Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
I had been using IB for futures trading and found that trading during news times was difficult because IB filters their data. I called and asked detailed questions and sure enough they admitted they filter their data and said they are not best for trading around the news events. They are fine for all other trading if you don't require tick by tick data. In fairness it is nice to trade stock options and futures all from one account, but i opened a new acct for futures trades because of the filtered data. Additionally futures only brokers offer better commissions than IB, they are very high relative to other brokers who offer a better data feed.
Range bars are built from ticks. Interactive Brokers does not have historical ticks so you won't get range bars on historical charts. You cannot backfill your charts, but need to leave your PC running 24/24.
On real-time charts Interactive Brokers has condensed ticks. As a consequence on high resolution range chart there may be missing some bars.
I have attached 2 charts. One is built using tick data from NT replay file, another historical data recorded during IB session.
There are differences. But IB chart is pretty good approximation (in this case), visually it is about 99.9% correlation?
My guess, that on average, it should not be much different which chart to trade. It could have much importance for high frequency systems, small range bars, etc., but again, dealing with uncertainty when making trading decision, it should not impact final result over the period of time when having data only as accurate as 99.9%. Sorry, it is speculation on my side, may be somebody statistically proved different.
Not having historical data from IB for range bar charts - it is a problem. May be you could advise if it is possible convert NT replay data into historical?
Can be used for trading, but it is not 99.9 % correlated. There are lots of bars missing with IB due to the condensed ticks, which are transmitted.
To save real-time data as historical go to -> Tools -> Options -> Data and select "Save chart data as historical".
If you do this with Interactive Brokers, you will get some low quality historical tick data with some holes, as you will possibly not be able to run your PC 24/24.
IB can be used 24 h a day. You must reset the log off time to an earlier time.
For example: log off time 11.50 PM, time at the moment is 11 PM, then reset to 10.30 PM.
When 11.50 PM is passed, you can reset to original setting. That has to be repeated every day, if you need data 24/7.
Depends also on your trading method and data requrirement. I trade some ETF's with IB, and save their real time data with NT, but I don't need 24 hour data, I start trading on New York Open, and don't need much history to take scalping entries, so I start my charts around one hour before the open to get enough bars on the chart for my indicators to settle in.
Only your most recent stop and targets will be at IB. If your ATM does things like customized multi-step trail stops, volume trigger, target chase, and other advanced or customized ATM functions, those will not execute, if your PC looses connection.
