Oanda FXtrade
I have been using Oanda fxtrade now for 14 months and can say the following:
Firstly, a bit of back ground about the company,OANDA. It was formed in 1996 by Dr Micheal Strumm, a prof. in Computer Engineering and Dr R. Olsen an economist. The company is a lot more than just a forex trading platform, it covers just about every aspect of forex. It has offices in New York (HO), Toronto and Zurich. It has 14000+ clients including a number of large household name corporates.
FXtrade was designed to be a true 100%electronic platform devoid of dealer intervention.
It was easy and quick to open an account. There is no minimum amount for opening accounts and multi currency sub accounts can be opened in the following currencies: USD,EUR,JPY,GBP,CHF,CAD and Aussie dollar. Withdrawals from the account have also been no problem, it takes 30 seconds to click on the funds withdrawal form and fill out the amount to withdraw. I think the withdrawal fees are quite steep: first withdrawal in a calendar month is 40 euro and any other in the month is 15 Euro. Or 25 for first and 15 for second, and in USD acc international transfer is $40 and $15 for subsequent.. So maybe a tip for regular monthly withdrawers is to make first withdrawal at the beginning of the month and second just before the end of the month and then skip the next month and do the same in the subsequent month,saves a little.
Now on to the FXtrade platform.
Firstly, it is totally internet based, accessable from anywhere. It is remarkably stable and I have never had a single day of downtime. One thing to note is if you browser suppresses Pop-ups you will be unable to log-in, this will need to be adjusted.
Oanda is trully 100% electonic, it is evident in the instantanious fills received. To do this ALL orders are executed as MARKET orders. So slippage is a possibility. The worsed slippage I have received on a stop order during NFP's was 11 pips, but I have heard accounts of much larger slippage, in normal market conditions you get your price instantanously.
There is no minimum lot size. You make your lot size what you want from $1 up. I think this is great because it gives gives total flexibility and allows for small traders to hone there skills on a small account risking 'bread and milk' money. I have found the greatest use of this in combating those 'BOREDOM Trades' where I trade just for the sake of trading, I still do it, just on a lot size of 10 euro, so the loses are but cents.. And when I get that trade that sets up properly I can step on the gas a bit.
Leverage is not the best compared to others it is adjustable between 20:1 and 30:1. So along way off the regular 100:1 and up offered by others. But it keeps you from losing your head. Spreads are good, during regular trading hours the following is the norm:
EUR/$ 1.8 pips
$/JPY 2 to 3 pips
BP/$ 4 pips
$/CHF 3 pips
Aussie 2 pips.
During the Asian opening hour on monday and NY late afternoon hours on friday spreads widen to 10 on euro.gp etc, due to less liquidity. Also around economic data release spreads widen usually about double normal. I have found this useful as a good indicator of when volitility is about to occur in the market and pay extra attention.
Another interesting feature is that it is possible to trade 24/7, so trades can be opened closed adjusted on Saturday or Sunday. The market prices are static during this time. So at least if some thing dramatic happens on the weekend that will affect prices on Mondays open it is possible to open or close a trade during the weekend to take advantage of the news.
Charts are OK, they are not the best in that data is limited. So it is possible to be oblivious to long term trends and S/R which are not apparent on short term data. Indicators are abit scarce just they have most of the favourite but Fib's and Ganns would be useful. Some other features that would be useful are trailing stops.
All in all I am happy using them and would recommend them.