Sorry for the silly question, but I am a bit confused. When I look for Micro Dow (MYM) on the CME (or anywhere else really) the symbol I get is MYM, however, on barchart the symbol they use is YR: (https://www.barchart.com/futures/quotes/YRM21/profile)

This also happens with some indexes, like the ^DJI, that they call $DOWI (https://www.barchart.com/stocks/indices/dowjones/industrials?viewName=main)

Can someone shed some light on why barchart (and seems like only barchart) has different symbols that the Dow or CME group itself?

And since I already made one silly question: is there any difference between ^symbol and $symbol? like, one means index and the other means equity? or is just styling?

Thanks

Some data-providers use different sympols as the CME, i.e. CQG or TradeStation

tr8er 

Some data-providers use different sympols as the CME, i.e. CQG or TradeStation

It does look like it, but why? and where can I find that information, or read more about it?

tr8er 

Some data-providers use different sympols as the CME, i.e. CQG or TradeStation

magicTurtle 

It does look like it, but why?

Because they want to?

magicTurtle 

and where can I find that information, or read more about it?

Sometimes data providers use their own symbols. I don't think there's much else to find out about, unless you happen to be dealing with one in particular and want to know what a particular symbol means to them.

MYM, not the symbol name but the actual contract you can trade, for instance, does not exist independently. It's a contract on CME and nowhere else, and its name on CME is "MYM". If someone uses some other name to designate it, you may want a translation to the CME name so you will know what they mean. But if they use their own name, then that's just a weird thing they do.

There's not much more to know about it.

Bob.