REMAINING VIGILANT … ALWAYS!

“Always check the pool before entering!”

We live in a world where events and circumstances happen and change so quickly, it’s literally impossible to keep up. In financial trading, from the start of the “modern era” in the late 1970’s up to around the turn of the century [1999 – 2001], that pace remained steady; oh sure, there were technological innovations that came about because of the computer revolution, but the “art & science” of trading pretty much remained the same. Starting from just after 2001, came paradigm shifts that started with electronic trading and removal of physical “pits” and the end of an individual trader’s need to use the CME or any of its affiliates [e.g., COMEX, NYMEX, etc.].

From about 2001 to April 2012, as the world came to grips with shocks it never expected from the 2008 housing bubble collapse, traders started to become relatively comfortable with online trading, while the industry as a whole, dealt with scam brokerage houses rushing in to open accounts, taking customer money, and then disappearing. This isn’t much of a problem anymore, thanks to the LP banks making it much tougher, from a due diligence standpoint, for anybody wanting to set up a brokerage house and clear customer trades through the LP bank. In fact, what the record shows is that the U.S. leads the world in scams the last decade; to wit, 1) Stotler, 2) REFCO, 3) MF Global, and 4) just recently FXCM. “I guess all of that wonderful regulation from the porn watching CFTC, NFA, & SEC didn’t do much good did it? Oh, and how about regulation & monitoring by the CME? Nah, too busy taking cash from HFT’s and others for quicker access to its Globex servers to worry about your piddly futures account”.

And then comes April 2012, where the FED & BIS [Bank of International Settlements] come in one day and slam gold lower by about $100 per Oz. in a coordinated manipulative attack on the market that nobody has ever seen. Of course, now it’s commonplace and doesn’t even raise an eyebrow when they slam gold lower, but back then it was news. Enter the BOJ & ECB and the shenanigans they started pulling away from U.S. markets, and in retrospect trader’s should have realized [including me] it was only a matter of time before the FED joined the manipulative party.

That brings us to February 2016, where after a bear market in crude oil sent prices into the 20’s from the 100’s a while earlier, the FED sent in the “Plunge Protection Team” [PPT], heretofore reserved for stock indices, into the oil market to save the energy industry in the U.S. from bankruptcy and oblivion. And from that moment, anything and everything traded is at the “whim” of a central banker; when you have unlimited power and the CNTRL-P machine to print as much money as you need, what’s going to stop you from pricing a market [any market] where you want it priced for policy objectives? Strictly from a stock indices and stock market aspect, I don’t see protesters outside any building anywhere protesting higher stock prices with signs and angry protesters; simply put, who’s gonna protest higher stock prices, and what person who works and has any kind of IRA, or 401(k) doesn’t want to see higher stock prices? So, the FED knows you aren’t gonna care if they manipulate prices higher and give you a “FED put” underneath your portfolio. While it may go down from time to time, there isn’t gonna be anymore 40% declines or anything like that, as long as the CNTRL-P machine is on.

Which brings us to the other side of the equation in financial trading, the brokerage houses. Before I get started, though, let me just say I am totally pleased with Turnkey as my current brokerage house of choice; don’t live under any illusions that there exists a “perfect” brokerage house … there isn’t one and won’t be one anytime soon. And also remember, brokerage houses are simply the “middleman” between us and the scumbag LP’s, who refuse to deal with us cuz they don’t want the scrutiny. In any event, it is what it is, and we live with it, deal with it, or we don’t trade … it’s that simple. From a relative standpoint, Turnkey has excellent customer service [could be better, but I could say that about them all]; their round turn [RT] commission structure for STP/ECN trading is the very best I have seen [meaning the lowest] at $2.00 per RT per 100,000 of notional value; and their spreads are among the lowest and best out there and rival institutional rates not seen at many places. It’s very easy to open and fund an account, and withdrawals are handled quickly and efficiently. So, all in all … yea, I’m glad we are here!

However, I’ve said before and I’ll say it again, for a myriad of critical reasons, you have to be insane to have a trading account in the U.S. That leaves “offshore” brokerage houses [“offshore” defined as simply non U.S. domiciled] as the only option and the dirty little secret is that 90%+ of those don’t or won’t take U.S. citizens or residents as clients, simply because [thanks to Obama and his crew of socialists] they don’t want the “hassles” of U.S. law.

Still, no matter where you park your funds and do business, you have to constantly monitor your brokerage house for any “hints” that there might be problems on the horizon; I can’t stress this enough, cuz over the years and years I have traded, I have seen plenty of good brokerage houses, who for years had good, solid reputations, go down the “rabbit hole” into oblivion very quickly, all the while giving hints months before that there were problems. Just as one example, I got my funds out of Forex-Metal before they went rogue and were labeled a “scam brokerage house” by Forex Peace Army because of problems that started with spreads ballooning, customer service going downhill, and a problem I had with a small withdrawal weeks before I moved my entire trading account.

What usually happens is it starts with a severe drop in the quality of customer service; your statements via email become erratic, emails don’t get answered, live chat is unresponsive and never available, and their phones go “dead”. You get this, and it’s time to leave … like right now, and there’s a chance it may be too late anyway. My point, though, is to remain vigilant … keep your eyes and ears open, and always stay on top of things.

To this end, I’m sad to report that LMFX has dropped to the point where I would not feel comfortable keeping my funds there in an account. As many of you know, last year I not only had my account there, but I also was an affiliate IB, where I was told we could start our PAMM very shortly … that was over a year ago … fact is they lied, and I found out why they lied at the end of last year … they were selling the brokerage house to another group [unknown and wouldn’t say who] and didn’t want to start or do anything to upset things … Ok, well I don’t like getting lied to no matter the circumstances, so I left cuz I know what their actions mean.

That ushers in a new group who doesn’t want to be known, who change banks to somewhere in Eastern Europe, and from what I gather from some clients who still had accounts there … even though I told them to get the hell  out and leave way back in December … nope, they stayed until recently. Long story short, one guy started his withdrawal process at the end of April of this year … it’s now mid-July … he just got his money yesterday … it took him just over 10 weeks of screaming, yelling, threatening, a zillion emails wanting his money … what he got back from them that he showed me was every excuse in the book for why they couldn’t send the money right now, but in a couple of days it will be sent … we promise … only, more time elapsed, the excuses got more bizarre … until yesterday, when the money finally showed up and he got charged by LMFX $60 for the wire. EXIT QUESTION: “Would any of you find this acceptable behavior on the part of the brokerage house, and would any of you keep funds there”? If any of you reading this had an answer other than “hell NO”, trust me, LMFX would love for you to open an account and fund it … happy trading.

So, what once was good and OK, has turned into bat guano within a year; nothing is ever “written in stone”, cuz things change for various reasons. I’m glad he got his money, but my lecture to him still stands; “you have to heed the warning signs, and when you ignore them, bad shit happens. Learn from this”! Now, just to be clear, I’m not saying LMFX is a “scam brokerage house”; what I am saying is that I definitely disapprove of the way they handled this gentlemen and the process he had to go through to get his funds … it’s disgraceful and LMFX should be ashamed of itself … of course, they won’t be, and it’s business as usual … that isn’t good enough for me and it shouldn’t be good enough for anybody else either, and it’s why I wouldn’t keep a nickel there going forward.

Turning to today’s market … ZZZZZZZZZ … ok wait, let’s give it a chance shall we? … why I don’t know, cuz it very much looks and feels like another “Flying Wedge of Death” [FWD] kind of day with an upside bias … but who knows, we’ll find out via the ‘setup” shortly.

It’s Friday, and I’m gonna just recap the day … I’ve been in this biz a very long time, trading stock indices since the beginning … this is the weirdest day I have ever seen … I have never seen the SP500 so manipulated on the buy side ever … by the same token, the Dow30 is all over the place with a correlation matrix that has lost all meaning … I’ve mentioned it before, but today is the worst I have ever seen, and that’s saying something since I’ve seen more trading days than most … add to that, today was the worst day I have seen with “speed of light … crickets” trading conditions since the central bankers decided to make the stock indices their playground … the gaps in price discovery, the speed at which it goes up/down from nothing, and the endless M1’s where the ranges are 1 or 2 points and literally goes nowhere for hours is really baffling and strange … it’s a manipulated market; in no way, shape, or form does this market resemble anything it did prior to 2016. Did you know the CME now offers discounts in clearing fees and commissions to central banks that trade Dow30 & SP500 futures? Could there possibly be any greater admission than this? Since the inception of central banks into the stock indices in February 2016, this is the biggest intervention, manipulative jack higher I have ever seen. It’s only been about a year and a half … I’m sure in the future there will be more with more gusto to come. Seriously … God help this country with all of this, cuz when it blows up [which someday it will], the mess will be unbelievable.

Of course, throw in slippage into this mess, and the scumbag LP [if this was a just world] would simply be hung … what they do to orders that I can see from the quotes is literally criminal, but there isn’t anything anybody can do about it cuz it’s the only way you can trade … you can bitch and scream at them all day and night, turn blue in the face, and it won’t raise an eyebrow over at the bank … deal with it.

Today was one of those days where I walk away happy I only lost a couple hundred bucks … trust me, it could have been far worse … it wasn’t, cuz I know what I’m doing, but the speed at which the stock indices mete out punishment is staggering … throw in slippage, and it’s a very bitter pill. So, I’ll take the splinter out of my finger, and look forward to next week. Look for some DAX30 trades next week, as I throw in some “Dow30 from Germany” into the mix; lately, this market has picked up and the version 4 algo is doing very well there. No reason not to trade it in the early hours. Onward & Upward!

PAMM spreadsheet directly below.

Time for the beach … dog and I are outta here … until Monday.

Have a great weekend everybody!

-vegas

OUR TURNKEY FOREX “PAMM/MAM” IS NOW OPEN AND OPERATIONAL; SEE “PAMM/MAM MANAGED MONEY PROGRAM” IN “DOWNLOAD LINKS” SECTION IN RIGHT HAND COLUMN FOR DETAILS [VIEW ONLINE AND/OR DOWNLOAD] AND START YOUR JOURNEY FROM WHERE YOU ARE AT TO “ESCAPE TO SUCCESS”!

WHAT KEEPS US UP AT NIGHT

“All I wanted to do was order some ‘Meow Mix’, and here I am setting up an appointment @ 3 A.M. to get neutered at the Vet? Wait … what?”

Up until I left right after the “fairy tale” NFP report, Friday was one of the worst days evahhh! I have seen in electronic trading, over the whole mix of markets. Oh, to be sure, each market [FX, stock indices, metals, interest rates, & commodities] has had its rough days over the last 15 – 16 years, but throw them all in the same bag at once with headline news, and you have a recipe for disaster; and that “disaster” are gyrating markets that go up/down at speeds most traders [including myself] find not at all conducive to making money. Get on the wrong side of a couple of these vicious swings and you’ll be like internet Kitty above, looking to book a reservation at the nearest animal shelter to get your trading balls back.

Because here’s the thing; you always have to recognize and remind yourself why you are being allowed to trade by the banks/LP’s; why are they giving you and your piddly retail account such easy access to a multiple trillion dollar per day market? ANSWER IN THE FORM OF A QUESTION: “why do the swankiest casinos in Las Vegas offer penny slots?” SHORT ANSWER: “they’ll take any amount of your money any way you want to give it to them.” 

“If the LP is the squirrel, guess what your account is to them?”

So, when trading is so utterly chaotic simultaneously across multiple markets, probability theory is out the window, GBP & NFP stupidity reigns supreme, and not wanting even to be tempted by this kind of market bullshit, I left early; when I got back and took a look at what I missed, I realized immediately leaving was the right choice. If the probability for a profitable trade is not on my side, via algorithm rules, I simply will not be an “ear of corn” for some fucking LP who views my account as “lunch”!

I have repeatedly, in the past, told people there is no “perfect” brokerage house to trade at; they are all conduits for bank liquidity providers [except Saxo Bank which is its own], and thus are no more than marketing tools and middlemen for the banks because the banks do not want [under any circumstances] to have to deal with the retail trading public. So, before I consign the great “Cable Disaster of 2016” to the history books, I want to point out something I should have done on Friday; and this is an important point. Let’s take a look at the “flash crash” in Cable at LMFX and see what happened on their MT4 trading platform, and then compare it to the “rape” at ASSETS FX. Directly below, the GBPUSD candlestick chart from LMFX.

And, just as a comparison reminder from Friday, the chart below from ASSETS FX.

“Why yes, you too can lose almost 1,000 PIPS to the criminal LP for no fucking reason other than pure greed. Yes, special indeed.”

On the face of it, it’s borderline criminal what the LP crooks did to the trading clients of ASSETS FX in Cable [in my opinion, the LP was Standard Financial, which is Citibank, but it could be somebody else. Not that it makes that much difference, but I thought you might like to know which LP I thought either started this or piggybacked somebody else on the way down.]; AFTER FRIDAY, THERE’S NO REASON THIS LP SHOULD HAVE ANY CLIENTS. Oh, they’ll be quick to “hem & haw” like a flock of chirping birds in heat about 1) fast chaotic markets, 2) no liquidity with disappearing bids, 3) widening spreads 50X normal, 4) computer systems run ‘amok’, and 5) a combination of any or all of the above, but the one thing they won’t ever talk about in public is how they live to feed off of these events all the while escaping  legal scrutiny because as we all know “the only rule” in FX trading is simply this: “there are no fucking rules!”

EXIT QUESTION FOR THE LP @ ASSETS FX: “Since all dealers and LP’s face the same market conditions, have the same basic computer & networking systems, and are tied at the hip to every single level 1 top tier bank trading desk in the world on down, how is it your low bid price is a whopping almost 1,000 PIPS below the same quote @ LMFX, thus totally screwing any customer sell stop to the tune of almost 1,000 PIPS?"

ANSWER FROM THE LP: [crickets]

Of course, there is an answer, and it comes in 2 parts; the first part drives the second part: 1) absolute pure greed, and 2) the computer & networking systems are INTENTIONALLY PROGRAMMED to execute market orders with the lowest of the low ball bids/offers from a “pre-defined” list of 20-30 banks around the world; your order to sell, at any given millisecond goes to the bank for execution WITH THE LOWEST BID, and if your order is to buy, your order goes to the bank with the HIGHEST OFFER. This “pre-defined” list of banks runs the gamut from tier 1 banks like JP Morgan to tier level 5 banks in some shithole parasitic banking backwater nobody ever heard of before. In the case of a liquidation sell/buy stop on a position, that order is automatically routed back by the system to the counter party bank holding the other side of your initial position; there is no “competition” [hahaha] for your stop because the position needs to be closed with the originating bank, NO MATTER THEIR BID/OFFER QUOTE, WHICH IS MORE THAN LIKELY TO BE OFF THE MARKET WITH OTHER BANKS! So, in the case of what we saw in GBPUSD on Friday, there is the very real possibility some traders at ASSETS FX actually got filled BELOW THE LOW @ 1.10217.

And this kind of bullshit happens all the time in multiple markets; only not nearly with the severity of what happened in Cable; more like a “paper cut”. Many times, as I’m liquidating a gold position the liquidating price on my sell comes back $0.05 - $0.15+ below the bid/offer I’m seeing on my screen. Why? Because my liquidation order to close is not going to ALL bullion banks, it is strictly going to the bullion bank it originated from [i.e., the bank that had the highest offer at the time I bought, even though my trading screen ALWAYS shows highest bid/lowest offer, which from a trading standpoint is a total joke and pure fictional bullshit], and many times their quotes are “off the market” intentionally as they seek greater profits for themselves that they split with the brokerage house. In other words, the vast majority of banks in this “game” of trading are parasites; feeding off the host [the market] hoping you won’t care or notice for simply a few pennies. Great work if you can get it, all the while repeating the process a million times over during the trading day!

This is the “raison d’etre” of WHY IT IS SO IMPORTANT TO “BUY” VIA ALGORITHM RULES, AND TO LIQUIDATE GOLD ON THE WAY UP AS PRICES ARE RISING ON ABOVE AVERAGE SPIKES SINCE THE INCEPTION OF THE TRADE, OR AT WORST, WHEN IT STALLS; because if you have to liquidate when it turns around and starts going down, YOUR GOING TO BE LIKE MY FRIEND DIRECTLY BELOW!

“Please Lord, a ‘special place in hell’ for those LP’s that fill my liquidation order way off the market. Amen.”

So, while all the powers that be feign shock … SHOCK I TELL YOU … with their faux outrage over some LP who decided they needed a “quick” capital injection to meet customer losses they had to back via huge losses in gold & JGB’s and figured out GBPUSD was ripe for the pillage, the “dirty little secret” whispered to LP execs all over the world by their CEO’s on Friday was, “Christ, why can’t we do shit like this? Johnson, form a committee and study this and get back to me ASAP; damn, I could use a bigger Christmas bonus!” And so, after the SNB showed them all how to do it back in Jan. of 2015, these “one offs” are happening with more frequency than anyone would like to admit; now you know why.

And so, the brokerage house & dealer crime syndicates just sit back, watch with hidden glee as the customers “bitch, scream, holler, moan, threaten legal action [hahahaha, that’s a good one!]”, AND THEN RAKE IN MILLIONS OF DOLLARS JUST TRANSFERRED TO THEMSELVES IN SECONDS AT CLIENTS EXPENSE. “Thank you, please come again!”

And while ASSETS FX aren’t the ones that did this to their customers, and they have no control over what an LP does, it isn’t like they haven’t been warned of this kind of behavior in the past by the LP in FX. After all, I let them know in no uncertain terms of what I thought about their actions when they refused to fill my limit sell order in EURJPY @ 121.175 on its way to 121.270 before immediately dropping to 121.080. [see Friday’s post for details if you want more] And, just for the record books, they never did do a damn thing about it.

So, my message to ASSETS FX is simple; I realize you had no part in totally screwing your client base in GBPUSD on Friday, 10/7/2016 during the Asian “flash crash”; I’m not blaming you. My question, however, is a simple one: is the LP still on your platform? Because if it is, I guess you have no problem seeing your clients get royally screwed on sell stops. If I owned your business, I would have told them by Friday afternoon to “get the fuck out and don’t let the door hit you in the ass as your leaving; you’re finished on my MT4!”

Now, if they are still there with you, the next question is why? It can only mean money; they either agree to give you part of the “customer spoils” from the flash crash, or they give you a bigger piece of the spread going forward; please explain to me how this arrangement benefits your clients in any possible way?

And, if all this isn’t enough, we know from the last few weeks that the LP made changes to their crude oil CFD, seeing it go from an above average instrument for customers to one of the worst on the market in a day. “Any bets out there, that the same LP in GBPUSD is the one in Crude Oil also?”

To be fair to ASSETS FX, their spot gold [spread, round turn commissions, and minimal slippage] trading is still [and has been for a long while] one of the very best on the market along with LMFX [I know it’s hard to believe, but it’s true]. While at times I get a little annoyed with some slippage that I think is a “little over the top” with market orders, it’s still only a matter of a few pennies I’m trying to squeeze out on a position. Their recent additions of “new” stock indices [especially the DOW30, SP500, & DAX30], so far at least are very good; “net” trading costs are “reasonable”, and so far I don’t see any problems with slippage.

We’ll see what happens with these CFD’s in the days & weeks ahead; ASSETS FX history with stock indices isn’t a very good one. It was 2 years ago at this time on the calendar, that they first introduced stock indices onto their MT4 [October 2014]; since then, the current “new” CFD’s are the 4^th set [with 4 different LP’s] that are supposed to impress. It’s very early still; let’s see what they do with 1) round turn commissions, 2) spreads, 3) slippage on market fills going forward, and most importantly 4) not if, but when there is another market panic to the downside in the DOW30 or the SP500 in the future, what kind of shenanigans is this “new” LP going to pull? Will the CFD’s be on the futures market, or will the bottom drop out like what happened in GBPUSD to screw customer stops below the market that have no business being hit and set off by the LP? I guess we got something to look forward to don’t we?

As I looked over the action from Friday, when I got back from the beach and after dinner, it very much looked like a small capitulation move occurred at the European close, when somebody [read BIS on behalf of the Fed] monkey hammered gold lower in a $10 blitz in 3 minutes with $2 billion notional of futures contracts at the market [see Zero Hedge for details]. Either that, or it was the dumbest hedge fund manager on the planet [theoretically possible, but highly unlikely]. I’ll ask the question again; “What kind of normal [haha] trader person that cares about price, after a $70 price move to the downside in 4 trading days, sells 2 “large” at the market at the bottom?” Well, nobody I know that’s going to be in this business very long with behavior like that; which reinforces my belief he/she didn’t care at all about price, and that means it’s the manipulators punishing day trader longs. Directly below the RM=3 move within a minute of the European close @ 18:30 LMFX server time.

So, coming into today, what’s the worst thing you can possibly see on your screen if want gold prices to go higher today? That’s right, the numbskulls in Asia rallying gold about $8 per Oz., buying like they always do, and then watching the price drop. Seriously, these people need psychological help; “how many weeks/months/years of data do you need to convince you that if you wait to buy in New York you will get consistently cheaper prices? What the fuck is wrong with you? Pay some young MBA 100 Yen per hour to sit and wait for the manipulators to strike and buy it then; for the life of me, I can’t understand the idiocy and dementia of these traders!”

And of course, with that having been said, here we are at midday New York with what … a $3 - $4 per Oz. chop session that sees prices unable to go up or down. Exactly what am I supposed to do with this? I’ll tell you … leave it alone and come back tomorrow … not that I want to … but I’m unwilling to subject myself to a trading strategy today that consists almost entirely of hope … “as in I hope it can go higher … please?” No thanks.

This time of day all it takes is eye contact with the dog for more than 2 seconds, and a little grin on my face that says, “ready to hit the beach?”, and he’s scrambling like a fighter jet looking for Ruskies, trying to locate his leash, nurfball, and the all important bag of Beggin’ Strips. Time to unleash in the beauties of the turquoise water and forget markets … I’m so outta here … until tomorrow.

Have a great day everybody!

-vegas

OPEN A DEMO AND/OR LIVE ACCOUNT AT THE LMFX LINK IN THE “DOWNLOAD LINKS” SECTION OF THE WEBSITE TITLED “OPEN TRADING ACCOUNT – DO IT NOW!”

 

 

 

 

 

WHAT IF NOBODY DOES NOTHIN’?

THE “PUDDING BUSINESS” IS STARTING TO LOOK GOOD

I think the markets greatest fear is that the BOJ [11 PM New York time for actual decisions on rates, 2:30 AM New York time for the presser with Kuroda & Crew if you’re interested] will “sit tight” and while they do nothing will “jawbone” the market to try and take the Yen lower [good luck]. And if that happens, it leaves the door open for the FED, which I think has a very good chance of raising rates, to knock the shit out of everything.

But what if they both do nothin’? Would that mean markets are on hold until December? [Better dust off that resume to the bearded lady at the circus.]

I don’t know folks, but I can tell you this about gold; it very much feels like it’s going lower no matter what the asshats do or say. In the last 2 days, have you seen any short covering of significance after the recent move down from the 1350’s? Well, I haven’t, and that gives me a sense most commercial shorts are comfortable in their positions, and aren’t worried about what the BOJ & FED might do or say. Sub 1300 here we come.

Now, I could be all wrong about this; they both could be dovish and we get a massive move higher in short order and catch the entire crowd on the wrong side of the trade. Boy, would I love to see this!

And much to the delight of the entire financial elite community, volatility in pretty much all markets has collapsed today ahead of these 2 meetings; there aren’t any trades to be made anywhere that justify a position in this slop.

And speaking of slop, no comments from Black Pearl to Yours Truly on the blistering emails I sent them yesterday about the crude oil CFD’s at ASSETS FX, where you too can get screwed by a liquidity provider that sees you as solely an income source to be “milked” like a cow. “Hey, if we do it slow enough you won’t even feel it!”

No comments from LMFX either about their PAMM’s; silence all around as they take their sweet ass time getting things done. I mean, God forbid, let a customer know when shit will be done; it’s like they do this intentionally, almost like the airlines, they alienate and piss all over their client base and then are shocked to find out people hate them and wish there were alternatives to using them.

In essence, the financial trading business is a complete and utter mess. As retail customers, we face 2 big problems; 1) all, and I do mean ALL, brokerage house management types are lying sacks of shit, that will say anything, promise anything, and then deliver nothing like what was agreed upon, then look you in face and say, “what, what’s the problem?”, 2) the entire industry views your account as a source of revenue that is theirs, not yours; that money you put in, that’s theirs not yours; your money is just “borrowed” from them for a short while, as management in cahoots with the LP’s figure out how to separate more money from you every time you click the button.

As I have stated numerous times, the PAMM concept is in its infancy; it’s only been around for a couple of years, and the early years were a total disaster in terms of 1) fees, 2) outrageous spreads, 3) outrageous round turn commissions, and 4) slippage on fills. On top of this, pretty much everybody in the trading business from the brokerage house & LP side viewed “managed money” as “chump money”; money we can screw and at the least take advantage of with fees.

Sadly, not a whole lot has changed much; in the last 5 years I’ve hosted 6 PAMM’s that had to be shut down, either because the brokerage house no longer wanted U.S. clients or money managers [3], or because when I started trading spreads ballooned, slippage increased, round turn commissions increased, volume quotas were instituted, or a combination of all four and I simply said, “this is bullshit, and I’m not screwing my clients, so shut this thing down. This isn’t what I agreed to!”

To be sure, some brokerage houses & LP’s are clearly better than others; that doesn’t mean they aren’t lying sacks of shit, it only means they don’t stink as much. I’m trying very hard to show patience and remember what it is that is at stake in this business; I know “Rome wasn’t built in a day”, and I fully realize from the annals of business history these things take time. But for Christ’s sake, you would think one of these outfits would get their act together and dominate the business; sadly, so far, it’s amateur hour on a massive scale. Until tomorrow when “stupid shit” happens … I’m so outta here.

Have a great day everybody!

-vegas

SPITTING INTO THE WIND

“So, you wanna a piece of me?”

We live in a world [financial, political, etc.] that is changing so rapidly, there are days when I just want to jump off and say “stop the spinning before my head explodes!” Two things today that “frost my cupcake”, and I got that look on my face like the dog above; “you pretend to throw the ball and expect me to run? WTF is wrong with you?”

The first is the crude oil pricing and spreads at ASSETS FX, where 2 things are in play today that I most definitely DO NOT LIKE; 1) increase of spread costs by 25%+ from 3 cents to 4 – 4.2 cents, and 2) this idiotic 3 decimal pricing by the “Black Pearl” liquidity provider [London] that does nothing more than rip customers off and place them at a bigger disadvantage when trading. So, why the increase in the spread? Because they can, and you’re not supposed to notice, so STFU and start trading. The 3 decimal pricing is nothing more than an attempt to pick buy/sell stops off from small retail specs who are trading, and serves absolutely no other purpose. None. This is a pure greed play by increasing the cost of trading for no purpose, except you’re not supposed to notice.

Those of you that have accounts at ASSETS FX, send them an email at the following; info@assetsfx.com and let them know you don’t appreciate what Black Pearl is doing, and tell them to pass along your criticisms to Black Pearl, and that you won’t trade it unless they stop. That’s the only thing we can do; stop the money flow where it hurts them is the only thing they pay attention to and understand.

My second bitch comes from LMFX, where all of the PAMM upgrades should have been completed 5 weeks ago; in other words, I’m getting the same old “tried & true” brokerage house bullshit of 1) “Everything Is F-ing Awesome, Baby?”, 2) the PAMM will be up “soon”, and 3) “Everything is F-ing More Awesome-er than it was before!” and thanks for your patience. “If I want bullshit, I’ll walk into a pasture full of bulls, Ok?” In other words, I’m getting stonewalled by these guys and have no idea what the hell they are doing, why they are doing it, what the delay is, or how long it will be.

What is extremely frustrating to me [and I’m sure others as well] is that in order to put together a PAMM, you need to do planning which takes time; then the brokerage house comes along, and along with the LP, changes the rules that made you want to partner with them in the first place. It’s like I’m just some chump who just hopped off the turnip truck and said “wow, looky here, a place to trade. Go ahead and rip me off, lie to me, and change your trading conditions, cuz I’m just some rube who doesn’t pay attention to things like you sticking your fucking greedy hands in my wallet. Yea, no problem.” Well, it is a problem.

What makes matters worse is that we all [U.S. citizens & residents] are being “sold out” by our government to the likes of the pukes at the CME, who make no doubt about it, don’t like the fact you can trade CFD’s and don’t have to use their futures contracts. The number of “offshore” [definition = non U.S. based] brokerage houses that accept U.S. clients grow smaller every day, as most offshore brokerage houses want nothing to do with U.S. clients because of the hassles of the U.S. Government. The ones that do accept U.S. clients [like LMFX] know this, and thus feel no pressure to keep their promises; “shit gets done when it gets done, OK?”

To put it all into context, we HAVE NO STABILITY AMONG BROKERAGE HOUSES AND/OR LIQUIDITY PROVIDERS, AND THE ONLY THING YOU CAN COUNT ON WITH COMPLETE 100% CERTAINTY IS THAT THEY WILL DO THEIR UTMOST BEST TO FIND WAYS TO EXPLOIT YOUR ACCOUNT FOR THEIR OWN PROFIT. If that means THEY LIE TO YOU 100% OF THE TIME, raise spreads indiscriminately, raise commission round turn rates, increase slippage on market fills, not honoring limit buy/sell orders, and raping buy/sell stops at every chance, well … THEN SO BE IT! And when I see it, I get greatly offended by it. I’ll have more on our gold PAMM tomorrow.

Other than that, “Everything Is F-ing Awesome, Baby!”.

And, of course, the entire world is on “hurry up & wait” as this is Central Bank week [no trades today]; markets churning, going nowhere, as we all await the “stupid shit” they will unleash in the next 48 hours. Thank God, nature isn’t nearly as fucked up as the financial markets find themselves in with being controlled by the 0.01%. The beach awaits … I’m so outta here with this mindless, senseless chop.

Have a great day everybody!

-vegas

WAKE ME IN SEPTEMBER

CUZ MORNING GOLD TRADING IS MAKIN’ ME SLEEPY!

Seriously, trading gold today was hard; basically a crap day with a small range going nowhere fast. Take a few random minutes for some stop hunts by the dealer community, and that pretty much wraps up the day’s activity. However, there were 4 trades from the algorithm from 08:00 New York time to about Noon; after that, I’m not interested due to time constraints of the trading day combined with a very tight daily range. The odds here is that this stuff dies soon, and I don’t want to push the envelope hoping for some volatility where there is none. Directly below in successive order the day’s trades.

 

I’m not sure what the rest of the week is prepping for; it sure feels like today’s “death march” higher is a fake out, and I’m still looking for the retail stops below 1330 to get taken out and slaughtered; as long as we hang out here in the 1330’s with no real move higher, the likelihood of gunning for the stops becomes more real each trading day. Below 1333 during the New York day, and you have got to be really careful about being long the market because the move below 1330 could get really messy really fast; any stop you have on the downside, if it gets lumped in with the rest of the world, has the potential to get filled a lot lower than you think.

If you’ve visited the LMFX website today, you’ll notice they have made widespread changes. The PAMM pages have also been updated, but the ability to create and activate a new PAMM has not been linked yet; expect this to be done here shortly. As soon as it is ready, I’ll create our PAMM and we’ll get rolling. In any event, I’m targeting the day after Labor Day to start trading, which is 2 weeks from today.

If you are interested in participating, first you need to open a regular account, and then choose your method to fund it; opening an account takes about 2 minutes and you’ll need to verify your identity [copy of passport or drivers’ license sent via email attachment] and verify your physical address [copy of utility bill or first page of bank statement]. Once the PAMM has been created, go over to the PAMM page and choose to participate in our fund [I haven’t decided on a name yet – I’ll let you know]; money will be taken from your personal account and placed in your PAMM account, and the funds placed in the master pool, which is what I trade.

Minimum amount to start is $400, and additional deposits can be made in amounts equal to or greater than $200. There are no lockout periods, and there is 100% transparency with what I do on your behalf. All trades will be tracked by me, here on my website, as well as by LMFX in their tracking results. My incentive fee is 17% of profits, and there are no other charges or fees. It’s really a very simple process, and if you hve any questions/comments, drop me a note at traderzoogold@gmail.com and I’ll get back to you ASAP with a personal response.

Have a great day everybody!

-vegas

OPEN A DEMO AND/OR LIVE ACCOUNT AT THE LMFX LINK IN THE “DOWNLOAD LINKS” SECTION OF THE WEBSITE TITLED “OPEN TRADING ACCOUNT – DO IT NOW!”

OUR LMFX GOLD TRADING PAMM WILL BE READY AS SOON AS LMFX GETS THROUGH WITH UPGRADES TO ITS PAMM SOFTWARE! WE ARE VERY CLOSE; OPEN YOUR LIVE TRADING ACCOUNT TODAY, FUND IT, AND BE READY TO PARTICIPATE!

 

CFD’s VS. FUTURES: YOU DO THE MATH

It’s a well known fact the Mrs. Watanabe’s of the world are not a “happy bunch” of ladies; first getting shellacked in the Yen carry trades of 10 years ago, now suffering the brunt of negative interest rates, and now watching declining or stagnate world stock indices. Throw in consistent losing trades in crude oil & gold into the mix, and is it any wonder they are collectively scratching their heads in disbelief.

So, as a “public service”, Yours Truly is making the algorithms available to anybody [even Mrs. Watanabe if she knows what’s good for her!] with free downloads or online viewing of the various algorithms along with important documentation. And where can Ho Lee Sheet & Wat Dee Fuk [along with other traders worldwide] get this financial porn? Easy Peezee; just take your eyes on a walk over to the right hand column and go to “Download Links” and click. All the files are for free at “box.com” and can be either viewed online or downloaded [no sign up needed; just click and view or click and download]. And just so you know, there’s a lot more files on the way.

Which brings me to today’s discussion; should I trade futures or should I trade CFD’s? For my money, it’s an easy answer; CFD’s beat futures hands down. Why? Take a look at the comparison table below of the CME versus LMFX; 2 glaring facts stand out. 1) much more favorable margin requirements, and 2) far greater flexibility in terms of risk management because you can easily adjust your volume levels to fit your trading style.

In the case of gold, specifically, you can trade spot gold in 1 Oz. increments [0.01 lots in the volume box on the MT4] with margin of 1% per Oz., giving up approximately 1 tick to the futures market [where the liquidity provider bank hedges] on fills. For me, if you’re losing money because of $0.10 per Oz., you’re doing something wrong! This is a market that consistently puts in daily ranges of $15 - $23 per Oz. [that’s 150 ticks – 230 ticks], so don’t sit there and tell me that 10 cents matters; it doesn’t.

With the SP500, you’re effective spread with commissions [round turn] is 0.42 index points; since the futures have a minimum spread of 0.25 [and forgetting whatever rate you pay with an FCM for commissions], you’re paying LESS THAN 1 TICK for access to a market that is 1/5^th the size of the futures with approximately 80% less margin needed in your account.

SO, WITH THE OTHER MARKETS, DO THE MATH MRS. WATANABE!

Our “long only” Gold PAMM [managed money] will be ready here in the next few days; the added cost of the PAMM structure is a major problem for money managers, and makes some markets not worth trading or unavailable [hello stock indices & crude oil]; however, since spot gold is considered part of FX, the added cost of trading gold inside a PAMM for all of my clients is only $0.08 per Oz.; and that makes it the most attractive, lowest cost, consistently volatile market traded. Details on the Gold PAMM will be announced when it is ready; in the meantime, over in the “Download Links” section of the website is the link to open an LMFX account, which you have to do first anyway before you can have a PAMM account and participate. So, don’t wait until the last minute to sign up.

One more thing: I’m putting the incentive fee back at 17% of profits to make my PAMM one of the lowest cost structures for investors on the planet; this obviously puts a little more money into your account.

And now for commentary on today’s gold action.

Yup, Al Bundy pretty much sums everything up; sitting here watching this crap waiting for 1) August to be over with, 2) BOE interest rate meeting, and 3) Friday’s NFP to be released, it isn’t surprising there isn’t much interest right now.

So, today’s action? Well, I made one trade, and I had to wait for what seemed like a week. I mentioned in the algorithm manual, that you have to be really careful about buying any kind of waterfall or even down move when there is less than $13 per Oz. range; today points this out in spades, as the M1 had several small waterfalls on the way down, which I didn’t buy because of the small nature of the daily range. Starting at $12 per Oz., I’ll give it a shot, but I would much rather buy waterfalls with ranges for the day higher than $15 per Oz. When you wait, you probability of success is much greater than it is when the range is below $12 for the day.

Now, the chart below doesn’t really show a waterfall to get long, but 2 factors entered my trade thoughts; 1) NFP and the BOE loom tonight and Friday, and we have seen long stops get run for well over 2 hours with plum being under yellow the entire time, and 2) the market coming back and engulfing the 3 previous lows in one M1 candlestick. As the chart shows, I didn’t make all that much on the trade [about $1.30 per Oz.], and the range is still a paltry $12 and change with about 2 hours to go until the close. If I was trading the PAMM, I more than likely would have skipped this trade, and afterwards written the day off as a non event before key reports.

Have a great day everybody!

-vegas

OPEN A DEMO AND/OR LIVE ACCOUNT AT THE LMFX LINK IN THE “DOWNLOAD LINKS” SECTION OF THE WEBSITE TITLED “OPEN TRADING ACCOUNT – DO IT NOW!”

OUR LMFX GOLD TRADING PAMM WILL BE READY AS SOON AS LMFX GETS THROUGH WITH UPGRADES TO ITS PAMM SOFTWARE! WE ARE VERY CLOSE; OPEN YOUR LIVE TRADING ACCOUNT TODAY, FUND IT, AND BE READY TO PARTICIPATE!