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  • #9,101
  • Jun 6, 2016 5:06pm Jun 6, 2016 5:06pm
Is it true i can actually trade on tradingview through FXCM?
  • #9,102
  • Jun 6, 2016 5:36pm Jun 6, 2016 5:36pm
Quoting Heaveneze
Is it true i can actually trade on tradingview through FXCM?
Hi Heaveneze,

TradingView is currently beta testing this functionality as mentioned on their blog. Traders who are not part of the beta test group can use TradingView for charting but not for placing trades.

You can place trades directly on Trading Station charts.
  • #9,103
  • Jun 7, 2016 3:54am Jun 7, 2016 3:54am
We had what could have been another FX massacre this morning at 0011 ET in the GBP pairs: an apparent "instantaneous" 180 pip step change in GBPJPY, for instance. Any perspectives from your side of the table?

Thanks.
  • #9,104
  • Edited 4:47am Jun 7, 2016 4:05am | Edited 4:47am
Quoting dwt
We had what could have been another FX massacre this morning at 0011 ET in the GBP pairs: an apparent "instantaneous" 180 pip step change in GBPJPY, for instance. Any perspectives from your side of the table? Thanks.
I had +60 pips positive slippage on that spike
Of course was possible also a not so nice event
In few days will switch off all my gbp charts
  • #9,105
  • Jun 7, 2016 5:53am Jun 7, 2016 5:53am
Quoting corre71
{quote} I had +60 pips positive slippage on that spike Of course was possible also a not so nice event In few days will switch off all my gbp charts
Was your positive slippage with FXCM? In any case, congratulations.

dwt
  • #9,106
  • Jun 7, 2016 8:21am Jun 7, 2016 8:21am
To help everyone better understand why, as a US resident, you need to trade offshore, I am going to fully explain how I trade.

I trade 5 pairs....GBP/JPY, GBP/AUD, GBP/CAD, EUR/AUD and EUR/CAD. As you can see, I trade the pairs with the largest daily range.

I have a $5,000 trading account, which I do not keep with ANY BROKER. It is secure in my own bank account.

I risk 2% ($100) per trade with anywhere from a 40 pip stop and 100 pip target up to a 100 pip stop with a 250 target. Always 2.5:1 reward to risk.

When I trade I simply transfer $100 to my broker and set my size depending on the stop. 40 pips approx. .27 lots, 100 pips approx. .12 lot, etc.

My winning rate is 68%, when I win I simply withdrawal the $250 and leave $100 for next trade, if I lose, I transfer $100 when next set up is ready.

Now, here is the key, to trade .27 lots with any US broker on GBP/AUD, for example, requires a deposit of $1,080 for margin!!!!!

Funds are not protected with a US broker (my broker either) so here is what I cannot comprehend from those trading with US brokers:

WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO DEPOSIT $1,080 RISK $100??????

Or for you larger traders, how about a deposit of $10,800 to risk $1,000?????

Very often, I have 3 trades going..... $30,000 to risk $3,000???

Someone please explain, am I missing something?? Like is it the fact that you cannot hedge, do you like FIFO??? What is the reason folks stay with US brokers??
  • #9,107
  • Jun 7, 2016 9:46am Jun 7, 2016 9:46am
Quoting dwt
{quote} Was your positive slippage with FXCM? In any case, congratulations. dwt
Not, atm do not have an account at FXCM but is at 1st place in my todo list
I had this positive slippage on another UK FCA regulated broker where i scalp only gbpusd (on eurusd is a crap), but i must say that lately am experiencing also high negative slippage and slower execution
  • #9,108
  • Edited 3:12pm Jun 7, 2016 1:39pm | Edited 3:12pm
Quoting dwt
We had what could have been another FX massacre this morning at 0011 ET in the GBP pairs: an apparent "instantaneous" 180 pip step change in GBPJPY, for instance. Any perspectives from your side of the table? Thanks.
As the June 23rd date of the Brexit vote approaches, expect more GBP volatility with each new poll that indicates some shift in voter sentiment. The DailyFX research team is has been hosting a series of webinars leading up to the Brexit vote and will conclude with a rally in the final week on June 21st.

I trade 14 pairs, and 4 of them are GBP crosses: EUR/GBP, GBP/USD, GBP/JPY and GBP/AUD. My personal approach has been to reduce my exposure to the British pound dramatically (and to a lesser extent to the Euro) by trading smaller positions in these pairs.
  • #9,109
  • Jun 7, 2016 2:02pm Jun 7, 2016 2:02pm
Due to the regulations in the US it looks like I will need to open an account with FXCM. My only complaint is the commission amount. I used to pay $15-16 per million not 40.

Either way, question for you Jason, I use Ninja Trader, is it possible to open trades there (or through your API with custom software) and have use the mobile Trading Station to close a trade should my main platform lose connection? I would assume the account is tied this way, just want to verify. Thanks.
  • #9,110
  • Jun 7, 2016 3:11pm Jun 7, 2016 3:11pm
Quoting pipmaster77
Someone please explain, am I missing something?? Like is it the fact that you cannot hedge, do you like FIFO??? What is the reason folks stay with US brokers??
The biggest concern when it comes to unregulated/offshore brokers is their lack of accountability and financial transparency.

Should traders do their own due diligence when choosing a broker above and beyond checking whether a broker is regulated? Absolutely, but making sure a broker is answerable to some government authority by being regulated is a bare minimum when it comes to the safety of your funds.

Higher leverage/lower margin requirements offered by unregulated brokers may mean you can deposit less money with them, but what about the money you do deposit? If you have so little trust in these brokers you want to minimize your account balance, why deposit any money with them at all? What about the larger traders you mentioned who statistically don't use as much leverage and place even greater emphasis on the financial transparency of their broker?

Accountability to government authority is a key reason why retail forex traders have over half a billion dollars on deposit with US-regulated brokers.

Attached Image


If a broker is unregulated, it means they are unable or unwilling (which is worse?!) to meet even the minimum standards of financial responsibility and transparency set by government regulators. Furthermore, a broker accepting US clients without being regulated in the US is violating government regulations. If an unregulated offshore broker is willing to break one law to get US clients what's to stop them and who's to stop them from breaking other laws to the detriment of these clients?

Traders only have to look at sites like Forex Peace Army to read about the difficulty traders can encounter trying to get their money back or get a dispute resolved when there is no government regulator providing oversight. Below are just a couple of examples:


Crown Forex

"Although some people with accounts were still able to get their money out at this early stage, many accounts were not refunded... the company had no authorization from the SFBC for any activity in the financial sector in Switzerland."


Unfortunately, that wasn't the end of the story. A couple of years after going bankrupt, the people from Crown Forex were at it again, this time helping others become unregulated brokers.



JadeFX

"fraudulently solicited and misappropriated more than $3.2 million from more than 500 customers in the United States and throughout the world to trade forex... None of the defendants has ever been registered with the CFTC."

  • #9,111
  • Edited 4:58pm Jun 7, 2016 3:53pm | Edited 4:58pm
Quoting corre71
{quote} Not, atm do not have an account at FXCM but is at 1st place in my todo list I had this positive slippage on another UK FCA regulated broker where i scalp only gbpusd (on eurusd is a crap), but i must say that lately am experiencing also high negative slippage and slower execution
I'm glad to hear you plan to open an account with FXCM. I'm also glad to hear you received positive slippage with your current broker today.

However, you also mentioned that lately you've experienced high negative slippage and slower execution with your current broker.

While negative slippage is a risk trading with any broker in any market (particularly with the increased volatility we've seen lately), you'll be interested to know FXCM's Trading Station platform provides you with tools like Market Range and Range Entry which limit your negative slippage (but not your positive slippage) on Market Orders and Entry Orders respectively.

A one-year study of orders executed through FXCM show our clients receive positive slippage at least as often as they receive negative slippage.

  1. 76.2% of all orders had NO SLIPPAGE.
  2. 13.5% of all orders received positive slippage.
  3. 10.2% of all orders received negative slippage.
  4. Over 58% of all limit and limit entry orders received positive slippage.
  5. 52% of all stop and stop entry orders received negative slippage.


In regards to execution, it's worth noting that on FXCM's No Dealing Desk (NDD) forex execution, we offset each of your orders one-for-one with the best prices from competing liquidity providers. On the NDD model, we don't profit from your losses or lose from your profits. Instead, we profit from your trading volume, so it's in our interest to execute your orders quickly and efficiently.

To this end, we offer a variety of platforms to choose from and even API options for traders looking to optimize their trade execution speed.

  • #9,112
  • Edited 4:36pm Jun 7, 2016 4:11pm | Edited 4:36pm
Quoting fxRichard
I use Ninja Trader, is it possible to open trades there (or through your API with custom software) and have use the mobile Trading Station to close a trade should my main platform lose connection? I would assume the account is tied this way, just want to verify. Thanks.
Hi Richard,

You are correct. If you have a NinjaTrader account with FXCM, you also have access to Trading Station (desktop, mobile and web) to place trades on the same account. The same goes for if you have an API account with us.

Quoting fxRichard
My only complaint is the commission amount. I used to pay $15-16 per million not 40.
You might qualify for a discount on your commissions through our Active Trader program.

That said, commissions are not the only trading costs to consider. Spreads (not only at normal times but also during periods of high volatility or low liquidity) and execution quality (both positive and negative slippage) can impact your overall trading cost. When all these factors are taken into account, even FXCM's standard transaction costs are very competitive.
  • #9,113
  • Edited 5:22pm Jun 7, 2016 4:48pm | Edited 5:22pm
Quoting Jason Rogers
{quote} Hi Richard, You are correct. If you have a NinjaTrader account with FXCM, you also have access to Trading Station (desktop, mobile and web) to place trades on the same account. The same goes for if you have an API account with us. {quote} You might qualify for a discount on your commissions through our Active Trader program. That said, commissions are not the only trading costs to consider. Spreads (not only at normal times but also during periods of high volatility or low liquidity) and...
Thanks for the response Jason. I have been watching your spreads, combjned the total cost is a little more than what I used to pay but doable. I'll be opening a live account with your firm next week to test out execution etc. As long as execution is good (I'm a scalper) then the minimal added cost is worth it vs trying to go off shore and deal with the headache.Your active trader program does make the costs a bit better all things considered. Thanks
  • #9,114
  • Jun 7, 2016 5:05pm Jun 7, 2016 5:05pm
Quoting Jason Rogers
{quote} The biggest concern when it comes to unregulated/offshore brokers is their lack of accountability and financial transparency. Should traders do their own due diligence when choosing a broker above and beyond checking whether a broker is regulated? Absolutely, but making sure a broker is answerable to some government authority by being regulated is a bare minimum when it comes to the safety of your funds. Higher leverage/lower margin requirements offered by unregulated brokers may mean you can deposit less money with them, but what about...
This is exactly my point, though. The US regulators do absolutely nothing to protect the trader or our funds. I understand you are going to defend FXCM, and I get that. But there is no denying all of the tricks all US brokers have been using for years and really nothing is done about it. The brokers here are being regulated by bodies that do not have the slightest clue regarding forex. So my point is, I don't trust any broker, period. If I can risk $3,000 on a trade(s) by depositing $3,000, why would I give any broker $30,000 in margin to accomplish the same thing. I'm still only risking a certain % of my forex capital, I simply chose to not have it with any broker. Let's face it, during the SNB event last year, FXCM account holders in the US came within hours of losing their entire accounts. Using my above example, I would have been out $3,000, not $30,000. I'm not speaking of negative balance issues, I'm referring to the company simply not having the funds to cover my balance as they are not segregated.

Regarding Forex Peace Army, check the reviews on FXCM, Forex.com, etc, while there are many unregulated brokers with excellent reviews and no issues whatsoever. That is who I trade with
  • #9,115
  • Jun 7, 2016 5:23pm Jun 7, 2016 5:23pm
Quoting pipmaster77
{quote} This is exactly my point, though. The US regulators do absolutely nothing to protect the trader or our funds. I understand you are going to defend FXCM, and I get that. But there is no denying all of the tricks all US brokers have been using for years and really nothing is done about it. The brokers here are being regulated by bodies that do not have the slightest clue regarding forex. So my point is, I don't trust any broker, period. If I can risk $3,000 on a trade(s) by depositing $3,000, why would I give any broker $30,000 in margin...
That's the healthiest attitude on this business. Sooner or later one learns that the hard way.
  • #9,116
  • Jun 8, 2016 9:13am Jun 8, 2016 9:13am
@ Jason
At FXCM, customers orders are sent to liquidity providers anonimously, or the liquidity provider can track that an order come from a specific customer (maybe he don't know his name, but knows that this specific order come from the customer A), and so act accordingly if they do not like order flow from this trader?
  • #9,117
  • Jun 8, 2016 9:33am Jun 8, 2016 9:33am
Quoting Jason Rogers
{quote} Thank you for this additional information. I'm not aware of any changes in the recent Trading Station update that could cause such problems. It's supposed to be a front-end change to improve charts, etc. and should have had no impact on the back-end execution. For this reason, I want to investigate this further for you. Please send me a private message listing the email address we have on file for your account. I can use this to pull up your account details and have the tech support team look into what's happening.
Hi Jason,
The support team are fully aware of this issue. I opened a ticket months ago, but nothing has been done. For them it's normal to have 6-9 pips slippage regularly. For me it's not normal as that didn't happen before. None of the brokers I've used have such a lousy performance and lack of support, so I'm closing my account.
Cheers
  • #9,118
  • Edited Jun 9, 2016 10:09am Jun 8, 2016 6:06pm | Edited Jun 9, 2016 10:09am
Quoting pipmaster77
{quote} This is exactly my point, though. The US regulators do absolutely nothing to protect the trader or our funds. I understand you are going to defend FXCM, and I get that. But there is no denying all of the tricks all US brokers have been using for years and really nothing is done about it. The brokers here are being regulated by bodies that do not have the slightest clue regarding forex. So my point is, I don't trust any broker, period. If I can risk $3,000 on a trade(s) by depositing $3,000, why would I give any broker $30,000 in margin to...
While I won't speak for other US brokers I would like to address questions you've raised about FXCM's trade execution. It's interesting you should also mention the SNB event last year: http://www.forexfactory.com/showthre...23#post8130023

Quoting FlashCall
{quote} How come they lost 100 of millions of $ during CHF last yr if they were betting against you? That means their clients made 100 of millions....
Quoting n_aftab
{quote} spot on ... the brokers that lost money are the ones not trading against you ... and the ones that seem to have lost nothing are the ons most likely to be trading against you .. and have the most incentive to mess you around and play games with you and your platform.
As others here have rightly pointed out, the SNB flash crash last year proved FXCM provides genuine No Dealing Desk (NDD) forex execution, where we offset each of your orders one-for-one with the best prices from competing liquidity providers. That means we don't profit from your losses or lose from your profits. Instead, we make money from your trading volume. Therefore, we want you to be profitable, so you will trade with us more.

Below is an excerpt from an interview with Finance Magnates our CEO Drew Niv did after the historic event:

At the time of the SNB announcement over 3,000 FXCM clients held slightly over $1 billion in open positions on EUR/CHF. Those same clients held approximately $80 million of collateral in their accounts. As you know this was the largest move of a major currency since currencies started floating 1971.


The EUR/CHF move was 44 standard deviation moves, while most risk management systems only contemplate 3-6 standard deviations. The moved wiped out those clients account equity as well as generated negative equity balances owed to FXCM of over $225 million. We believe that the FXCM system operated properly during this event.


The caveat of our no dealing-desk execution system is that traders are offset one for one with a liquidity provider. When a client entered a EUR/CHF trade with FXCM, FXCM Inc. had an identical trade with our liquidity providers. During the historic move, liquidity became extremely scarce and shallow, which affected execution prices. This liquidity issue resulted in some clients having a negative balance.


While clients could not cover their margin call with us we still had to cover the same margin call with our banks. When a client profits in the trade FXCM gives the profits to the customer, however, when the client is not profitable on that trade FXCM Inc. ends up having to pay the liquidity provider.


FXCM ended with a regulatory capital shortfall. Accordingly, FXCM needed to get a loan to cover this balance, which it did. For anyone that still thinks FXCM is running an FX dealing desk, we have now demonstrated that such is not the case.



Given what happened with the SNB, the forex industry is now looking very hard at any potentially similar issues, especially with the increased geopolitical risks in Europe and economic risks in China.

The primary change FXCM made was to remove some currency pairs from our platform that carried significant risk due to over-active manipulation by their respective governments either by a floor, ceiling, peg or band. We also raised the margin requirements for other currency pairs which reduced the maximum leverage available on our No Dealing Desk (NDD) forex execution to 100:1.

However, we continue to receive requests for higher leverage (lower margin requirements) particularly from traders in emerging markets where the average account balance is smaller. Offering these traders a DD option through Mini accounts ($50 minimum) in addition to our existing NDD model for Standard accounts (2k minimum) and Active Trader accounts (25k minimum) allows us to cater to their demand for higher leverage from a risk management perspective.
  • #9,119
  • Jun 8, 2016 6:09pm Jun 8, 2016 6:09pm
Quoting corre71
@ Jason At FXCM, customers orders are sent to liquidity providers anonimously, or the liquidity provider can track that an order come from a specific customer (maybe he don't know his name, but knows that this specific order come from the customer A), and so act accordingly if they do not like order flow from this trader?
Hi Corre,

When a trader places an order through FXCM's No Dealing Desk (NDD) forex execution, an exact matching order is sent from FXCM to the liquidity provider that is providing the best price. For example, a buy order in the example above would go to liquidity provider #2. To the liquidity provider, all orders appear as Market Orders from FXCM and contain no information about the trader.

Since your stops, limits, and your entry orders are invisible to these price providers, we create an environment free of price manipulation. When we combine this with no re-quote trading you have the opportunity to confidently trade all market conditions, even during key news events.
  • #9,120
  • Jun 8, 2016 6:15pm Jun 8, 2016 6:15pm
Quoting keen246
{quote} Hi Jason, The support team are fully aware of this issue. I opened a ticket months ago, but nothing has been done. For them it's normal to have 6-9 pips slippage regularly. For me it's not normal as that didn't happen before. None of the brokers I've used have such a lousy performance and lack of support, so I'm closing my account. Cheers
I don't have information regarding your account at this time, only your forum username "keen246". If you send me a private message listing the email address we have on file for your account, I can use this to pull up your account details. If the tech support team already took a look, I can't promise I will find a new solution for you, but I would like to try. Another pair of eyes couldn't hurt. I'd hate to lose you as a client.
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