ScottB

silverpuma, The 6E (EC on TradeStation) or any CME futures contract has the exact same spread regardless of the broker. With the FX cash (which MB Trading also has), ECN spreads are determined by the participants and with a FX cash account with a non-ECN broker, are set by the broker. Even with brokers that offer commission based accounts, there are two kinds. In a true ECN, one account holder can trade with another account holder whereas in some accounts you can only trade with the banks involved (I believe Currenex is this way). That means although you can rest orders, only the banks can hit you which they never will unless your bid has become the ask. Your best bet is to always ask the broker directly and not depend on your interpretation of their marketing material.

Hi, Initial margin is the amount per contract to enter a position, maintenance margin is how much you must have per contract to hold those contracts once you purchase them. If your account had $10,000 in it and the initial margin were $5,000 per contract, you could purchase 2 contracts. If the maintenance margin is $3,500 per contract, you can hold those 2 contracts as long as your account has $7,000 in your account. If your account were to go down to $6,999 due to an adverse move against your positions, the broker would issue a margin call and depending on the situation (and the broker) could liquidate 1 contract or require you to add funds to your account. One terrible reason for holding on to losing positions is the difference between these two margins. You can stay in more positions based on the maintenance margin than you can purchase given you are flat. I hope that helps. Scott

Just think about it all in terms of housing prices. Even the cost of raw materials corresponds to the interest rate differential in the case of FX. Scott

1,000,000 USD in the spot market is 8 futures contracts for the Euro - 1 futures contract is for 125,000. Scott

Mark, I do EasyLanguage programming but primarily strategies as opposed to indicators. I have been programming EasyLanguage since 2004 and had over 20 years of commercial systems software experience (C, C++, C#) before that. Are you planning on staying with 8.8 or are you going with version 9 when it becomes available? The real question there is whether or not you need access to the facilities available with version 9 that are not available with version 8.8. Scott

maxr - Yes, not trading anything with tight stops is an option but remember, price could move a big figure during that time given the right circumstances (some sort of shock Sigma X type event). Also, with my broker (Velocity futures), the overnight margin kicks in if you hold over that gap in time. Their day trading margins are always in effect as long as you do not hold open positions during that period. While I would never magin myself to that point (equivalent to 250:1 in the cash market), the other end of the spectrum would be full CME margin. As I said, if you are going to hold a longer term position, you should probably be in the cash market. Scott

maxr, Your analysis of the differences very well done. I trade currency futures exclusively because I only trade the majors with full lots. I have traded both spot and futures and find the primary difference is whether you need the size in the crosses and whether the 1700 -1759 (Eastern) downtime is an issue for you. As to the size in the book, many misinterpret what the size off the inside market is. Those are normally hedgers (even FX brokers hedging in the futures market) and really does't mean much. I have worked for several hedge fund/prop trading firms and contrary to popular opinion, we can easily hide the sizee of our orders by either shredding the order (breaking it into very small orders, often 1 lots) or by working the order (entering in a band of prices rather than a specific price). I have a term I use "unit of the gods" referring to what size move catching the attention of an algorithm. For the large players in the 6E (EC to TradeStation folks), that number is somewhere around 20 ticks and for huge macro players it is 50+ ticks. That means the rest of the price movement is simply noise to them and if you are good, you can move in and out of those bands kind of like a speedboat moving among oceangoing ships. You can turn a lot more quickly then them but you have to watch out for the wake. All in all, if you can trade a full lot on the CME, that is the place for the smaller player in my opinion. I hope this helps.

I have traded with Velocity for several years and I find them to be consistently far above all the other brokers I have used in every aspect; I recommend them highly. I agree with pretty much everything Steven said. There is one important point he left out. Velocity's low margins covers all time frames where you don't hold over a market close. This means if you trade currency futures as I do, you can close your position at the close of the trading session (1600 central) and reopen it at 1701 using the same margin. If you see a trade during the Asian hours the margin is the same as any other time. I completely agree with Steven that you should never max out their margins (currently $500 per currency contract). I have dealt with many support desks and theirs is outstanding. They also have a neat feature which gives priority to customers with open positions if you call from the phone number associated with the account.