I'm brand new to Ninja Trader DEMO so maybe I'm missing some features but incase I'm not here's my opinion of what's missing from Ninja Trader software.
Please keep in mind that I am a somewhat experienced day trader.
What seems to be missing from Ninja Trader :
User definable smart hot keys and hot buttons.
Entering position size/orders on Ninja Trader reminds me of 1980's software...
Advanced day traders often use user definable 'dynamic' hot keys or hot buttons.
I don't even see any hot buttons at all and the hot keys don't seem to be smart programmable hot keys.
Not having those are a HUGE disadvantage to day trading and makes placing orders and adjusting position sizes horribly inefficient and it takes much longer than it should.
Lost time often means lost money in day trading.
Some examples:
Let's say you see a prime A+ setup and you want to instantly take a big position, say with 70% of your account size.
Pro day traders will have a hot key or hot button that does that so with one key press or one click on the hot button and you take your large position.
The % of your account is user definable so you could also set this to take a 2% position. The point here is speed and ease of order entry with a user definable size.
Exiting is much the same.
Let's say you're in profit and now you want to lock in your gains / n% of your position while letting the rest run.
Pro day traders have a hot key / hot button to do this.
They don't have to manually type in the share size or contract size they want to close.
They don't have to do the math then enter the order.
They don't have to select a menu of predefined sizes...
They simply push a hot key or hot button that's already programmed to do the math and close the n% of the position.
They have multiple hot keys defined for different % sizes for different purposes.
To me Ninja Trader's lack of real hot keys (am I missing something?) and lack of hot buttons is horrible design.
I am constantly having to adjust my size with the horrible position size order qty on the right of the chart.
It reminds me of 1980's type software to be honest.
I'm having a hard time believing the Ninja Trader developers didn't make user defined programmable hot keys or hot buttons.
Really?
And you guys want $1,100 for this software?
Why?
I suggest you guys use DAS software for awhile so you understand better day trading software.
Even lowly TOS has user definable hot buttons by share, contract or lot size.
They don't let you pre-program the math or by %, but any hot buttons are even better than what Ninja Trader has.
Btw, DAS has been working with AMTD and DAS is making an AMTD compatible version soon.
They've already been working on it. So unless DAS scraps the project pretty soon AMTD traders will be able to use DAS software for their orders.
I'd imagine there's going to be software fees but I'm guessing.
I see something that looks like a calculator which is a terrible way to enter position size.
So slow and awkward and since Ninja Trader isn't really 4k compatible it's also TINY to see.
If I want to make a trade:
Understand speed is critical to day trading success.
I first have to move my mouse over it. I could be drawing something on screen or have my mouse on any of multiple monitors so this could take some time.
Then I have to click the tiny calculator and it then pops up and displays some preset sizes.
Next if I want to choose one of those preset sizes I can click it and it then fills the qty field with the selected size.
Yipeee!!!
We're getting closer to actually placing an order.
Of course by now price has already jumped around quite a bit and may have even screwed up the trade... Certainly the entry is blown.
Still no order placed... just qty of size selected.
Most often I have to then adjust my position size again...
As price moves it changes my desired position size and thinking.
Then. Now. Finally... I need to click a hot button to buy/sell ask/bid/whatever.
OR even worse:
I have to move the mouse over the position size text field,
click in there,
then type the number of contracts I want to trade...
Not only does this take a lot of time but I may not instantly know how many contracts I want to trade. Meaning if I've scaled into a position and now I have say 57 contracts and I know I want to sell 80% of them to lock in gains then let the rest run, I now have to do math in my head before I even get to submitting the order.
Calculate in your head 80% of 57.
See how long that takes?
Far to slow.
Honestly if I were trading small cap stocks I'd of missed the entry/exit.
The process takes way to long.
I'm shocked this software is in it's 8th major iteration and the developers haven't figured this out yet?
They must not be day traders.
No way.
$1,100 for software that doesn't work as well as other choices, even free software in some cases.
Guys I'll buy a lifetime license if you want to be more reasonable about the price, like $200 or $250.
Other than that maybe I'll just use the free version or just use another broker.
Send me a DM.
Thanks.
Please keep in mind that I am a somewhat experienced day trader.
What seems to be missing from Ninja Trader :
User definable smart hot keys and hot buttons.
Entering position size/orders on Ninja Trader reminds me of 1980's software...
Advanced day traders often use user definable 'dynamic' hot keys or hot buttons.
I don't even see any hot buttons at all and the hot keys don't seem to be smart programmable hot keys.
Not having those are a HUGE disadvantage to day trading and makes placing orders and adjusting position sizes horribly inefficient and it takes much longer than it should.
Lost time often means lost money in day trading.
Some examples:
Let's say you see a prime A+ setup and you want to instantly take a big position, say with 70% of your account size.
Pro day traders will have a hot key or hot button that does that so with one key press or one click on the hot button and you take your large position.
The % of your account is user definable so you could also set this to take a 2% position. The point here is speed and ease of order entry with a user definable size.
Exiting is much the same.
Let's say you're in profit and now you want to lock in your gains / n% of your position while letting the rest run.
Pro day traders have a hot key / hot button to do this.
They don't have to manually type in the share size or contract size they want to close.
They don't have to do the math then enter the order.
They don't have to select a menu of predefined sizes...
They simply push a hot key or hot button that's already programmed to do the math and close the n% of the position.
They have multiple hot keys defined for different % sizes for different purposes.
To me Ninja Trader's lack of real hot keys (am I missing something?) and lack of hot buttons is horrible design.
I am constantly having to adjust my size with the horrible position size order qty on the right of the chart.
It reminds me of 1980's type software to be honest.
I'm having a hard time believing the Ninja Trader developers didn't make user defined programmable hot keys or hot buttons.
Really?
And you guys want $1,100 for this software?
Why?
I suggest you guys use DAS software for awhile so you understand better day trading software.
Even lowly TOS has user definable hot buttons by share, contract or lot size.
They don't let you pre-program the math or by %, but any hot buttons are even better than what Ninja Trader has.
Btw, DAS has been working with AMTD and DAS is making an AMTD compatible version soon.
They've already been working on it. So unless DAS scraps the project pretty soon AMTD traders will be able to use DAS software for their orders.
I'd imagine there's going to be software fees but I'm guessing.
I see something that looks like a calculator which is a terrible way to enter position size.
So slow and awkward and since Ninja Trader isn't really 4k compatible it's also TINY to see.
If I want to make a trade:
Understand speed is critical to day trading success.
I first have to move my mouse over it. I could be drawing something on screen or have my mouse on any of multiple monitors so this could take some time.
Then I have to click the tiny calculator and it then pops up and displays some preset sizes.
Next if I want to choose one of those preset sizes I can click it and it then fills the qty field with the selected size.
Yipeee!!!
We're getting closer to actually placing an order.
Of course by now price has already jumped around quite a bit and may have even screwed up the trade... Certainly the entry is blown.
Still no order placed... just qty of size selected.
Most often I have to then adjust my position size again...
As price moves it changes my desired position size and thinking.
Then. Now. Finally... I need to click a hot button to buy/sell ask/bid/whatever.
OR even worse:
I have to move the mouse over the position size text field,
click in there,
then type the number of contracts I want to trade...
Not only does this take a lot of time but I may not instantly know how many contracts I want to trade. Meaning if I've scaled into a position and now I have say 57 contracts and I know I want to sell 80% of them to lock in gains then let the rest run, I now have to do math in my head before I even get to submitting the order.
Calculate in your head 80% of 57.
See how long that takes?
Far to slow.
Honestly if I were trading small cap stocks I'd of missed the entry/exit.
The process takes way to long.
I'm shocked this software is in it's 8th major iteration and the developers haven't figured this out yet?
They must not be day traders.
No way.
$1,100 for software that doesn't work as well as other choices, even free software in some cases.
Guys I'll buy a lifetime license if you want to be more reasonable about the price, like $200 or $250.
Other than that maybe I'll just use the free version or just use another broker.
Send me a DM.
Thanks.
Happy New Year!
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