Hi
Well although I have never traded with IG, I have never heard anything seriously problematic with them on a retail level. However, you sound like you have some serious experience trading and you prefer ECN models. If you aren't algo trading, maybe finding a broker that actually gives you access to currenex would be better for you. I traded on currenex via both algos and directly on the platform. I liked seeing the liquidity pool (sort of like a poor man's level 2 in stocks). It can sometimes give you some indication of micro movements. I usually don't get asked these questions while writing for Binary Options Broker Reviews, New, Analysis , where I blog about the market in relation to binary options trading, but I hope my full answer helps:
If not really your thing, and you want to stay in an MT4 environment, then the choices for a scalper are zero in my opinion. I don't know ANY broker that will allow it for more than 15 minutes.
They won't come out and stop you or ask you to leave (although GKFX will in fact tell you to go hime with a nasty letter - trust me). But they will shift you to an MT4 grouping that slips you big time. You have no recourse against this. Every time you want to enter the market using anything other than a market order, you're screwed. Think you can outsmart them by using market orders? Think again, they have a backoffice set up that can disrupt your trading style by using one of the following:
1. delayed pricing - simply put the price is delayed by X seconds
2. opt out delayed pricing - same as above but what the system does is check the price in reverse and then authorizes the trade. So if price is now 1.30001 on the EUR/USD, you click ASK, and 0.7.5 seconds pass (but the delay is 0.5 seconds and in the time between 0.5-0.75 seconds that have passed the price shifts in their favor - slippage plays)
3. spike protection settings for moves as low as 0.1 pips so you simply can't enter the market
Look, all I am saying is that don't expect a retail broker to let you screw him. In their defense, why would they allow it? They earn by watching you lose. This goes for all market makers including the banks. I am not saying that's a bad thing. Quite the contrary. Not only do I not think it's bad, I firmly believe that market making provides an integral and important function in economics. However, for retail brokers, who aren't facilitating the economy, it's just a means of B-booking trades. Again, nothing wrong with it and I am 100% supporting it. So long as the broker pays out profitable traders - it's cool with me that 95% out there lose their cash - part of the game is how I see it.
So I would recommend stepping into a more advanced trading environment with a true ECN (be careful with that too as 90% of those that claim they are ECNs are actually just institutional brokers and all that means is that they are B - Booking really big traders as opposed to retail clients). You can get access to pro level trading environments where you can get pricing directly from the banks with nearly every institutional broker - it just means that they are B Booking the trades based on pricing from the big banks - so if you scalp - it's not an issue. I still wouldn't do this with a retail broker. Even the best ones like Alpari or FXCM or whatever. I would sincerely go with a real insti broker and not a retail broker.
Hope that helps
