw and walk all over clients, even at the interbank level, it's funny, the market makers and dealers at the largest fx banks in the world all paranoid that the brokers are screwing them, it's the same all the way up, and yes, it's a screwfest all the way. And when the regulators throw a lawsuit over the desks of the jackals (interbank brokers), it's even funnier for them. There is no real regulation. Sarbanes Oxley was supposed to address the more mischievous process transgressions, but the little annual bs process audit doesn't scratch the surface or do very much at all. I should know, in my first year at the former Merrill Lynch, in risk control, I was responsible for signing off on a whole lot of that bs. This is the problem. No one can be trusted, all is just well until it's not, and then it's too late. There is nothing to stop any retail broker from burning the customer today and cooking the books tomorrow, nobody is ever going to get caught. I'm fresh off a total screwing where I was told categorically that the company I was dealing with was a non dealing desk environment. F'n Bastards, all I can say. And here I believed them and the excuses as they assuaged and manipulated me and the truth to the tune of dozens of no fills, slips, freezes, you name it. I should have known better but I am human and a bit to trusting of people, and still in my first year of private retail trading. So now I think I've learned a thing or two about brokers. There's a lot of blatant lies out there and not much you can do to protect yourself. I believe the only place to trade in an open and fair marketplace is the CME. Probably because it's been around for so long the government has had lots of time to open it up and keep it fair. And their trading technology is simply awesome. There is no other place where every single trade is time stamped, audited, and regulated as intensely. In my opinion all financial product trading should be carried out in the open, especially the OTC trades in the interbank market. At any rate, I'm hoping for good things from MB and look forward to seeing non manipulated interbank prices. But if i get a single solitary delay, freeze, or requote, I'm done with MT4 brokers. I will only use them or any other retail broker for the great charting MT4 offers the neophyte but I will execute soley on the CME Futures market. Afterall, all the banks are there, and trading against each other no less, and USD crosses have as much liquidity as you will find anywhere. Why not trade direct in the true interbank market when all you need is a similar sized account with a clearing agent in Chicago? At any rate, I'm going to give it a try, and I hope it's good....



MB is obviously the legit broker. Spare us with trying to single someone out and also keep in mind that not everyone has the same needs out of a broker, so you aren't going to be able to "disprove" what MB is. I've been around this board a long time and there are probably 20 names that post here regularly that I would vouch for as having been here for a long time and knowing what they are talking about.

As for anyone's "world view" of politics, yours already sounds pretty jaded so we'll keep that in mind as you go. Can't wait to hear your findings!

By the way, if you are referring to wanna's comments about Trailing Stops, they are correct, MetaTrader client software handles Trailing Stops so you have to leave it running. However, if you prefer server-side pip-for-pip trailing stops (the way it should be), use Desktop (formerly Navigator). You have much more order control with their order types there than in MT4.[/quote]

I'll be honest, I don't get it??? Apart from TDFX requiring 100k to open an account it certainly would make more sense to trade with them directly and avoid all the technological scalper voodoo, wouldn't it? I think I read some of your comments but I can't remember which ones, what are you implying here?

TDFX is the ECN technology. They don't accept retail customers. MB Trading now owns TDFX outright, but prior to a couple of months ago, you couldn't just open with TDFX, you had to open with a broker that routed to TDFX. And I've traded with CME and I'm not impressed when it comes to FX. I do agree with you that I wish the whole thing was centralized and regulated at a level that all trades could get reviewed, but we aren't there yet.

Here's what you won't have with MB:

Requotes

Here's what you can do for yourself with MB:

Don't use MT4, use their own platform. It gives you much better order types and you can control/prevent slippage with it. The MT4 interface simply doesn't allow this and is archaic.

Here's what will happen at some point:

You'll get a fill that isn't exactly on the pip where you wanted. It's technology. You'll have an order in on a news spike and get filled 15 pips higher and 30 second late, and you'll come back here and try to tell us that MBT is a bucketshop because of it. We've all heard the junk. Isn't the more appropriate point that no one should be able to expect that they can always get a fill at the pip they wanted 100% of the time? Once you realize that, you realize that it is a true market, and then you just want a broker who isn't getting in your way or pocketing your losses.

By the way, I have friends at the CME. While it is nice to have it centralized, there are still entities on the exchange trading against you that see all of the order flow. That ain't perfect either.

I have no idea (nor do I care to be blunt) if half of what you say about your background in the industry is true or not. All I know is that plenty of people here are very comfortable with what MBT is and how they are different than the rest of the brokers out there, because they clearly are. Does that make them perfect 100% of the time? Not at all, but I'll take 98% with no intent to screw me and run with it.

You might think different, so you might need a different solution.

Well, thanks for info. In response to a few points I will say this.

Firstly, TDFX still appears to be owned by Toronto Dominion Bank as it has for the last 170 years. I can't imagine the fourth largest bank in Canada selling it's FX business to MB Trading, a retail outfit.

Second, it costs 50 bucks to register oneself as a business in Canada and hence the right to open an institutional trading account with any of the local investment banks, TD Securities included. Although I don't have that kind of money I did inquire about doing just this through RBC.

Thirdly, my background isn't really that special. I did a MBA at a US school with a hong kong campus and then got a few jobs. Didn't really last at any of them. Couldn't work with the obnoxious egos at ML, the asshole brokers at Cantor, and as for ICAP, that was something else. Anyways, I definitely have seen some shit working on those interbank trading desks..... enough to say that the system is just a big game to the OTC players and it's unfettered capitalism to be sure, it's a problem.. and hopefully we reach a better place where markets can do what they are supposed to do before we have a repeat of those rather unnerving times of almost two years ago. I really don't want to see it again but I think it's inevitable if the OTC options aren't made transparent...

As for CME FX, it's really just the USD crosses that are in play there. I don't see how any of these retail brokers can compete with a Trading Technologies setup on your home PC that's dialing you into the pit at the speed of light, and you can get filled literally at the speed of light, the banks can't game you, no second look options, you hit it it's yours, and if you have an issue they'll pull up the log and show you exactly what transpired. It's truly an amazing thing that has developed over the past few years. You just can't get that anywhere else that I'm aware of. A lot of the investment bank research I read often looks at the positioning in the futures market and uses this info as an important part of their analysis indicating that this is a big and important market to the interbank market. I'll agree there's not much happening in the way of the crosses, but E/U, no better place to trade it in my opinion.. I'll still give MB a shot though, and I hope it's good cos I don't have enough money to have all these accounts and pcs running after one year teaching myself how to make a dime in this market...

That's the wrong TDFX. MB Trading's ECN is 3DFX and was never Canadian based. That's probably the confusion. You're looking at the wrong thing.

I agree on most of the rest. Good luck.

Good luck. Hope you find what you are looking for.

Upcoming Webinars:

May 5th @ 8PM EST - NinjaTrader & MB Trading
This Webinar will train you how to integrate NinjaTrader with the MBT Navigator and how your MB Trading account works with this platform. Additionally, there will be training on the basic features of NinjaTrader, and the comparison with aspects of the MBT Navigator.

May 6th @ 8PM EST – MBT Desktop Pro Charting
MBT Desktop Pro: Charting. This training will go over the features and functionality of the MBT Desktop Pro platform in regard to charts. The topics will include set up, preferences, order entry from the chart, studies, and plugins.

May 19th @ 8PM EST - StockTickr & MB Trading
StockTickr provides a professional grade trading journal and automated trading robot. Import trades automatically from MB Trading into StockTickr and generate valuable performance metrics that let you evaluate your trading and uncover ways you can improve your bottom line.

Many more at MBT Webinars

Articles of Interest:

Your Best IRS Audit Repellant?
Looking for Reasons NOT to Trade!
The Trading Week: May 2nd-7th

Correct. TDFX and 3DFX are different companies and not associated with eachother.

Anyone else had a marketdata outage during the big sell-off just now?

Hi jeblang,

I am supposed to make a profitable trade but there was a no connection outage and was left to see my position went beyond margin call, gone into negative and the position was closed with a loss!

Please help. Now I lost due to this.

Thanks!

I was actually executing during that time. Looking at Market Depth bids were pulled and only a couple entries were showing instead of the usual list.
There was a tiny hick-up for less than a min when my account was reloaded, but that's it.

I was supposed to make a profit but I had lost connection when it turned down sharply after the hour.

Please help. There is no way for them to check but at least give me back my money. Also, it's obvious that there is a problem with the connection because I couldn't get out and went over margin call and the position is still there until while it automatically closed my position because no margin left.

How can this happened!

Ok, I had enough of this crap. I was enthusiastic using their MT4 beta, I was eager to be lenient with their live account problems. Not any more.

Today I returned to my computer and saw that the MT4 platform opened in my absence a 6 full lots worth long on AUDUSD (when it was heading south), no SL, no TP. And no, I didn't have any EA running at that time. I was lucky to close the trade with a small loss. And no, I am not going to open a ticket regarding this erroneous trade: I'm still waiting for someone to resolve an issue I had more than a month ago.

I had an open trade that hit TP several minutes after 5pm EST. Of course, the server was down at that time ("off quotes"). It took 20 freaking minutes for the server to get back working - and of course, during this time, the price turned back on me and hit the SL the moment the server was running again. All this time there was some price action. Someone was willing to buy the stuff I wanted to sell. I don't believe the BS about all the liquidity providers shutting down their computers in the end of the day. Who was showing the price then? Why did the interruption last for 20 minutes?

Enough is enough. Justin is a nice guy and does a terrific PR job for MBT, but it's not enough. MBT's MT4 simply doesn't work - despite all the good intentions. I have a small a/c with GoTrader. They don't claim to have invented the ECN MT4 wheel. They simply provide the feed with spreads which are tighter than MBT's spreads+commish (on the more liquid pairs), and they do it 24/5, no interruptions. They had an issue with execution speed, they solved it. They even allow "hedging" (so that I can order my stops-and-reversals, instead of babysitting my trades like an idiot with MBT). I'm moving my funds to Australia.

Same here I can confirmed that there was a 20 minutes disruption at the begging of this hour 5pm and luckily got another member here to testify. Please give me back the balance and profit I could have made.

Hi Justin,

I have a live account with MBtrading using the metatrader option. Can I still login at MBT Desktop PRO to place trades? I just want to use metatrader for charting.