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I might have spoke too soon as I don't have the numbers in front of me. The broker I will run with is Advantage Futures, Chicago. This is a really great company, their technology and IT power is awesome.
They are located right in the CME building. You can even rent a desk from them right there at the CME, even your own office with a view, for few hundred to few thousand a month depending on what you want. I would love to do that, talk about a fast connection, and you could walk down to the floor anytime you feel like it and see and hear what is going on. I just don't know if I could do it since I'm Canadian.
Anyways, these guys are the speed experts. They are not a brokerage firm, so you can't just trade anything you fancy. Your account is setup and hardwired with contract size maximums and contracts available to you, and you will have your own trading ID number at the exchange, and it is blistering fast connection. They have many HFT and high freq hedge funds trading through their technology.
I don't have the commission sheet they sent me last year so I can remember what their rt fee was above the license, but it was a lot lower than what you get from the brokerages, a sliding scale that goes way down if you are doing over 2000 lots/month, well down into the sub buck area if I remember correctly. I will have an answer for you this week, and also, if you decided to look at them you can mention me eh?
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
1. This week, trade M6E micro lots in SIM according to strategy I will go live with following week or two. Goal. Turn a profit.
2. Get setup to trade M6E microlots. Open the account. Get DTN IQ feed for charting 6E on NT7. Get X Trader fired up, get the order types sorted, lock and load.
OK. Now, I outlined my goals earlier.
1. Only my strategy. One strategy one time. No changing strategy during session.
2. 3% account risk per trade, never more, never less.
There you have the rules.
And my strategy.
1. Only trade with the trend as I define it on 2000VOL charts
Slept in through the London open, missed a great setup right on the 7am NY open, then got tired and took a half baked trade for a loss of 3% of funds. The trade should not have made it to the screen. I may consider trading for shorter time frames and more focus. It was psychologically challenging playing the M6E and 6E side by side, but doable. I will keep simming with DTN.
I just got dtn iq setup on nt7. Here is a picture of a tick chart. It looks like they come one tick at a time.
DTN IQ, so far, seems to have a very consistent flow with NTB16. Overall, it is excellent and I like it. Some unknown issues have however arisen with the Gomi Ladder and the upgrade to version 16/IQ Feed. Anybody else having issues running gom ladder with b16/IQFeed?
Stuck to my instrument of choice. Will continue with 100% focus on this instrument and take my chances when they come, which can be like watching pain dry at times, and requires a lot of confidence when you are standing on the plank...
The Journal continues. I have been very busy getting organized for my final walk down the plank so to speak. I say it because I am going live with 3k which is not enough capital to play the edge out without taking a whole lot of risk.
So the plan is to get down and gritty and get a few clean scalps off every day, just one or two, absolute assassin style. That's about the same as I'd make driving a taxi which is what I have been grappling with the past few days, using my last to get that job, or scalp, risk, and nail something to the wall after almost two years of round the clock R$D.
If this goes down, I'm going down with it, straight to the satan's lair, no passing go. If I can build this account capital up to the required levels one scalp at a time, I'll earn my badge. Simple as that.
Due to the extreme risk, are you doing anything extra special to try to hedge back in your favor? For instance, limiting yourself to only certain time periods, or only x number of trades per day? Do you have experience in that regard -- can you trust yourself to follow your own rules?
Another common problem with under-capitalized accounts is "going the other way", meaning not overtrading but undertrading. You wait for the "perfect" setup. There really is no such thing, in my opinion. You have your method, and within that method you have no way of knowing the outcome of each trade. You need a basket of trade results before you can compare with prior historical results and know if you are truly following your method correctly (unless you make a blatant mistake). How are you going to achieve enough trades for your basket with an under-capitalized account? Have you conquered the psychological issue of trying to find the "perfect" trade since you can only afford the "perfect" trades?
You have to trade like you don't need the money.....just take the set ups you know and love....never mind the having to be right mentality.....that will blow out the remainder of your account.....
Decide in advance what your trade is, no "what if" trades, place the stop and sit on your hands.....let the edge work.....I promise, it will come.....
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Thanks a lot AZ. I'm getting psyched up and appreciate everybody's kind words of support and encouragement. I've got a lot of experience built in here and now after a two month break from live trading I am feeling like a well trained prize fighter.
The opponent is not the market, it's not money, it's not even the truth, it's just me. Most of us here have an edge. It's high time we executed our plan with ice cold emotionless precision. The goal is to be cool water, to flow in and out of trades and scalp them one at a time.
I've decided to switch over to the Dow and the 5$ price point. The master plan calls for a two car two profit target 1-3/trades/day strategy on the 6E. That will come. For now, I'm scalping 10 pips average, one car. Get in, get out, always staying one molecule ahead of the wave. 10 ticks at a time.
Getting things ready to go. Now charting NT7.17 on Kinetick beta. So far so good. Thanks to Zondor for all his help getting it running. Account opening in final stages at Dorman, some little issue with utility bill but hoping that is not a road block. Looking at CTS as an execution engine. Very impressive offering by Dorman.
Once up I am going into scalping mode. The master strategy is now going for small bites of the apple. Three 10 tick scalps is 150/day. That will double the account in a 20 trading day month. So that is a goal. But really, the number one goal is to keep a cool head and get it right. To find the the chill zone where you know you can do no wrong. This month, I just want to get my trades right, that is according to my setup without any emotional blinders and interference. OK. Time to look for some breathing exercises..