I have been training myself in forex for the past couple of months, and am ready to open an account, but I'm stuck in deciding which one. I started using OANDA's demo platform, but have recently been using Metatrader through StrategyBuilderFX. I like Metatrader much better, and I see that I can open an account with FXDD though StrategyBuilderFX. I've only heard good things about OANDA, and have also heard good things about FXDD. Any opinions are appreciated. I will either open an account with OANDA and still use StrategyBuilderFX's Metatrader demo platform, or go ahead and open an account with FXDD. No daytrading right now (just swing trading), but may start daytrading in the future. Thanks in advance. BJS
i'm in same position as you. I've been demo'ing with GFT's software. I'm looking to start out with a mini account. I'll check back for suggestions.
Just my sole opinion... Oanda and FXDD are both generally highly regarded brokers and haven't really had any problems with them, however I will disclose I haven't actually traded extensively in Foreign Exchange, mostly only the ocassional trading as I am still testing the water on both platforms. With FXDD, I believe when you go sign up a trading account with FXDD Directly, they will give you a choice of their own FXDD trader or MetaTrader and as such I believe you do not need to go through StrategBuilderFX (Aside from that, I will disclose that I feel I have reason to believe that the propriertor of SBFX has possibly been Marketing in other public forums by stealth in order to generate traffic and gain referals (kick backs from either MetaQuotes and/or Brokers they refer clients to), and as such, I am personally reluctant to support SBFX). When I was earlier this year trying to convert an existing Managed Trading LPOA account with FXDD to a self trade account, FXDD offered me the option of using MetaTrader. All and All FXDD I believe are alright. Haven't had any bad incidents with them yet. They seem fairly reputable in their business approach, the only bad thing I heard about them was from the manager of a Managed Forex Program I was invested in, telling us to close our FXDD account and move to FXUC. But I feel I have reason to believe that the manager in question had already a long relationship with FXUC and as such was making up an excuse to get people to shift their accounts. With Oanda, They have their own propriertary trading platform and are based around individual PIP units rather than the more widely accepted 'lots', shouldn't matter too much, but some people take a bit of getting use to this arrangement. Their platform is java based and should work in Linux as well, but the charting tools with in them I personally feel may be a tad too primitive or basic for some traders and unfortunately, (from my point of view) they don't intend to support MetaTrader, Personally I would stay away from their box options though as I've never been able to divise a successful strategy around them even on their demo.
Don't open a live account with GFT. The trade environment changed when I did. I had major spikes in cpu usage causing alot of lag durring just moderate volitility. A couple times my cpu froze for 10-15 sec when I was trying to exit a position. Lost about 8 pips more than I wanted, with 5 lots and 400:1 leverage. If your looking for the leverage then go with interbank group. I have a live standard account with them and there is no extra cpu usage when price starts to move. And the price movement stays with FXDD, who I just opened a mini account with. Or if you intend on making mid/long term trades Or swing trade then platform lag won't be an issue much. They do have a nice platform with dealbook. But don't try to trade short term intraday. Dave
I'm removing my funds from interbankfx and putting it with the rest at oanda. Interbankfx has had too many "technical difficulties" for my pleasure. I'm not a maniac who goes nuts when software goes down but having it go down 3 times this week and they shut their entire system down friday afternoon. They need to get their tech department into better shape before i'd put any money with them again.
I have signed up with many different forex demo accounts, including Oanda and FXDD. At the moment, I am leaning to go with forex.com to open a mini account because it seems like their platform suits me best - so far. One thing they all seem to have in common is their spread often does not reflect the price on the charts - sometimes even when volume is low the chart is 2 or more pips outside of the price spread showing. Is there a place I can open a mini account where the chart and the price spread always agree?
You are probably confusing middle price charts and bid/ask prices (the spread), as what you say makes no sense really.
Last night I was watching eur/usd on forex.com. Forex.com had a spread of 1.2807/1.2810 yet the chart was showing a price of 1.2805, 04, 03, and 02 - moving slowly up and down - but the spread was not changing. This went on for at least 2 or 3 minutes. I know that on occasion, the chart will show an odd spike all of a sudden and the spread does not react, but from what I have observed, this type of thing seems to be a regular occurance and confuses me since the spread does not always match the chart. Is it just me, or do forex traders simply accept this type of thing as something to be expected?