Lets end this once and for all... looking for a true ECN
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Thread: Lets end this once and for all... looking for a true ECN

  1. #1
    Hi guys. Im considering transferring funds from my current broker. Ideally, I am looking for a true ECN broker. This has turned into a harder choice than we'd anticipated. It appears regardless of which broker your study, there are definitely disgruntled customers for each and every one. There are no brokers which have 100% positive reviews. The issue is, when reading these reviews I cant help but feel that many of them are composed by misinformed traders who just made bad trading decisions and felt some of the fault was the brokers. Its hard to sift through all this information without being completely confused and after days of looking for answers I kind of feel like flipping a coin and seeing what happens. I decided to begin this thread in the hopes of getting some clarifiion from real Currency Market traders who make their living trading the markets. No offense to new traders, demo traders, micro lot traders or anybody else who thinks they understand that business, but please refrain from giving your opinion. This thread is intended to do is hear from real FX traders who make their living trading and also have a thorough knowledge regarding the construction of Currency Market brokers, ECN's, NDD's STP's etc.. Up to now I am leaning towards dukascopy to get a couple of reasons. ECN, ability to hedge and lets face it the swiss banking reputation is very significant. The issue is, I had been advised that accounts under 50k are not true ECN in dukascopy (my account will be 10-20k), and they also have different issues with customer support and money withdrawals. MB trading has also popped up as well as FXDD with currenex and although oanda is fundamentally a bucketshop, I understand several traders who make a living trading with them. So if anybody is out there and may offer some solid guie, it'd be greatly appreciated but please recall I would rather have 0 replies than 100 answers giving me bad advice. Who's the best TRUE broker? What were your experiences? What are the best choices to get a trader opening an account my size? And please men, no imagining or remarks based on what you have heard. I'm already confused enough, so lets get to the bottom of the!

  2. #2
    Thanks for the responses guys. After reviewing the brokers suggested, I am still confused. Both have negative and positive reviews. Interactive brokers minimal lot size is 25k which rules them out for the time being as I occasionally scalp. LCG looks fine with 10k minimum lot dimensions however currenex, hotspotfx etc all have mixed reviews and a few true horror stories regarding slippage amongst other things. Im beginning to have the impression that although Oanda is a MM, their clinics are not setup for you to shed like most bucket shops. I dont mind the ECN platforms with no charting however after reading extensively there is still no light at the end of the tunnel. Any one else care to chime in?

  3. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by ;
    Hi guys. Im considering transferring funds from my current broker. Ideally, I am trying to find an actual ECN broker. It has turned into a more difficult choice than I had anticipated. It appears no matter which broker your study, there are undoubtedly unsatisfied clients for every one. There are no brokers that have 100% positive reviews. The problem is, when reading these reviews I cant help but feel that many are composed by misinformed traders who only made bad trading choices and felt some of the fault was the brokers. Its hard to sift...
    I am currently having the same problem. I have a similar funds and I am looking for the best place to place them. Oanda is a no go for me as they do widen ceases to suit themselves and as I am a short term trader I hope to avoid this. You may be ok, as I recall you trade 4 hour chart setups so 4 or 3 extra pips during your commerce wont hurt too much. I have narrowed it down to MBT and currenex as the finest I could find with MBT being the cheaper of the two.
    There was Hotspotfx, that was a true ecn with low commision. You only wanted 7k to open an account. It was awesome execution without a b.s.. You could see your order come onto the book. They've gone strictly institutional today. Sorry I couldnt be more useful

  4. #4
    I am waiting a support from LCG if I could use HOTSPOTFX together....also I am doing a test with divisafx...

  5. #5

  6. #6
    Hi A-game. Personally, I use Alpari UK. I know there's a thread here at the minute telling a horror story about them on their traditional account (market maker), but I will pass on my experience using them on their ECN side.

    I originally opened an account on their currenex ECN platform with #40,000 to test them out. I exchange intra-day earning the area of 10-20 transactions every day. They allow you to exchange as low as $10,000 units, and over that you may use exact dollar amounts. I.e you do not need to exchange in multiples of $10,000 but may be specific such as $17,550 in the event that you want, so you may adjust your transaction size to exactly match a percentage of your equity if you want.

    Their spreads are good, with EURUSD typically being around 0.4 - 0.9 pips, and more volatile pairs such as GBPCHF or even GBPJPY being typically between 2.5 - 3.2 pips. They do charge commission in addition to this of course but that is negotiable based on your traded quantity per month. You should expect to cover a round turn commission originally equivalent to approximately 0.4 pips, but you can talk this down significantly once you receive your quantity up to a few hundred thousand dollars each month.

    Execution at the amounts I exchange has always been excellent. I do clearly get slippage that I expect as normal and could be completely stressed when I didn't. The slippage works both for and against me nothing questionable. I sometimes become tight fills, but that is rare and completely normal when trading in the real world. In terms of slippage, you may set a maximum amount you are willing to accept and in the event that you can't get filled within that limit they'll remove your order. This is a wonderful feature since it means that your market orders (which is all I use) aren't at risk of excess slips, so I could still calculate fairly accurately my risk. In all honesty slippage very rarely exceeds a few tenths of a pip....but I really do just trade at high volume/liquidity times of day.

    The first time I withdrew cash I had to jump through a few hoops like sending additional evidence of my speech and connected bank account, but I had my cash in a day of these receiving my scanned files. Every other withdrawal after that initial one was hassle free and simple. The moment I had been comfortable with themI deposited over 6 figures in to my account which is the level I keep my account at all time. Leverage is reduced with them once you have an account over #100,000, but still much more than you really need anyway so not a problem.

    They assigned a dedied account manager to me, so I have the direct number to his desk on my phone and can call him whenever I like. Occasionally I've had issues such as my internet connection going down, and I've called my account manager, instantly got through to himand he has handled my transactions according to my directions over the telephone until my link has come back up, so for me their customer service was outstanding.

    In all fairness the currenex platform isn't the greatest when it comes to charting, but they are improving it all the time. In the time that I've been using them, the charting package was updated and improved and it's now far better. The true order side of this platform I believe is excellent and very easy to use. The one click trading feature is perfect for my kind of trading and I have no complaints at all.

    Over all I am very happy with them and am more than comfortable with a large amount of cash deposited with them.

    I went through the very same issues you are facing when I was searching for an ECN fashion broker, so I hope this can help you somehow at least narrow down your search.

  7. #7
    If you live in the US, forget dukascopy. They are no longer putting up with the US rules and are closing US accounts.

    I, also, am still searching. Leaning towards MB.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by ;
    I am awaiting a support from LCG if I could utilize HOTSPOTFX together....also I am performing a test with divisafx....
    Let me know how you get on using the hotspot account/platform
    Quote Originally Posted by ;
    Hi A-game. Personally, I utilize Alpari UK. I understand there is a thread in here at the moment telling a horror story about them on their classic account (market maker), but that I shall pass on my experience using them on their ECN side.
    Outstanding review, I hadnt even bothered looking at alpari as I pre judged them out of there market manufacturer side. I thought the minum account size is 30,000 GBP or equal

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by ;
    I hadnt even bothered considering alpari as I pre judged them out of there market maker side. I presumed the minum account size is 30,000 GBP or equal
    If I remember rightly from the time that I joined them, the minimum account opening balance was $20,000, but that may have changed now so it'll be well worth considering the site.

    On their expert account they supply the currenex platform or MT4. About the MT4 platform they've minimum transaction size of 3 lots ($300,000) which seems excessively high to me personally if you're using an account balance of just $20,000. The currenex platform that I use has a minimum transaction size of just 0.1 lot ($10,000) so there's much more flexibility in managing risk. As I mentioned earlier, with all the currenex platform there is, in addition, the capability to exchange exact amounts so you can always exchange an exact% of your available equity per transaction, whereas using the MT4 platform that I believe you may just exchange is put increments which is more restrictive. I have no idea why there's such a discrepancy between the two platforms on essentially the same type of pro account.

  10. #10
    Just a note....Divisafx has minimal open 2.500 $ and has currenex viking, currenex classic, Mt4 and MT4 via net...

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