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Hey everyone,
Im brand new to trading and just learning and I have been using a sim account on Ninjatrader through Amp futures and as of March 6th, 2015 my demo license expired so i contacted Amp about renewing it and the representative for Amp told me through their live chat assistance that as of March 10, 2015 Amp futures will no longer be supporting any new accounts utilizing Ninjatrader and suggested I try Multicharts instead. He did say that any accounts opened before March 10, 2015 with Ninjatrader would still be supported though.
I have not seen this mentioned on here or anywhere else so I thought I would mention it since it threw me for a loop. I have only been sim trading for about a month and Ninjatrader is my first platform and Ive already grown used to it and now it appears that I have to find a new platform to learn since I wont be opening a live account until I can trade with consistency and be profitable. I have enough to learn with just trying to learn to trade and then to have to start all over with a new trading platform is a minor setback.
I have been considering multiple options and haven't made up my mind yet on what I am going to do. Actually on that same note, are there any platforms that offer delayed data streams that I might be able to use until I am comfortable with going live? I think it would be more convenient than trying to bounce around with different platforms since I am so new to trading. I figure its going to be at least a year before I am even close to ready and I don't want to keep doing 30 day trials knowing its going to take me a lot longer than 30 days to learn.
I've recently been shopping around for a new broker, and got right in the middle of what appears to be a new direction for NinjaTrader Brokerage. From what I understand (and someone feel free to correct me if I'm misstating it here), NinjaTrader Brokerage has terminated some sort of data/API agreement with AMP. My understanding is this also will affect Optimus Futures - and possibly others as well.
My requirement is that I want to use NinjaTrader and MultiCharts (both with full license) at the same broker. I've been sort of doing this (with many issues) at Interactive Brokers, but finding that NinjaTrader is never up-to-date on support of the TWS interface at IB. In essence, I find that I often cannot trade Ninja at IB unless I downgrade TWS. So I digress...
So I called Optimus, AMP, and NinjaTrader Brokerage, and find that Optimus and AMP are heavily promoting MultiCharts and minimalizing NinjaTrader as a platform. They both did mention the March 10th change on NinjaTrader. In my conversation with NinjaTrader Brokerage, they of course are welcoming me with my fully paid version of NinjaTrader with nicely discounted commissions, and other benefits. Also to my surprise, NinjaTrader Brokerage said they would support MultiCharts via a "white label" CQG connection.
My question to NinjaTrader is if this is part of a long term strategy to eliminate connections to all brokers except for their own brokerage? If so, they would be going down the same road as TradeStation where it's basically an all-in-one approach (platform/data/broker). However, it's interesting to note that NinjaTrader Brokerage will still quietly support MultiCharts on CQG.
The other question I would have for NinjaTrader Brokerage is regarding the data. Apparently Ninja has a specialized version of CQG called Continuum. This was (I believe) just for NinjaTrader, and is unsupported on MultiCharts. That's where this "white label" version of CQG comes into play. NinjaTrader Brokerage will charge a nominal monthly fee to use this. This way you can have your cake and eat it too.
Where does this leave Optimus and AMP? Do they still have unadvertised capabilities to hook up NinjaTrader? Would they be able to do this via Rithmic data connections? Inquiring minds would like to know...
Denver, CO, June 30, 2014 NinjaTrader Group, LLC has announced the launch of NinjaTrader Brokerage following their acquisition of Mirus Futures. The new brokerage will leverage the best of both award winning teams to address unfulfilled traders expectations …
I didn't realize how evolved this process was, after reading through that thread. I now see that NinjaTrader Brokerage will explicitly support trading at FXCM, IB, TDAmeritrade, and MB Trading.
I still need to find out a bit more on the "white label" CQG support for MultiCharts at NinjaTrader Brokerage. I'm wondering if trading MultiCharts at the new Ninja would be an anomaly and how well that would be supported if a problem should occur.
With the release of the new Optimus Futures site, we will remove public demos, videos and/or blog posts related to NinjaTrader. NinjaTrader does not allow the on boarding of new customers to certain brokers unless you hold a life time license bought prior to July 2014. So we are not "minimizing", rather we were put in this spot and see no point of showing something we do not have and/or place special requests to be accommodated.
The existing customers that we currently service on NinjaTrader will continue getting our loyal support, and to the credit of NinjaTrader support team, they have supported us as before.
However as we go into the future, our focus would be on other platforms that are not in the brokerage business. For example, MultiCharts, SierraChart, MarketDelta, etc. amongst others that that we are currently looking to create alliances with. The new site will reflect it.
As for other comments: I found no difference in latency, execution, between Continuum and CQG.
You will have to make your own tests to come up with your own conclusions.
Second, you have the TradeStation model all wrong. TradeStation in some instances does allow you to execute with other brokers so long you pay for their platform. For example, You have the capability to automates your orders and route them to InsideEdge, NinjaTrader, etc. Prior to being a brokerage, TS was a software for many years under numerous names and as such kept some features to allow you to execute via others.
Having said all the above, as competitive as the landscape brokerage has become, at Optimus we respect the choices people make. There are different growth stages as a trader, and as such, your choices may be different during these stages.
Thank you,
Matt
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To be fair, a discussion about TradeStation's connections to other platforms could be another thread. For example, you can hook up NeuroShell to the TradeStation Brokerage account, receive data, and execute trades. This is a recent development, and may be part of a trend - who knows. However, the point I was originally making is that NinjaTrader appears to be going down the same road as TradeStation once took. At one point they were an open platform with many connection options. Then they became a brokerage, and that all changed. They are now (and have been) opening up again in recent years to more connections.
NinjaTrader and their brokerage seem to be repeating this history - at least to my way of thinking. However, it looks like there are several other brokerages they still support. Overall this is an interesting event.
Thanks Matt for the clarification/update on where Optimus stands. Since I have a fully paid NinjaTrader license purchased before July, 2014, I could in theory move that to Optimus (or others). However, my license is for a single broker only, and have been using that at Interactive Brokers. I'm guessing you can use the single broker license at any broker, as long as it's only one at a time.