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Question for Big Time Professional Traders/Programmers

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  • At some point all MT4 Brokers work against Retail Traders
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  • #1
  • First Post: Edited 11:15pm Jun 16, 2015 11:04pm | Edited 11:15pm
Hey folks,

Well I'm starting to do reasonably well trading, I believe this is the start of my journey... I'm sure there will be plenty of obstacles in the future! An obstacle I recently noticed as my account's size grew was Slippage! Especially on my larger account (Tickmill), it was blatantly large and I suspect it will only get worse.

I'd like to move away from MT4 Brokers and the MT4 Platform in due time as it seems it's an up hill battle with MT4 Brokers.

I would like to hear advice from Professional Traders/Programmers who have had experience working with better Trading Platforms
I'm willing to pay for access to a good Trading Platform, along with other fee's required to access data etc.

The Trading Platform must be able to access deep liquidity either directly (is that even possible lol?) or through a broker

Ultimately I would like to trade in an environment that provides fast execution but more importantly little/no slippage. Spread is not much of an issue. My yearly budget would be ~10K - 25K for this type of trading environment give or take a few K depending on the ability of the Platform and Services of the Broker.

In your opinion, are there any other options a Successful Retail Trader has in trying to "enter" this type of environment??

Thanks everyone, as always I appreciate the feedback and knowledge this community has/still provides me
A Positive Mind, and Positive Spirit lead to True Happiness
  • #2
  • Edited 3:58am Jun 17, 2015 3:21am | Edited 3:58am
To avoid/determine slippage you will need a platform with active slippage control (i.e. Dukascopy), true limit orders (i.e. limit orders that cannot be executed worse than the limit - some MT4 brokers perhaps), or IOC/FOK capabilities. But this may mean that your order does not get filled or not entirely filled.

I disagreed with your claim - (pure) A-book brokers simply pass all of your orders on to LPs (and you can receive the counter-party's name to see who took the other side of the trade).
Return To Disorder
  • #3
  • Jun 17, 2015 4:22am Jun 17, 2015 4:22am
I disagree too, the fact that a broker offer MT4 as platform doesn't mean he have any interest in work against you, the opposite is true most of the time, a good broker (and almost all good brokers offer also mt4 now) will be veeery happy to have a client that make good profits!
Good profits mean account get bigger mean trade sizes get bigger mean more commission for the broker.

As for the slippage, you are right, at one point as your trade size grow you face slippages, you then need to enter and exit your trades with IOC or FOK (I always use IOC for example), this mean no slippage but also you may get partial fills or no fills at all, the best solution is always to use a limit order to enter/exit market (you can as well put a limit order at current price!), that would give you absolutely 0 slippage or even positive slippage.

But getting back to the idea of mt4 broker as working against retail traders, no it doesn't make sense.

Take care
  • #4
  • Jun 17, 2015 8:52am Jun 17, 2015 8:52am
Thanks guy I appreciate the replies,

It was/is just very hard to believe the massive slippage on just 1 of my accounts but alas what to do at the end of the day I am stil making profit with them.

I'll look into brokers such as and including Dukascopy and also "true" limit orders as I've never heard of "true" orders before.

Thanks again guys, goodluck and Godbless!
A Positive Mind, and Positive Spirit lead to True Happiness
  • #5
  • Jun 17, 2015 9:00am Jun 17, 2015 9:00am
Some brokers are fair with their clients but we can count them on the fingers of hands...
Algorithm is life
  • #6
  • Jun 17, 2015 12:27pm Jun 17, 2015 12:27pm
Quoting Rparm
Hey folks, Well I'm starting to do reasonably well trading, I believe this is the start of my journey... I'm sure there will be plenty of obstacles in the future! An obstacle I recently noticed as my account's size grew was Slippage! Especially on my larger account (Tickmill), it was blatantly large and I suspect it will only get worse. I'd like to move away from MT4 Brokers and the MT4 Platform in due time as it seems it's an up hill battle with MT4 Brokers.
Is it actual Slippage with Tickmill or is it because the Latency over the last couple of weeks has been just fucking terrible?

I really don't think it has anything to do specifically with MT4, as I have traded a few different platforms and with other charting services. There will always be issues no matter what you migrate to, more often broker dependent/specific than the software being used.

Benefits of MT4, is the availability of a lot of easy to work with, customize-able tools, (scripts, EAs, indies)

Throwing these babies out with the bath water, may not be exactly what you are wanting to achieve.

Just saying is all.
Money Can't Buy Happiness. Poverty Can't Buy SHIT! You Choose!
  • #7
  • Jun 17, 2015 12:29pm Jun 17, 2015 12:29pm
Quoting CrazyCoder
Some brokers are fair with their clients but we can count them on the fingers of hands...
I'd actually go vice versa...there's a lot more of them that can be trusted, than not.

What specific advantage do they have by ripping off the average schlep for a couple hun, when there are thousands of others handing over their accounts on a daily basis?

If you really want to see the corrupt side of the equation, start looking at your brother trader. It's typically these guys that have fucked things up for the rest of us.
Money Can't Buy Happiness. Poverty Can't Buy SHIT! You Choose!
  • #8
  • Jun 17, 2015 1:20pm Jun 17, 2015 1:20pm
I recently saw an interview (it's on youtube, very interesting to see) with the founder of London Capital Group, Simon Denham.
A well know broker highly respected broker based in London.

In one of the video's he said they don't care about losing traders, they let them trade how and whatever they want until they are bust.
They look for profitable traders on the long term, and they do not trade against these traders, they copy them.
So whatever this trader buys or sells, they would do exactly the same.
I don't think brokers will put much effort in working against you, this asks to much time.

Inserted Video


In another part of the interview he said the winning/losing rate on traders is around 20% winning, 80% losing.
He also mentions there where universities who did this research and came to the same result, this shows the 5% vs 95% is bullshit.
  • #9
  • Jun 17, 2015 2:11pm Jun 17, 2015 2:11pm
Quoting Dkam
In another part of the interview he said the winning/losing rate on traders is around 20% winning, 80% losing. He also mentions there where universities who did this research and came to the same result, this shows the 5% vs 95% is bullshit.
I am with you on the fact that brokers cannot be committed to taking that much time to stop hunt the little accounts. And it seriously does make more sense to just stop trading against the regular winning accounts, and even sounds like it'd be a lot easier thing to do.

As for the 80-20% or 95-5% for losers to winners...unless we could actually see what the stats say, and I mean, a very detailed description...it's actually a bit misleading.

I remember a few years back, a member posted the stats off of one of the brokers. They claimed to have some 45% of their current accounts being in positive trades and being green for the year. They also claimed that this was an impressive gain over the previous 37% year, prior.

Seems pretty decent, right?

For most, it seems that way. For guys like me, we want to know the rest.

Most would assume that this is, of all accounts. What if it is only accounts that have a balance of over $100k? What if this is only of the people that joined in that calendar month? What if this is only the people who trade less than 5 trades per week?

The point is...all stats are typically bullshit and they are spun into the favor of whomever decides to add them of value.

Check it.

Several years ago, the Cancer Society put out a set of stats that claimed that 40% of women will get breast cancer. This is a pretty serious number. From here, women flocked to their doctors to have mammograms. Several months later, the full report of the study came out. The full study read, 40% of all women who live to the age of 112, will get breast cancer.

(I don't actually recall the numbers of the study, but do specifically recall that the 40% rate only seriously applied to centurions)

Good/Bad/Indifferent...nobody should take a broker, platform, chart set, methodology or money management idea, based purely off of statistical bullshit. Each person should claw their way through market and gain a sense of this value for themselves.
Money Can't Buy Happiness. Poverty Can't Buy SHIT! You Choose!
  • #10
  • Jun 17, 2015 8:35pm Jun 17, 2015 8:35pm
Quoting Dkam
I recently saw an interview (it's on youtube, very interesting to see) with the founder of London Capital Group, Simon Denham. A well know broker highly respected broker based in London. In one of the video's he said they don't care about losing traders, they let them trade how and whatever they want until they are bust. They look for profitable traders on the long term, and they do not trade against these traders, they copy them. So whatever this trader buys or sells, they would do exactly the same. I don't think brokers will put much effort in...

The way the LCG boss describes how the company hedges against exposures to different aspects of market risks, is almost similar in spirit to how institutional FX options traders hedge their options portfolios i.e. they don't give a shit about particular options trades, particular option strikes, particular counterparties etc etc.

They just pull up their generated FX options risk reports (or FX stepladder reports, different banks will have different names for them), check at which levels their OVERALL PORTFOLIO (not individual trades) are over/under exposed to particular risk measures, and then hedge accordingly (or not, as the case may be).

In the same spirit, retail traders should be under no illusion that MT4 brokers are somehow CONSCIOUSLY "working against" retail traders. It doesn't make any business sense.
I'm not trying to convince anyone. I'm not in the "convincing" business.
  • #11
  • Jun 18, 2015 12:55pm Jun 18, 2015 12:55pm
Quoting Rparm
I'll look into brokers such as and including Dukascopy and also "true" limit orders as I've never heard of "true" orders before.
What I meant is this: I am trading via the same broker you mentioned with your account. They told me that negative slippage can occur on their limit orders(!), which by definition must not occur since the very sense of a limit order is to not to be executed worse than the limit.. But they appeased me with that it would rarely happen in practice!?
Return To Disorder
  • #12
  • Edited 2:01pm Jun 18, 2015 1:34pm | Edited 2:01pm
I appreciate all the feed back gentlemen!

Something that would be a good test to do with your Broker (something I am doing with mine) is to trade the same strategy(EA/autoamted of course) on different accounts with the same broker to get an idea of slippage (use a vps).

If you compare accounts 1 and 7 of my TEs with the other accounts 2,3,4,5, and 6 you will see major consistent negative slippage on accounts 1 and 7.
1 and 7 have been losing consistently for sometime now suffering even 26 pips slippage with Stop losses and slippage on with Entry Fills.
This is the reason I question the Integrity of Tickmill and a few other brokers. It might be worth doing to see if your account is being slipped on purpose or there is some other issue regarding your account(s). My VPS has 1.2ms delay all orders are filled on the same millisecond when looking at the trade history very rarely is the trade filled late, so the issue is not time.

I did withdraw the majority of my funds from accounts 1 and 7 sometime ago when I noticed this, and I'm damn glad I did. It's very tough to say for certain that Brokers are or Aren't out to get Traders (Everyone has a different opinion, even I used to think Brokers didnt/won't waste their time with small time traders) but events such as the one described above make me extra cautious!
A Positive Mind, and Positive Spirit lead to True Happiness
  • #13
  • Jun 18, 2015 2:26pm Jun 18, 2015 2:26pm
Quoting Rparm
This is the reason I question the Integrity of Tickmill and a few other brokers. It might be worth doing to see if your account is being slipped on purpose or there is some other issue regarding your account(s).

Ironically, the reason I signed up multiple accounts with Armada/Now Tickmill in the first place was because my demo and live accounts, auto traded, came up to almost identical for profit running same pairs and logic.

I still maintain that it is the latency and connection, look at the bottom right hand corner of your screen on live vs demo. Live = green/green - Demo = red/green and though they provide the connection status, if you are watching live vs demo side by side, you will see exactly what I mean. HUGE lag on live, demo runs like a peach. This is the exact opposite if you ware working with Pepperstone. Their Demo servers are total garbage, but live runs smooth.

Again, I do not believe that this is deliberate...more so, just a shit connection or morons in the IT department at tickmill.
Money Can't Buy Happiness. Poverty Can't Buy SHIT! You Choose!
  • #14
  • Jun 18, 2015 2:36pm Jun 18, 2015 2:36pm
try atom8 or lmax
Fear's for the other guy
  • #15
  • Jun 18, 2015 2:38pm Jun 18, 2015 2:38pm
Reminder.
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  • #16
  • Last Post: Jun 18, 2015 3:42pm Jun 18, 2015 3:42pm
Quoting Rparm
Hey folks, Well I'm starting to do reasonably well trading, I believe this is the start of my journey... I'm sure there will be plenty of obstacles in the future! An obstacle I recently noticed as my account's size grew was Slippage! Especially on my larger account (Tickmill), it was blatantly large and I suspect it will only get worse. I'd like to move away from MT4 Brokers and the MT4 Platform in due time as it seems it's an up hill battle with MT4 Brokers. I would like to hear advice from Professional Traders/Programmers who have had experience...

How about MB Trading http://www.mbtrading.com/exnspread.aspx
ECN, True Limit orders , MT4 (no dealing desk) & Ninja Trader compatible?
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