Brokers who actually run at the market price?

I have been testing different brokers for months and no one executes orders exactly at the market price, even in ECN accounts. There is always a small slip or put conditions that are not reflected in the demo. Is this normal or just everyone plays with us? I would like to know if any have had a REAL experience with a broker that does not manipulate the execution.

I'm asking because I've tried IC Markets, Pepperstone and FP Markets... and I've all seen differences between what should be executed and what really happens. Sometimes even in sessions with low volatility.

Jajaja welcome to the circus. All "ECN" retail brokers are cardboard ECN. No one puts you directly into the interbank market, they simply route between their own internal network. Run to real market? Only if you have millions and you go by prime broker.

I operate with Darwinex and honestly it is the one that has given me the least execution problems. Of course if you seek surgical precision, do not operate news, nor scalping in M1. That is asking the elm for pears.

Brother, if you slip 0.5 pips with 0.0 spread sometimes, it's not manipulation. It's pure physics. The market is not frozen waiting for you to click the mouse. Learn how to manage that in your strategy, or keep looking for unicorns.

What bothers me most is not the slippage, but the typical “requote” when the price goes in my favor. What a coincidence that when it goes against me they take it to touch. That is no longer physical, that is novel script.

Try LMAX. It’s not cheap, nor is it going to give you welcome bonuses, but it’s the most decent real execution thing I’ve ever found. Yes, you have to have a minimum $10K to be directly noticed.

I thought I was the only one who noticed the difference between demo and real.

MT4 has its limitations, even with a good broker. If you really care about running at the millisecond, go to cTrader or even NinjaTrader. There you will notice less interference from the server.

Honestly, if your system depends on a perfect run to be cost effective... your system is trash. A solid system supports a spread and occasional slippage without breaking.

What you call manipulation is sometimes just latency between your PC and the broker server. If you’re in South America and the server is in London, you already have the problem there.

I have VPS in London, says ECN in Pepperstone, I operate in liquid sessions and still see micro slides. But they compensate with fast execution and zero requotes. You can not have everything.

Look, if you don't want to be tricked, open up an account at Interactive Brokers. Commission for everything, Jurassic interface... but institutional execution. Yes, get ready to read 80 PDFs before you understand the platform.

I am in a similar situation and have come to think that the most honest thing would be to stop looking for a perfect broker and just learn to live with the real market conditions. Everyone has good and bad things.

Change your mind: don’t look for the ideal broker, look for the broker that least disturbs you. And then adapt your system to its rules. It’s more realistic and less frustrating than looking for absolute transparency in a business designed to squeeze the retailer.

After testing multiple brokers for more than 5 years, I can confirm that finding a “perfect” execution is more an unrealistic expectation than a tangible possibility in the retail trading world. Although many brokers are promoted as ECN or STP, most of them remain intermediaries that add liquidity from various sources and execute your orders with some latency, variable spreads and, in some cases, inevitable slippage. This does not always imply manipulation, but it is crucial to understand how and why it happens. One of the most important factors that traders tend to ignore is latency between their trading terminal and broker servers. This can be mitigated by using VPS located near the broker server, but still does not completely eliminate the problem. In addition, during high volatility events, such as economic news, orders can bounce between price levels due to lack of instant counterpart, which generates slippage or even rejections. Another point worth mentioning is the broker execution model.

Thank you for sharing this info, it made me rethink everything I thought about execution.

And then what do you think of brokers offering 0 fixed spread? Marketing trick?

Brutal analysis! Of the best comments I have read in this forum, direct and realistic.

Good contribution, but I'm still not clear on how to prevent orders from being rejected during NFP. Any tips?

Very good about the post-execution analysis, I've never seen that on my trades.

If with all that you say Interactive Brokers is the most reliable thing, it's still worth dealing with your jurassic platform.

Thank you for taking the time to write something so detailed. It really changes the perspective with which you see the brokers.

But are you saying then that all brokers have conflict of interest, even those who claim to be ECN?

Thank you very much for this clear explanation, especially the latency part. I had not considered it that way.

Thank you for sharing your experience with specific broker names. That’s what’s needed here.

And how do you really know if a broker is a market maker or STP? Is there any way to check it?

I thought the part of the VPS was key. Thank you, I’ll implement it this week.

Excellent, just what I needed to make a decision about changing my broker.

But don't you think if we're already accepting mediocre execution, we're going too far down the standard?

So, the ones we use scalping should we forget about retail trading?

Thank you for being so concrete and not hanging around.

Thank you, you opened my eyes with the high volatility events. I always thought it was my mistake.

And what do you think of the positive slippage? Should that also be considered when analyzing the broker?

Can you share how you analyze the executions in your log? I’m interested in that method.

Thank you a thousand for the honesty. You can tell from the real experience, not like many here.

Thanks total. This is worth more than 20 YouTube videos.

I've been with a broker market maker for three years and I've never had any serious problems.

Do you really think Interactive Brokers is a better option? Many find it hard to even operate there.

Thanks. With comments like this one understands better how to adapt to the reality of the market.