Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
Does any one use etrade for futures? How do they find the reliability? How do the commissions compare? For ES I believe its 1.5 commission + 1.3 exchange fee = 2.8*2 = $5.60 per round turn on the ES contract
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
Hi, since I'm new here I wasn't allowed to respond or DM halperin in the brokers forum... so, if it isn't too great an offense, I thought I'd respond here to their eTrade question...
I opened an eTrade account a couple months ago. It was my first account in my most recent foray into futures. I only did a handful of trades in MES to realize I needed to do more work studying. So, take my experience with a grain of salt.
I had no issues with the company. They were very responsive on the phone and I believe their fills were efficient for a retailer.
However, I found their platform wanting. There was very little customization. Colors, candle widths etc. Plus, their flagship platform is web based. They do still support their old pc based software which I preferred, but IIRC, you couldn't trade futures from it. Unfortunately, they didn't allow you to have both the pc version and the web based platform running simultaneously. They offered no tabs for multiple charts and you would need to open windows of charts which took up a lot of real estate with the borders, headers, margins etc.
Being a dabbler in programming, I considered using their API to customize some features I wanted, but their API offers very little power and I believe it uses Python, which I understand to be rather slow.
I also looked into using a third party platform like NinjaTrader or TradingView, but was informed by eTrade that their platform was all I could use.
And yes, their commissions are a little high, which made any attempts to scalp MES a more challenging endeavor than on other brokerages.
I have since purchased the lifetime license to NinjaTrader and have found the platform absolutely 1000% better, though I have yet to actually trade live with NT. I am not yet as comfortable with my trading skills though I'm paper trading at every moment during regular market hours.
I'm afraid I don't have any more insight, lacking experience with other platforms, but I wouldn't recommend them. You would think, given their resources, and current merger with Morgan Stanley that they would have a platform that could at least compete with and be loved by at least some traders in the same way as TOS.
Anyway, I hope that helps. Thanks for indulging my posting this here.
That seems high compared to TradeStation at this time. I think there is a promotion going on at TradeStation -- 50% off their regular commission for future contracts for new accounts. I don't see that on their website right now, so you might want to contact them to find out.
Tradovate and NInjatrader are the best.
If you have full license of Ninjatrader then commissions are way more cheaper. The only disadvantage of Nijatrader it do not have mobile app. Ninjatrader is a beast. I have been using it since 5 years. I am trying to find a platform similar to Ninjatrader which also has mobile app or atleast works in MAC
Are you looking for simply a data-feed on mobile to keep tabs of the futures markets? You can get a CME data-feed for TradingView for $4.00 a month (data only - no trading).
Or are you looking to trade on mobile? Ironbeam App is decent. You would need to setup an account with Ironbeam.
As for Mac/OS, MotiveWave is full-featured (Volume footprints, market-profile TPOs, volume profile, heat maps, etc.) and can work with rithmic and MBO data. EdgeClear has a nice package for MotiveWave with their templates called EdgeProX. (Note there is no mobile interface for MotiveWave).
