Hacker
17th June 2008, 16:03
First off - I have next to no idea about financials at all. But my interest is growing.
I opened a spreadbetting account with CMC Markets to get to their free mobile offer (see cheap deals thread)
Just been mucking about with their platform to place the trades to qualify for the offer, playing the FTSE100 cash. Bought £1 at market (5920) and then put a limit order to sell £1 at 5926.
Price wiggled about a bit, their spread climbed to 5926-28 and then 5927-29, hovered for a minute and then came back to 5920ish. My limit sell order to close at 5926 went unfilled.
Pulled up their chatbox to ask why this was, operator said they had a fire alarm and the entire building was evacuated. Now call me a raging cynic, but in the short time before they responded I read this:
This company has a reputation for running stops and moving prices that do not reflect the underlying index. Also, there have been reports of re-quotes and spiked out stops. However, it would be unfair on them to single them out, as their behavior is common throughout the market maker world.
As they say "CMC Markets is a market maker and as such sets the applicable price. It is the customer's responsibility to decide whether or not they wish to deal at those prices."
Scott F from Australia commented "I've been both a professional broker and a private trader for 15 years. I've seen a lot and heard a lot in that time. One thing I have never said to a client is ‘Sorry about that, bad price feed, however the trade is still yours’ or ‘You shouldn't have had your stop loss so close to the market’ (4% away????). I think I have heard one of these at least five or six times from this lot of shysters in the last 6 months. I've met some of the management of this firm in Australia through various industry functions and all I can say it that they appear to be some whiz bang kids straight out of university with a lot of brains and an attitude. Be wary of dealing here my friends."
Source - Can you become a successful trader with CMC? (http://www.financial-spread-betting.com/CMCmarkets.html)
My questions are:
- Does anyone here think they had a fire alarm? :lol:
- Aren't small limit orders filled automatically? Surely that's a waste of time/money someone having to manually fill an order for £1 a point?
- Tradefair operate a 1 point spread on the FTSE100 cash, this compares very favourably to their competitors (CMC 2pt, IG 2pt, Spreadex 3pt) - should the average mug financials punter send their business to Tradefair or are there other factors to consider?
My gut feeling is that I would never make money out of day trading but would stand a marginally better chance swing trading over longer periods when the spread would be a little less likely to kill me. I would probably still lose, just a bit slower.
Companies like CMC markets filling orders (or not) like this sounds like a route straight to the poorhouse though?
I opened a spreadbetting account with CMC Markets to get to their free mobile offer (see cheap deals thread)
Just been mucking about with their platform to place the trades to qualify for the offer, playing the FTSE100 cash. Bought £1 at market (5920) and then put a limit order to sell £1 at 5926.
Price wiggled about a bit, their spread climbed to 5926-28 and then 5927-29, hovered for a minute and then came back to 5920ish. My limit sell order to close at 5926 went unfilled.
Pulled up their chatbox to ask why this was, operator said they had a fire alarm and the entire building was evacuated. Now call me a raging cynic, but in the short time before they responded I read this:
This company has a reputation for running stops and moving prices that do not reflect the underlying index. Also, there have been reports of re-quotes and spiked out stops. However, it would be unfair on them to single them out, as their behavior is common throughout the market maker world.
As they say "CMC Markets is a market maker and as such sets the applicable price. It is the customer's responsibility to decide whether or not they wish to deal at those prices."
Scott F from Australia commented "I've been both a professional broker and a private trader for 15 years. I've seen a lot and heard a lot in that time. One thing I have never said to a client is ‘Sorry about that, bad price feed, however the trade is still yours’ or ‘You shouldn't have had your stop loss so close to the market’ (4% away????). I think I have heard one of these at least five or six times from this lot of shysters in the last 6 months. I've met some of the management of this firm in Australia through various industry functions and all I can say it that they appear to be some whiz bang kids straight out of university with a lot of brains and an attitude. Be wary of dealing here my friends."
Source - Can you become a successful trader with CMC? (http://www.financial-spread-betting.com/CMCmarkets.html)
My questions are:
- Does anyone here think they had a fire alarm? :lol:
- Aren't small limit orders filled automatically? Surely that's a waste of time/money someone having to manually fill an order for £1 a point?
- Tradefair operate a 1 point spread on the FTSE100 cash, this compares very favourably to their competitors (CMC 2pt, IG 2pt, Spreadex 3pt) - should the average mug financials punter send their business to Tradefair or are there other factors to consider?
My gut feeling is that I would never make money out of day trading but would stand a marginally better chance swing trading over longer periods when the spread would be a little less likely to kill me. I would probably still lose, just a bit slower.
Companies like CMC markets filling orders (or not) like this sounds like a route straight to the poorhouse though?