Can anybody recommend me a good Commodity Futures trading platform?
I am looking for a good trading software which provides a practice account without any time limit. I want to trade futures contract on oil,natural gas and ethanol.
Try this new Yahoo Group. It might be interesting. I’m searching for new members, very open-minded in business.
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/managemybusiness
I am aware of FOREX EA’s… What about Futures Trading Robots?
Hello,
I have been doing a lot of research and there are dozens and dozens if not hundreds of EA’s for use on MT4, trading FOREX.
But I am unable to find anything on robots for Futures trading. While I look forward to manually trading Futures in the evenings, it would be nice to have something to catch a good trend during pit hours, while I am away at work.
Thanks for any tips or keywords that may assist in a Google search. ; )
I haven’t also come across any automated futures trading system or what you are calling a futures robot. There are many futures contracts that you can trade. Maybe this has to do something with the nature of the futures market. You haven’t mentioned what type of futures contract you want to trade. Infact there are many dozens of futures contracts like stock index futures, crude oil futures, interest rate futures, commodity futures, currency futures and others. Futures markets are a lot different from forex. Futures market is a highly regulated market. You can find both price and volume in the futures market unlike forex where you only have the price action.
I came accross a swing trading strategy that works for forex, stocks and futures. This swing trading strategy takes not more than 10 minutes to trade each day. Many people think that automated trading is the solution or what you call the Holy Grail. Infact there is no holy grail. Successful traders are those who learn to trade manually first. Automated trading systems without knowning how to trade manually do not give good results as market conditions keep on changing and if you have the feel of how the market is changing you can change the setting of the automated trading system. You can only develop the feel of the market by manual trading. First practice and paper trade for one to two months. Only then trade live. Good Luck!
Is spread betting similar to futures trading?
I want to know in your opinion in what ways you think that spread betting is similar to futures trading, and which one would be best recommended for someone who lives in the UK to trade stock market indices, commodities and shares?
Spread betting and futures are similar but with spread bets you can deal in smaller sizes. Futures and options are mainly traded in the USA while spread betting is more popular in the UK and Ireland (in fact, in the land of the free, Uncle Sam makes it illegal to trade spread bets for a USA resident)
What is futures trading?
I realize that futures are commodities such as oil, gold, CORN (lol), and such, but where are they traded and is there a good news source for them? How can I invest in one? I have capitol.
A future contract is simply a promise to buy or sell a commodity at a specific price in the future. You don’t buy or sell contracts, but you open long or short and you need money in your account, its called margin. A simple example is crude oil. You need 3,400 dollars initial margin and I’m not sure, but something like 2,000 maintenance margin. An oil futures contract has 1,000 barrels per contract. What all this means if you want to invest 10,200 dollars and believe oil will go up, you go long 3 contracts (3,400 * 3=10,200) . And lets say oil is at 60 dollars a barrel when you open. If oil goes to 70 dollars. You make $10 per barrel, you have control of 3,000 barrells, (1,000 barells per contract and you have 3 contracts.) therefore you will have made $30,000. profit. Now before you go out and open a futures account, the downside could be nasty. Now we used $2,000 as the required maintenance, which means your account can not fall under $6,000 or else the brokerage will close your position. Oil needs to fall only $1.30 before you need to take out more money to keep your position open.
How do you make money trading futures?
Try an online tutorial and practice accounts.
how do futures contracts facilitate trading among strangers?
how do futures contracts facilitate trading among strangers?
Futures contracts allow both parties (buyer and seller) to reduce or accept risk. However, it would be very difficult to do if you had to know the person on the other side of the trade since it narrows the playing field. But by broadcasting futures quotes to the entire world, somebody will bid higher and another will offer for less money. It becomes more efficient when you can broadcast to lots of people (none of which you will know).
Think of it like this: If you were selling a rare baseball card, would you be better off finding a friend to buy it from you? Or would you rather broadcast it to the entire world through eBay? That’s essentially the benefit that futures markets bring to investors and speculators.
Can anyone supply me with a mechanical trading system I can use to trade shares and futures?
I know I’m supposed to create my own trading system, but someone must have one that works and can pass it on to me. I just need it to get started and then I can tweak it up as I go.
Hi there just send me a mail to jaques606@yahoo.com, with "mechanical trading", in the subject line, and i’ll send you some info regarding this matter.
I think it might help you in your decision.
Will reply asap.
Can someone explain futures and overnight trading to me in simple terms?
I don’t understand how a stocks value can change if the market is not open. Sorry I’m a rookie.
Futures trading is grains, cattle, hogs & other commodities. Regular stocks just trade in the day. Commodities and the currency traders go 24 hours a day.
What simulation trading platforms do you recommend for trading bond futures?
The best one is probably x trader by TT but it’s hard to get it for free. You can also try Transact’s platform or ninja trader.
For some good information on trading bond futures as well as other futures contracts, check out www.nobsdaytrading.com. The guy has traded professionally for years and explains how the game is really played. Good information as well as many warnings.
Does Tradestation include futures and currency trading unlike Ameritrade or E trade?
E trade and Ameritrade is just stocks, options and bonds isn’t it unlike Tradestation?
The three to brokers (as per Barron’s) that handle Stocks, Options, Futures and Forex are;
Tradestation, (great platform, $100 a month)
ThinkOrSwim (great platform (free, great service & education)
Interactive Brokers (poor platform, poor service, best pricing).
You can’t compare Ameritrade or E-Trade to the above brokers. Ameritrade & E-Trade are set up to assist the "investor". The three listed above are for the "trader".