Connection and Offerings and Reliability Realities of NinjaTrader Brokers

[bce111]

I just wanted to start a new thread here to have a discussion and share information about the various brokers (with accompanying data feeds) that offer the use of NinjaTrader. I think a lot of us are happy with NinjaTrader software itself. But obviously there have been serious issues in regard to the data feed from some companies lately. Please don't throw this in with the other connection thread as it's too big and has too many unrelated topics thrown together which makes it hard to follow and respond to and have a dialogue around any given topic.

Here is a list of brokers who offer the use of NinjaTrader. http://www.ninjatrader.com/Ecosystem/Broker.php
And there was an even better list in the Help Guide I believe that compared the different features offered by the various brokers in a table. But I couldn't find it. Does anyone know where that it? Thanks.

I'm interested in people sharing their own personal, or relayed by friends, information on different brokers and data feeds.

[bce111]

Someone suggested to me in a private message that, and I won't give their name as it was private, but they said, "Since you lost so many trading opportunities with the ZenFire problems, you might want to consider opening a second account with another Broker using a different data feed. That way, unless there's a problem with an Exchange, you always have an account available." I thought this was really good advice and I had considered this but never got around to it.

So that's partly what this thread is about.

[bce111]

One broker that's been discussed often is AMP Futures with the CQG data feed. And it looks like they also offer Rithmic and TTNET. http://www.ampfutures.com/ But now I'm looking and it looks like Rithmic no longer connects to NinjaTrader.

I read a lot of favorable comments on the AMP CQG combination on BigMike's Trading and some here too. But in another PM someone said, " I would have to move to Amp Futures to use their version of CQG and I know that one has had even more issues than Zenfire.. as a trading friend has it and is with Amp." So that doesn't sound very good. Again this is one comment and many seem to like this combo.

[bce111]

Just a personal comment that I'll throw in here so it gets seen and not buried in the other thread.

Without getting into the exact details, which are personal, I've had some very serious life threatening health issues the last few years with the related financial issues that come with that. And it was a real challenge dealing with this. So being able to trade and generate income is very important to me at this time. That's why I've been so demonstrative in my reactions to what was going on this last week as far as connection problems which created an inability to trade. And this is why it's important for me to find a reliable broker/data feed. Just to give some sense of where I'm coming from.

[walter79]

Hi,

the realtime AMP-CQG data feed works flawless. One of the fastest i have ever used. But AMPs customer support is one of the worst i ever experienced. Most of the time they do not answer to emails.

[bce111]

Hi,

the realtime AMP-CQG data feed works flawless. One of the fastest i have ever used. But AMPs customer support is one of the worst i ever experienced. Most of the time they do not answer to emails.

Thanks, Walter.

[schranzi9]

Why must we trade with mirus future and zenfire and plus Dorman as a clearing firm? When I remember rightly Dorman and RCG offers also ninja Trader+zenfire WITHOUT Mirus, but I am not sure at a moment where are the pros and cons to decide to trade direclty with Dorman without Mirus?
Chris

[steve2222]

Trying AMP demo

I have signed up for the AMP CQG demo.

So I will run both ZF (hopefully) and CQG in parallel.

Or in the worst case , assuming ZF does not get sorted in the next few days, I will move my live account to AMP if CQG runs okay over the next few trading days.

I used to have an account with AMP and they have told me it is still open so all I need to do for Live trading is sign a form to have my funds moved from Mirus to AMP.

I am also going to reach out to Matt at Optimus Trading (they do NT with Rithmic) and see what deal he offers. At face value their margins and commissions are not the lowest. They also do not offer Eurex.

CQG does offer Eurex with AMP (and Singapore and Australia) but I think there is an extra cost for this Eurex data whereas with Mirus/ZF there is not, so gets a bit harder to make cost comparisons.

[steve2222]

@schranzi9

Last time I looked I think you will find Dorman's margins and commissions are much higher than Mirus.

[walter79]

CQG is a superior data feed but you still have the problem with the unreliable historical data which comes from the nt servers. Just do a search in the forum and you will find a lot of examples.

So actually i switched to kinetick and i'm very happy with it. There are no gaps in the historical data and also the support is top. And furthermore you are more flexibel in your broker choice.

[bce111]

CQG is a superior data feed but you still have the problem with the unreliable historical data which comes from the nt servers. Just do a search in the forum and you will find a lot of examples.

So actually i switched to kinetick and i'm very happy with it. There are no gaps in the historical data and also the support is top. And furthermore you are more flexibel in your broker choice.

But Kinetick's order flow I guess still goes through Zen-Fire.

Here's is a quote from Ray yesterday.

If you switch over to Kinetick as your primary source of data then order routing will still use Zen-Fire API. However, the major problem right now is the stability of the connection. I can see already that stability has improved today over yesterday and early this past week. That is independent of the Zen-Fire API.

With respect to CQG, I am not sure I follow your question 100% but I can say that NinjaTrader has integrated a CQG API and the connection provides both market data and trade routing services to NinjaTrader.

[laocoon]

So actually i switched to kinetick and i'm very happy with it. There are no gaps in the historical data and also the support is top. And furthermore you are more flexibel in your broker choice.

This is interesting but who do you trade through?

[bce111]

I was looking through your posts, Walter, and I guess you're with Interactive Brokers (spelled out for those who wouldn't know IB ). I was with them for a number of years, and TWS was okay although I prefer NT, but I didn't like their customer service especially. They seemed a bit arrogant and seemed to cater to the largest accounts. Plus I was just looking at their margins and I knew they are very high. https://www.interactivebrokers.com/e...arginnew&p=fut
The Intraday Initial margin for one TF contract for instance is $2687.50. This is versus $500 at Mirus and I'm not sure what AMP is.

[laocoon]

I've been looking at my options these last few days and it basically boils down to 4 firms:
-AMP
-Global Futures
-Velocity Futures
-Vision

Vision and Velocity don't offer Eurex so that leaves AMP and Global.
Global offers AMP, Open E-Cry as well as RCG which is quite convenient as many traders who are currently with Mirus clear through RCG, so an account transfer could happen very quickly. The Global-RCG combo runs with Pats data feed. This is currently my preferred option.

[steve2222]

The Intraday Initial margin for one TF contract for instance is $2687.50. This is versus $500 at Mirus and I'm not sure what AMP is.

TF margin at AMP is $500.

http://www.ampfutures.com/margins_req.html