Discuss FxOpen.com ( FxEgypt)

[Teodor Jackson]

This is the initial message I sent.
But for whatever reason I didn't appear here after posting. Maybe my browser cache issue.
So I sent it again. With some modifications.
After few hours this one showed up.
Anyway, this one is obsolete. Please go to the next post.
=============
Ok, Mr Sergeant,

So you suspect I'm a kind undercover enemy playing some game against whoever you think I may target (who actually?)

In fact I'm just a retailer who had very unpleasant encounter with Mr Cat favorite broker.
And previously managed to get out of Liu's madness.

And since you regard FxFrench so friendly and helpful, maybe our nice Tom could explain little Jerry what does it mean:
---
Dear Client,

You used prohibited strategy for standard trading account(...) We recommend you open ECN account if you want to use STOP SELL/BUY strategy further.

Please see our rules -

Scalping
With limitations. ( 1) Stop Loss, Take Profit and Pending Orders 10 pips or more away from the current price; 2) Most of the trades must be open for more than 1 minute)


FXOpen - Trading Terms - Type of accounts

The prohibited strategy is:

1. Set up two STOP BUY/SELL orders in the same currency pair simultaneously with short TP and SL levels just before significant news on the market
2. Cancellation one of them just right now after one of orders is activated

FXOpen Team
---

Can you please explain me how did I violate your rules?
There is absolutely NOTHING about straddling news spikes in your rules.
Please show me where exactly did you describe it as prohibited?

The scalping limitations is just a smokescreen - my EA records everything in great detail. Debugging stuff is about 1/3 of its code.
I did not violate your official scalping rules. Your support representative tried to convince me you account any order, pending, of filled into 1 minute limitation.
See what I explained to your SR:

---
Even if you account pending limit orders to the "Most of the trades" pool I didn't do it - just recalculated the statement again: 30 of 47 total orders lasted over 1 minute while only 17 were shorter.
All of them were placed over 11 pips from the market.
This resulted in 18 trades, 5 of them were shorter than 1 minute while 13 longer - 29 minutes average trade lifespan. Again no "Most of the trades must be open for more than 1 minute" rule violation.
--

My account was blocked and I had to work hard to get my money back.
Mind you I was just testing my EA in live trading - I was trading $100 micro account. My max. win was just $5.46!

The only thing coming to my mind is FX Open found it... too profitable and thus dangerous for the broker. Indeed, it win over 68% of trades...

Dear Sergeant, is is the FPA that made me aware of the news spikes trading. Wasn't it Felix who insisted on commitment to trade news releases?
Isn't it FPA providing news releases trading recipes?

And when a rookie with some programming skills forged it into EA, he find's himself being treated as a felon by a broker who DIDN'T forbid it in his trading rules?
Yup, Mr Cat - I read the rules before I started my little test. I checked it against demo account and found I don't violate them before going for live.

And please tell me just one more thing, very curious about this one:
why is your feed clock floating? Sometimes up to 11 seconds off sync?

Is it just poor server time synchronization or is it to derail timed trading?
I'm talking about live account, fixed feed. On demo is much worse.

BTW: Did I mention demo and live quotes are not the same?
Again I'm talking about fixed spread accounts only….

There is just one positive thing in this story - you confirmed my EA is successful ;-)
This greatly shortened my forward test

PS: I just took a look at the trading rules FXOpen - Trading Terms - Type of accounts and guess what I found?
---
News Trading With limitations. Placing, modifying or deleting pending Buy Stop and Sell Stop orders (including opposite Stop orders) is not permitted during the Freeze Time immediately before a news release.
---
Nice one.
But it wasn't there in the first place when I started to trade the news this way.
It wasn't even there when I was in dispute with your support/financial dept.

I understand you don't like it. You have all your rights to not like it.
But I find it highly unacceptable the way you handled it.
If I read it in the first place, I would not do it. Mouses are small but not mad.
So why did you try to punish me?

 

[Teodor Jackson]

Ok, Mr Sergeant,

I'm going to give you more details while I'm worried about the Cat reading it :-|
I hope it won't vaporize from this forum if I suddenly come across some "trading difficulties"...
I do it only because I believe it's in open so I have lots of witnesses. The first one is my screenshot

So you suspect I'm a kind undercover enemy playing some game against whoever you think I may target (who actually?)

In fact I'm just a retailer who had very unpleasant encounter with FX Open.
And then I read his representative love story here... Pages long.

Aha, I previously managed to get out of Liu's madness. Most of the 18 messages you found come from that thread. Am I right?
Again competitor? I was there, I lost real money there... one of 1000 rookies there... again have witnesses.

Since you regard FxFrench so friendly and helpful, maybe our friendly Tom could explain little Jerry what does it mean:
----------------
Dear Client,

You used prohibited strategy for standard trading account(...) We recommend you open ECN account if you want to use STOP SELL/BUY strategy further.

Please see our rules -

Scalping
With limitations. ( 1) Stop Loss, Take Profit and Pending Orders 10 pips or more away from the current price; 2) Most of the trades must be open for more than 1 minute)

http://www.fxopen.com/TradingTerms.aspx

The prohibited strategy is:

1. Set up two STOP BUY/SELL orders in the same currency pair simultaneously with short TP and SL levels just before significant news on the market
2. Cancellation one of them just right now after one of orders is activated

FXOpen Team
----------------

Can you please explain me how did I violate the rules?
Again:
----------------
Please see our rules -

Scalping
With limitations. ( 1) Stop Loss, Take Profit and Pending Orders 10 pips or more away from the current price; 2) Most of the trades must be open for more than 1 minute)
----------------

The scalping rules DON'T apply to the news spike trading I performed! More bellow.

Then you say:
----------------
The prohibited strategy is:

1. Set up two STOP BUY/SELL orders in the same currency pair simultaneously with short TP and SL levels just before significant news on the market
2. Cancellation one of them just right now after one of orders is activated
----------------

BUT THERE WAS NOTHING ABOUT IT IN YOUR RULES BY THE TIME I DID IT!
That is November the 7th 2010 trough December the 7th 2010.
Not ANY word about any prohibited strategy.

But now, surprise, surprise, I read on http://www.fxopen.com/TradingTerms.aspx
---
News Trading
With limitations. Placing, modifying or deleting pending Buy Stop and Sell Stop orders (including opposite Stop orders) is not permitted during the Freeze Time immediately before a news release.
---
It wasn't there in the first place when I started to trade the news this way... Gap filling?
Look - I'm such a stupid rookie I didn't even think to save the original rules... Little I knew you change the rules while in game without any warning.
Oh yes, you warned me - by MT4 message sent to my terminal trading it automatically on VPS.
Somewhat you couldn't find a way to my regular mailbox while I get your daily reports without any problem...
Years ago I worked for some bank here. I know how to "send a message" to customers while making sure most of them won't read it.

BTW: what exactly do you mean by "Freeze Time"? Where can I find the "Freeze Time" definition?

The scalping limitations violation claim was just a smokescreen - my EA records everything in great detail. Debugging stuff is about 1/3 of its code.
Over 63% of my limit orders (partially resulting in open trades) were longer than 1 minute. 72% of real trades were longer than 1 minute.
Actually much longer - average time 29 min/trade.
They were set 15 pips from the market - no 10 pips rule violation.
But you accused me for scalping rules violation! This was the formal accusation.

My account was blocked and I had to work hard to get my money back.
Mind you I was just testing my EA in live trading - I was trading $99 micro account. My max. win was just $5.46!

Mr. Sergeant - I must admit here they allowed me to withdraw my money and the little profit I managed. I had to work my way but they finally did it.
Would dishonest competitor admit it?

The only thing coming to my mind is FX Open found it... too profitable and thus dangerous for the broker.
Indeed, it won over 68% of trades

Mr. Sergeant, it is the FPA that made me into the news spikes trading.
Wasn't it Felix who insisted on commitment to the news trading? The Diamonds room, blah, blah, blah?
Isn't it FPA providing news releases trading recipes?
You only "forgot" to tell me I need special tools for this.
After a year or so I figured it out and subsequently developed some tool.
No more than just a prototype as a matter of fact. And nothing really new.
The straddle strategy is long years old. I just modified it a bit.

And when a rookie with some programming skills forged it into EA, he found himself being treated like a thief by a broker who had NOT forbid it in his trading rules?
Yup, Mr Cat - I read the rules before I started my little test. I checked it against demo account and found it didn't violate the scalping rules before going for live.
The news trading limitation wasn't there. If it was, why would I do it? I'm not suicidal.

And please tell me just one more thing, very curious about this one:
Why does your feed clock float? Sometimes up to 11 seconds off sync?
It's neither always late, neither always early - the sync goes back and forth almost every second.
I know no any other feed behaving this way.

Is it just poor server time synchronization or is it to derail timed trading?
I'm talking about live account, fixed spread feed. On demo is much worse.

BTW: Did I mention demo and live quotes are not the same?
Again I'm talking about fixed spread accounts only...
You cannot reliably practice on demo.
And of course there is NEVER any order fill slippage on demo...

There is just one positive thing in this story - you confirmed my EA is successful ;-)
This greatly shortened my forward test
And please don't play tricks to make me doing it on your ECN account - it doesn't work on demo, why would I expect it to work on live?
I'm not THAT stupid.

 

[fxfrench]

I already expressed myself - I don't like the way he promotes the broker.
And I don't believe in any broker-customer friendship.
FX business is very particular - brokers are active market players.
There is no way they could do it without playing against customers.
Even the most honest broker is forced to do it.

If you would like more transparency, you can always try one of our ECN accounts. No dealing desk means you have nobody in between you and the market at large.

Can you please explain me how did I violate the rules?

Rules against scalping on market maker accounts are covered in the customer agreement. If the dealer has issue with the trading style you are using in a market maker type account, he does have the right to freeze your account and request that you move to an ECN account or close the account and trade elsewhere if your trading damages the dealing desk position in any way.

The only thing coming to my mind is FX Open found it... too profitable and thus dangerous for the broker.
Indeed, it won over 68% of trades

At least FXOpen is honest enough to acknowledge that and ask you to move to move to an ECN account. Your EA obviously works in a way that is damaging to or takes advantages of flaws in the market maker model and the company has the right to protect it's dealing desk.

And please tell me just one more thing, very curious about this one:
Why does your feed clock float? Sometimes up to 11 seconds off sync?
It's neither always late, neither always early - the sync goes back and forth almost every second.
I know no any other feed behaving this way.

Your feed is very much affected by your connection to the trading servers. If your connection is unsatisfactory you may try other servers or datacentre feeds to get a better ping.

BTW: Did I mention demo and live quotes are not the same?
Again I'm talking about fixed spread accounts only...
You cannot reliably practice on demo.
And of course there is NEVER any order fill slippage on demo...

Demo and live are two different things entirely. Demo trading is based purely on a price feed only. Real market conditions such as liquidity or other factors are not taken into account so of course demo and live are different.

And please don't play tricks to make me doing it on your ECN account - it doesn't work on demo, why would I expect it to work on live?
I'm not THAT stupid.

Why doesn't your EA work on ECN? If your EA causes problems with our Market Maker accounts, you will have the same problem at any other market maker you trade with.

We at least give you the option to continue on our ECN system without limitation. Why not give it a try?

 

[RahmanSL]

Teodor, you started off here with: “Can anyone explain me what is going on here? Is it forum about FxOpen or is it FxOpen forum? Or marketing channel?”
I came up with a reply which you obviously don’t like. Well, it’s just a reply to your question and you have absolutely no obligation to accept the reply, and there is absolutely no need to launch a personal attack against me either!

You seem to have issues with FxOpen and I suggest you file a formal complaint in here at the FPA giving full details of your discontent and grouses against them.

Which world do I live in??? My world is in the highly competitive and challenging oil & gas construction and forex is not that different.

I have 3 accounts with FxOpen and I have lost money (over usd3k) in all of them, not due to their fault, but entirely due to my impatience and greediness in my trading style. I am not crying about the lost money either as it is entirely my own fault.

If I have cause to complaint against FxOpen in the future, I will most certainly do it here at the FPA.
But to date, and as far as I am concern, FxOpen has been tested as an “Ok” broker by me and my IB Fxfrench has been most helpful in dealing with my initial teething problems with FxOpen. All “promised/advertised” bonuses and rebates have been paid into my accounts.

As I have said, if you have legitimate complaint(s) against FxOpen, please file a formal one in the FPA which will surely be of interest to all FPA members.

 

[Teodor Jackson]

there is absolutely no need to launch a personal attack against me either!

I'm sorry RahmanSL, it wasn't my intention to attack you personally. If I did, I apologize. But it's also not nice to suggest I play dirty games undercover.

You seem to have issues with FxOpen and I suggest you file a formal complaint in here at the FPA giving full details of your discontent and grouses against them.

See the FxFrench reply.
Neat and clean. Nicely goes around some parts. Nothing to complain from the formal point of view.
How can I cope with it? Who cares about some humiliation?

I took my lesson, I'm not going to go trough it again.

I have 3 accounts with FxOpen and I have lost money (over usd3k) in all of them, not due to their fault, but entirely due to my impatience and greediness in my trading style. I am not crying about the lost money either as it is entirely my own fault.

I would be happy to hear you won $3k and had no withdrawal issues. I had some with just $106 - had to ASK them to process it. Well, eventually they did it. Again no formal point to complain.

But to date, and as far as I am concern, FxOpen has been tested as an “Ok” broker by me and my IB Fxfrench has been most helpful in dealing with my initial teething problems with FxOpen. All “promised/advertised” bonuses and rebates have been paid into my accounts.

Good to hear that.
I have another account there. I trade it differently. I don't care about bonuses or else - I don't need it. I only care about my money. If he's OK I expect I won't have any issues to collect my profit. Just press the Withdraw button, fill the fields and done. No any extra action needed.
Am I right here?

 

[Teodor Jackson]

If the dealer has issue with the trading style you are using in a market maker type account, he does have the right to freeze your account and request that you move to an ECN account or close the account and trade elsewhere if your trading damages the dealing desk position in any way.

I'm not about it.
What I am about is: this wasn't prohibited when I did it. I didn't know I do any damage to your business. So while I respect your rights to protect yourself, I don't like the way you did it. It was just enough to ask me to stop it. No point to call me for rules violation and have me to beg you to release my money. I already explained it.

Why doesn't your EA work on ECN?

That's the point! I would rather ask you: why?
It works in tester but not realtime. I know, the tester is not reliable.
But it confirms the code functionality.
I modified the EA to enter at market instead of stops. But the orders don't get filled. Why? I take your Ask or Bid, add slippage...

If your EA causes problems with our Market Maker accounts, you will have the same problem at any other market maker you trade with.

Thanks for the tip.

 

[RahmanSL]

Ok Teodor, we have no beef here against each other; right? : )

Like I said, if you really have issues with FxOpen, you should file a formal complaint here at the FPA as members (especially I in particular) would be most interest to know.

I didn't say you were "playing dirty games under cover", but rather I wonder why you don’t like Broker’s IB getting along well with their client. And that (the reason why you don’t like it) is why I can only think that you are from an IB from a rival Broker to FxOpen.
I really do get along well with Fxfrench as he has been most helpful to me not only as an IB but in other matters concerning forex trading in general.
At the on start of your post, you should have stated the reasons for your dissatisfaction with FxOpen/Fxfrench instead of posting the way you did.

I don’t use EA or any other trader’s aid as I carry out all my trades manually. Quite possibly this is why I do not have any issues not only with FxOpen but with my other two Brokers too.
Like I have posted, I was up in profits which is beyond expectation, but my own greed and impatience always do me in. So, I have nobody but myself to blame for my losses. Like what’s stated in my byline: “Making money is easy, but keeping it is not!” That holds a lot of truths of my character.

Anywhere, like I have repeated many times, if you do have a problem or problems with FxOpen, please make an official complaint here at the FPA as we all would be most interested to know too.

As for Henry Liu’s “10k to 1mm” thread, I have posted some of my own views and comments and, for now, shall leave them at that as it’s no shirt off my back. But I would be most interested to see the final outcome before I add anymore comment on what have been posted so far.

 

[Teodor Jackson]

But still there is something I don't get Mr FxFrench:

You provide quotes, you accept orders based on your quotes and then you say these orders are prohibited or illegal or else.

Few days after my account was blocked (and after some discussion with support) I got another message (this is the most important part of it):

"We provide our clients with a fixed spread that is subject to spikes (fast market price movement up and down) during market conditions prior to significant news releases or international events with economic consequences. These spikes are based on our feed providers widening their spreads during these certain market conditions. Stop orders that are placed right before such news releases or events can be triggered by the price movement caused by the widening of spreads. In an effort to minimize client problems as a result of these spikes, all accounts using the strategy of placing Buy Stop and Sell Stop pending orders just before significant releases, with prices that are very close to the current market price, will be blocked".

If you have tech issues with your providers why won't you fix it?
Why won't you simply stop accepting orders in such conditions?
Why do you put the blame on customers?

If I lose due to my faults I don't blame any broker...
If my SL was triggered by just a pip or two I don't start shouting: "this is illegal broker activity to push prices to trigger my stop".
I simply correct my trading methods to avoid it happening in future.
But you take actions against your customers...

The last sentence in the extract, the one starting with "In an effort to..." - you know how does it sound?

 

[Teodor Jackson]

Ok Teodor, we have no beef here against each other; right? : )

Not at all Again sorry if I was too fast to write few words here or there.

Like I said, if you really have issues with FxOpen, you should file a formal complaint here at the FPA as members (especially I in particular) would be most interest to know.

Well, I said - no formal point. Unless I come across one. However I would rather like to have no any reasons to do anything like this.

I wonder why you don’t like Broker’s IB getting along well with their client.

I didn't say that. I said I don't like the way he occupies the forum. Pages long. Lots of promo stuff. This is what I don't like. Conversely I do like he assists FX Open customers here.

As for Henry Liu’s “10k to 1mm” thread, I have posted some of my own views and comments and, for now, shall leave them at that as it’s no shirt off my back. But I would be most interested to see the final outcome before I add anymore comment on what have been posted so far.

Well, that's another story - however interesting one. I come to that thread from time to time

 

[RahmanSL]

I think I know what you mean by Fxfrench hogging the forum : ) …But have you read postings by other Brokers' IBs at the FPA?? Some of them makes my skin crawls as I know their company stinks, but I refrained from posting there.

I think we cannot fault Fxfrench or any IB as they need wiide exposures to attract new clients under their IBship. I don’t begrudge Fxfrench or other Brokers’ IBs from advertising their services as…hey…they need to eat too; right!...and also, I can understand the pips difference offered by Brokers as they too need to make a living.
As long as Brokers are reasonably honest (if there really is any at all!) and their IB provide good services when required, well, I guess I can’t complaint.

But I still get pissed off whenever I read some IBs from some obvious bucketshop Broker trying to prop-up their two-bits company and also being rude as hell to their clients.
I have my fair share of “battles” with some of these obnoxious IBs and now I tend to refrain from jumping into their battles too freely.

As you know, daily we read from traders posting they have been scammed by so-and-so Broker and it’s getting to become the same old story…i.e signing up with a two-bits Broker without having first checking them out at forums.

We all are supposed to learn from mistakes made either by ourselves or by others, but very unfortunately, most of us don’t and even tend to repeat the same old mistake(s)...Humans!

Ok Teodore, all the best in your trading and try not to rush into too many battles; yah! : ) …..not long now to start of market trading time and we will need the energy and wits about us for a slice of that usd3 trillion pie; right? : )

Cheers!