International Index Trading

[wavepicker]

Everything is getting smoked. Welcome back Volatility

Good old fashion run on a bank. When was the last time that happened???

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=avrOgElXKYSA&refer=home

HSI, UK, US futures all getting smashed. Yen on a run. Loving it!

Just temporary weakness for 1-3 days IMO TI. Market will be stuck in this consolidation for a little while before finally breaking out to a new recovery high to finish the pattern which should be later this month/early next.

Just my 2c worth

 

[professor_frink]

Hi PF, just a quick question

i'm about to open up an account with IB and was wondering what charting package would you recommend? I've heard good things about Quotetracker and Ninja tracker. Are there any others (reasonably priced of course )?
ALso are orders place with the TWS software, or could i use the above mentioned packages?

Cheers

morning wiseguy,

sorry for the late reply. Haven't used Ninja before, but have heard good things about it. If you just need intraday charts without needing to collect much historical data, then Quotetracker is well worth the small investment required. I also use amibroker, it won't collect IB's data exactly as it comes in, the minimum you can use with ami is a 5 second chart, but is better served set up to store data in 1 minute intervals. If that isn't a problem for you, I would recommend having a look at it. There are a couple of markets that I follow that I prefer to use tick charts for- which is why I still have quotetracker installed on my machine. It will do Tick charts, volume charts and range charts quite well.

I did a trial of Sierra charts and Ensign earlier on this year- Sierra is good, in that it will collect IB's data exactly as it comes in(meaning you can use tick charts if you want), and would also store quite a bit of historical data, but I didn't like it as much as ami(mainly due to the fact that I know how to do some basic coding for ami, and wasn't particularly keen to learn a whole new way of doing things with Sierra).

I quite liked Ensign, but it was quite a bit more expensive than Sierra($40USD per month), and wouldn't let me do a backfill on the HK markets, which automatically ruled it out for me).

In addition to a charting package, it might be worth looking at a front end package for TWS as well(all depending what type of trading you use). For intraday trading, they are quite valuable.

Hope this helps

 

[acouch]

wiseguy,

i use

www.bracket-trader.com

which is compatible with ib

also a one off payment..very cheap combo.

ac

 

[Edwood]

Alliance & Leicester down 30% in the last 30mins of trading in London, now 575p down from 1060-odd within the last 10 days

 

[aussiebuggaa]

Wiseguy,

I assume that you will be trading the E-minis? I’ve just opened an account with Infinity Brokerages and found them to be pretty awesome!!! They’re some what little bit cheaper than IB in terms of commission $4.40 round trip and the margin is pretty low ($500/ ES contract). The front end is the InfinityAT, it is similar to Ninja Trader (without the great report management of the Ninja trader). There is about quarter of a second lag on the Infinity DOM level II data when comparing it to the Ninja, but I think it is livable.

For charting, Infinity comes with free data for Sierra Chart, so you will have to pay $25/month to use the chart. The data feeds are from Transact which is pretty solid, so it’s a great combination with Sierra Chart (Solid software package which I am using). However, I signed up with IQFeeds, $50 / months + $30 months CME exchange fee. I had to use IQFeeds because data from Transact is not PURE tick (same with IB) and I needed the pure tick for my chart setups. I scalp the ES, so every tick count!! So if you’re not a scalper then you can just live with the free data from Transact and pay $25/month for Sierra Chart.

BTW, I have IB account but just didn’t like their Book Trader and the way they do the order fills. You can also go with Tradestation, they have awesome Charting package which comes for free (+exchange fee) if you trades more than 10 contracts/month otherwise $99/month + exchange fee. But beware, I heard that Tradestation is pretty crap at filling your orders as well, but again, if you’re not a scalper then it should not be an issue for you.

Cheers,
AussieBuggaa

 

[Edwood]

big bad wolfe forming on Dow

 

[Edwood]

here's the pic to accompany the prev post - little wolfe achieved his target, big wolfe targeting mid Oct

 

[Trembling Hand]

Another large range day on the HSI. And another record close.
This index is nuts. Anyone else enjoying the mad day trading action?

Today there has been nearly a 3% range from low to high. That is pretty nice to day trade when you compare it to other indexes.

 

[professor_frink]

Another large range day on the HSI. And another record close.
This index is nuts. Anyone else enjoying the mad day trading action?

Today there has been nearly a 3% range from low to high. That is pretty nice to day trade when you compare it to other indexes.

Have a look at the H-shares for today TH, you'll probably be more impressed with it's performance, up 4.24% today. Was up about 5% at one stage in the afternoon session

 

[wiseguy]

im currently getting 4-5 point spread with IB on the MHI, Is that normal?

 

[professor_frink]

im currently getting 4-5 point spread with IB on the MHI, Is that normal?

yeah that sounds about right wiseguy.

 

[professor_frink]

afternoon folks,

Has anyone on here had any experience trading the dax? Would love to hear from anyone that has traded it.

I'm slightly concerned about possible order latency, considering how far away we are from the exchange. How have others found it?

 

[wayneL]

afternoon folks,

Has anyone on here had any experience trading the dax? Would love to hear from anyone that has traded it.

I'm slightly concerned about possible order latency, considering how far away we are from the exchange. How have others found it?

I have a dabble on the stoxx50 which is the same exchange; have not noticed any problems like that.

Cheers

 

[onemore]

Prof
I made the mistake once of trading the DAX using third party charting separate to my trading platform.

The intra day charts lagged the platform data slightly,so sometimes the chart would indicate that you were making money ,but the order platform was actually showing that you were losing .

It wouldnt matter to much, if you were holding longer time frames but for scalping it was a joke.

Anyway thats fixed I get fast fills and only minor slippage now . As you Know 1 pt is approx $40 AUD
Most of the time when I trade it ,the spread is about Half a point its nice and liquid.

Cheers Onemore

 

[professor_frink]

I have a dabble on the stoxx50 which is the same exchange; have not noticed any problems like that.

Cheers

cheers Wayne. Didn't want to go off and do the work to find a decent way of extracting money from it, to find I don't get filled half the time due to the order taking forever to get to market!

Prof
I made the mistake once of trading the DAX using third party charting separate to my trading platform.

The intra day charts lagged the platform data slightly,so sometimes the chart would indicate that you were making money ,but the order platform was actually showing that you were losing .

It wouldnt matter to much, if you were holding longer time frames but for scalping it was a joke.

Anyway thats fixed I get fast fills and only minor slippage now . As you Know 1 pt is approx $40 AUD
Most of the time when I trade it ,the spread is about Half a point its nice and liquid.

Cheers Onemore

Thanks onemore. If I end up having a crack, it will be through IB with their data feed for charting, so hopefully that won't be an issue. It most definitely looks liquid enough to throw a few contracts around. Might be a good replacement for the HSI if I can find a decent way of attacking it

 

[Trembling Hand]

cheers Wayne. Didn't want to go off and do the work to find a decent way of extracting money from it, to find I don't get filled half the time due to the order taking forever to get to market!



Thanks onemore. If I end up having a crack, it will be through IB with their data feed for charting, so hopefully that won't be an issue. It most definitely looks liquid enough to throw a few contracts around. Might be a good replacement for the HSI if I can find a decent way of attacking it

Frink why are you giving up on HSI?? I'm doing more and more on it and less on the SPI. I think I have found my niche. Yesterday I did 60 round trips :nuts:

This is just a guess but you would think the IB fills would be about the same for every market. And the SPI would be just as slow as any market as IB is in Hong Kong an order has to go from Aus to HK then back to SFE not much diff from Aus to HK to Europe or US. Just a guess.

 

[professor_frink]

Frink why are you giving up on HSI?? I'm doing more and more on it and less on the SPI. I think I have found my niche. Yesterday I did 60 round trips :nuts:

Will have a look at it again when(if) the current volatility gets back to a more normal level, but for the time being, I'm leaving it alone. The book has completely changed since the recent correction, and I'm having a hard time getting a good feel for the order flow That, combined with ever increasing gaps beneath the first line of the depth has me a little concerned about trading it with my current strategy.

Or maybe I just need to find a new way of trading it.

This is just a guess but you would think the IB fills would be about the same for every market. And the SPI would be just as slow as any market as IB is in Hong Kong an order has to go from Aus to HK then back to SFE not much diff from Aus to HK to Europe or US. Just a guess.

You're probably correct- I think I should get in contact with someone from IB to get these kinds of questions answered, so I know exactly where I stand.

 

[Edwood]

current Dax chart Prof from TPB, cheers

 

[professor_frink]

cheers Ed

I've been having a look at a couple of the other markets in Europe as well. Don't mind the look of the FTSE, SMI and CAC40. You traded any of these Ed?

 

[Edwood]

cheers Ed

I've been having a look at a couple of the other markets in Europe as well. Don't mind the look of the FTSE, SMI and CAC40. You traded any of these Ed?

no worries G

only on s/bet a/c, SMI have only done swings on it, when shorts are looming it often comes off before the others so its good to keep an eye on. Haven't done anything with CAC. FTSE is OK but can be choppy & after the first 2-3 hours tends to go to sleep until US open, but for our timezone those first few hours should give you enough. it often gap opens too on the back of US o/n. Dax is my preference but these last few days its a swift move at the open then rangebound until US open but I'm in bed by then so have been missing the action. yesterday was about 20pt range for the whole day!