Trading-Gurus.com » Dukascopy

LMAX Introduce "Micro Lots"

Jim — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 20:41:18 +0000

Last weekend LMAX quietly announced to those of their customers carrying trades over the weekend that they were introducing what MetaTrader brokers refer to as micro-lots on their spot forex contracts. Whichever way you look at it, that title is something of a misnomer, but we'll explain what it means to a client of LMAX.

Swiss Banks to Accept US Clients After CFTC Deadline?

Jim — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 19:37:28 +0000

Michael Greenberg posted an article over on ForexMagnates.com earlier today stating that:

MIG Bank – due to their bank status they will be able to accept US clients despite latest CFTC rules. The situation is not very clear for all offshore brokers now but MIG Bank were the first to announce publicly that they will be accepting US clients at least until July 2011.

I've been on the phone to Switzerland most of today trying to get confirmation of this report. I've even sent a few emails to MIG also, but I have yet to receive from them any clarification or confirmation of Michael's report.

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Ray the Random Robot Successfully Starts Smart Live Spread Betting

Jim — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 11:42:37 +0000

It's been an extremely busy week for Ray the Random Robot™, and he has undergone a number of cloning operations. First of all the MetaTrader 5 Automated Trading Championship 2010 finally got underway at midnight on Sunday, Moscow time. Ray's multi-currency MT5 clone started perfectly, but he has had some teething troubles with EUR/USD and has now slipped back to 273rd position out of 314.

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MetaQuotes Extend MetaTrader 5 Contest Deadline

Jim — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 13:59:00 +0000

We burned a lot of midnight oil here at the Trading Gurus last night trying to make sure our shiny new multi-currency upgrade to Ray the Random Robot™ wouldn't fall at the first hurdle in MetaQuotes entry into the 2010 Great Object-Oriented Robot Wars (GOORW for short). The deadline for entries into the MetaTrader 5 Automated Trading Championship 2010 is later on today. At least that's what we thought when we finally got to bed! This morning we awoke somewhat later than usual, only to discover that MetaQuotes have just extended that deadline:

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Trading Gurus Random Robot Enters the Dukascopy JForex Strategy Contest

Jim — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 12:01:55 +0000

As anticipated I received an email from FXCM last night, but it did seem just a touch impersonal. It started out by saying:

Dear Trader:

Code and Compete for a chance to win cash prizes in the FXCM Automated Trading Challenge. Sign up for a contest demo and put your automated strategy to the test with zero risk to your own money.

A bit further on it posed this rhetorical question:

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FXCM Launch Strategy Trader Automated Forex Trading Challenge

Jim — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 13:44:53 +0000

In a flurry of press releases FXCM have just (re)launched their new Strategy Trader trading platform. The headline reads:

FXCM Strategy Trader Delivers the Next Evolution in Automated Trading.

Despite this their Strategy Trader home page (now retitled "Automated Forex Trading") is still at pains to point out that:

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MetaTrader Micro-Lots go STP

Jim — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 11:42:35 +0000

Thanks to yesterday's disappointing Non-farm Payroll numbers the greenback fell and my troublesome sell limit order at European broker ActivTrades finally got filled. Consequently my new Interbank MetaTrader 4 micro-lot account with them is now fully funded, and open for business. As you can imagine, I have had one or two long discussions with ActivTrades over the last couple of days. During the course of those they pointed out to me that enough of their liquidity providers are now willing to quote and fill a 1K trade that it had now proved possible for them to introduce micro-lots on their "Straight Through Processing" (STP for short) MetaTrader Interbank accounts. When I enquired what "enough" meant in this context, the number three was mentioned. Unlike their Standard account, there is no "averaging algorithm" inserted by ActivTrades between you and the banks on their Interbank account. Instead they just add a bit to the spreads they are quoted, since they have to earn a crust somehow just like the rest of us.

MetaTrader Robot Ported to Dukascopy JForex

Jim — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 18:39:23 +0000

To celebrate the fact that forex broker Dukascopy have at last officially become a Swiss bank we have rewritten our first example robot to work on their JForex platform. Take a look at the JForex source code on our community forum.

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Dukascopy are now a Swiss Bank

Jim — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 10:45:54 +0000

Dukascopy have finally followed in the footsteps of MIG, and after a long wait they have at last received their banking licence from FINMA, the Swiss regulator. Consequently they now proudly call themselves "Dukascopy Bank SA". According to their press release:

Dukascopy Beta Testing MetaTrader 4 ECN Accounts

Jim — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 14:50:56 +0000

Last week Swiss forex broker Dukascopy announced that they are reducing the minimum lot size for their ECN retail accounts. According to the news section of their website:

Dukascopy (Suisse) SA announces the reduction of minimal lot size. Starting from 8th of January 2010, traders can use mini lots from 0.001 equal to 1000 units of a primary currency amount.

Last November Dukascopy reduced their minimum deposit requirement to $5,000, but at that time this was in a potentially lethal combination with a minimum lot size of 0.1. Note that as far as Dukascopy are concerned a lot is $1 million dollars, so a lot size of 0.1 corresponds to what most other forex brokers would call a full lot (i.e. $100,000). The new minimum lot size therefore corresponds to what most other brokers call a micro-lot of $1000. This now makes opening a Dukascopy account far more attractive to the average retail forex trader, who will no longer have to risk blowing their entire account with a single bad trade! If you're used to MetaTrader then you're used to experimenting on a demo account, and if you'd like to check out Dukascopy they helpfully provide 14 day trials of their JForex ECN platform which you can apply for here.

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