I’m looking for an explanation about the difference between trading Sp500 on spot and futures it’s been a week and I couldn’t find any conclusive answer, including on our forum.
I started using MT5 on my broker, FxPro, and I just discovered this new category called futures.
At first, I saw that quotations are a bit different and that I’m trading a CFD contract that will expire let’s say in March. So I decided to leave one of my trades on MT5 to see better and it’s a LOT different.
First, am I dreaming or there’s no swap? I opened it on the march 5 and swap = 0.
Secondly and most importantly, why the profit is very twisted?
Shouldn’t the profit be 12168 - 11429 = 739. So why I’m having just 184,75 (my account is in euros)?
Spot and futures have different pricing, usually futures lagging behind spot.
In terms of spread, that depends on the broker, not all brokers will give you no spread on all indices, so there is no one answer.
Pricing in stocks works differently than in forex,.for example stocks move in quarters.of a point, whereas spot (e.g. fx) moves in 100th of a point, so you need to maybe take that into account: 739 ÷4 = 184.
I am not sure if this was helpful, maybe others can go into a lot of detail…
That’s interesting. And i bet that all the market feels like that, that’s why the reversals may be very strong at first.
I prefer to work with levels, and that’s why forex is a never ending trading machine, since there’ll always be something going on somewhere.
I have this feeling with equities going up. Since we 've never been there, I have a very strong short bias. As if coming back to known levels were easier. Market vertigo maybe…
Not true those last years, until now. That’s why I shifted to macro trading for now, until things calm down a bit.
Is it easy to use futures volume data? That would be great and I have no idea how to use XD.
I agree, we have never been there… In 2015 I developed a short bias on the FTSE100 based on seven-year cycles, saying that the 2014 - 2015 deadline was not being respected, but I was wrong and at least from 2016 on there was no sign of a reversal… or a significant correction. I have not really looked at it since because it feels like picking tops and bottoms.
Futures volume is easy, just go to CME and try something like this:
Choose the contract that is closest in date to you (e.g. the March one before the 21st (that is when it expires); if after, then look at the June one) and click on ‘Charts’: under the chart candles/bars/line (you choose) there are the volume bars, colour-coded (Green/Red). Easy as that. This is not like the (frankly useless) de-centralised spot-fx volume data, because it actually applies to fx futures from one of the world leader in futures. So it is not accounting for the whole world’s influence on spot fx but if large buying volume shows up on a CME Eur/Usd futures chart and Eur/Usd is going up quickly then you can at least be reassured that it is not a completely false move (at least if you look at mid-to-long time frames, e.g. 1+ hours up to daily).
You can also try something like this:
It shows the volume-at-price going up by fifty-pip levels for EurUsd
with a colour/shade-coded map of options (calls=buy/ puts=sell) for each
price level, so that you get a sense of where strong option buy/sell contracts
are sitting.
Bear in mind that futures price and spot price are slightly different, with futures lagging behind by a few pips (how much can vary, e.g. at the moment only 10 pips for EurUsd but sometimes it can be 20, 30 or more, but still close enough), so options will vary too, but that heatmap is handy.
Still, it is no guarantee of a pip-by-pip move in the direction of your trade, or of levels not being broken, but it adds to the probability of knowing how likely certain levels are to hold or be broken…
These days have been very crazy. Stock markets, COVID, that f%¨%$% rally on Friday after Trump pumped the market:joy:, starting to work at home and getting ready for the impact here in Europe.
Thank you very much for all this material. This opened many doors for me since so far I didn’t know that I could have some kind of volume on forex apart COT weekly reports.
This is amazing, we have the options, data that I can download and other things, really thanks.
By the way, the chart is from trading view. Is the volume tool that they use coming from CME as well?
Sorry for the noob question, but this shows all the volume traded in futures, or just the volume inside CME group?
In your experience, how do you use futures volume in your trades? I know this is a very open questions, but I’d love to hear from experience.
Finally, I would love to have a chart like the ones that Linda Raschke posts sometimes. This one comes from a platform called photon.
@Piplogos Hello, no worry, I hope you are safe and.coping with.the isolation.
The picture.you posted is of an.indicator that is avialable under.various.names.under both.NinjaTrader.and.Tradingview (paid.subscription), i.e. volume at.price, which shows concentration.of.orders.at.a.particular price level.
You.can read a lot more about this on.this.volume.thread:
Volume.can be used in.context,.i.e. a daily.move in forex shows a huge.candle but if volume.in CME futures is.very.small relative.to.previous.volume.then it is likely to be a false.move… a trap…Or, a.lot.of.volume with a huge.candle.is.confirmation.of a strong move.
CME has a huge chunk.of world.futures.but.I am not saying it has all futures, however it is a good.proxy.for fx.sentiment if you trade spot fx,.depending on.your time frames.of.course.
Tradingview.has CME charts.so.the.volume.should be the same but you.can put the CME chart and the Tradingview.version side by.side.and see.if (with the same.time.frames) they match…
I took so long because I expected to read the entire discussion, but as this is going to longer ( each link in the chain takes to 3 more, and so on…), I wanted to come and say three things.
First thanks for the solidarity of sharing knowledge with us rookies.
Secondly, do you know any free provider of this data? Ninja trader, trading view and others do not seem to give volume freely.
Finally, I had an idea during a shower.
A public forum is an amazing idea, a way to make public discussions and the transmission of experience. But it comes with a cost : dispersion.
Although the interested researcher will go deeper and deeper, things may be lost with the lack of synthesis. I’m not proposing that we write books here, but if, as a first step, we organized old and excellent topic by themes, so that if someone is searching for something in particular, he would have a list of topics to read. Like an index of chapters of this book called babypips forum.
Imagine having an index of the classic discussions about for example 1. trend-following systems 2. Volume in forex, etc.
Finally, the research tool is not enough, since there are so many things and I would really like to see what the members, as curators, have selected as being the best topics about a theme.
Thanks for the mention @PipMeHappy I haven’t popped on here in ages. I out grew the forums. Still fun to pop on here.
You can use a basic Market profile tool on Sierra charts for both composite and VAP. Better yet you can just get a ladder, the VAP is on the ladder. I prefer to just have market profile on these days. Pretty much can trade anything, FTSE, ES, GBP, etc. Hope this helps.
, starting to work at home and getting ready for the impact here in Europe.