market makers and their execution

[moondude]

Hi forum, I have been into trading for many years and exploring new markets and familiar markets however one thing has always escaped me and that question is below, I would appreciate if anyone could help me to actually understand this definitively.

Do market makers have a different type of platform to everyone else where they can buy the bid and sell the offer to match liquidity all day?

I m interested to know what their price ladder actually looks like and how they execute i.e is their primary target to match the liquidity and make a rebate from it so much as to keep them in the trader, hedge out with a profit in a spread or outright market or is their sole target to match liquidity with other liquidity providers.

In either case, it is interesting to know how they actually go about doing it on the same futures platform as everyone else. You see them using TT Xtrader etc but their setups often look very similar to those who are on the buy side.

 

[J_C_Anderson]

It all depends on market we are talking about.

If to speak about the US equities, for example, marketmaker could see all depth of L2 with all orders placed. At the same time, he could not see stop orders as they are placed on the broker`s system and would be transmitted only in case if the launcing event would occur. So, the marketmaker could not see your stops (in fact, he understands where most of the traders would place their stops, but do not know exactly). The main role of marketmaker is to maintain the balance and avoid huge price movements - in such case marketmaker could even halt the trading of the particular stock.

If to speak about the Forex, when the broker combines the roles of marketmaker, counterparty and the broker itself, your orders are visible for broker/marketmaker, so keep it in mind.