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INTRODUCTION: The Futures Industry has evolved at a remarkable speed over the past decade and a half, thanks to the telecommunications boom of the nineties. During the mid-nineties, futures exchanges worldwide began introducing electronic trading. Electronic trading took the industry by storm. At present, electronic trading is the norm. For many futures traders, it is hard to remember a time when a fill confirmation was not instant. With electronic trading comes several major advantages: streaming quotes directly from the exchanges, market depth, and onboard order execution with advanced exit strategies.

There is an abundance of different electronic trading platforms out there today; each platform offers a different combination of features and functions. Most traders look for speed and an order execution feature with depth of market, but there are many other interesting and useful tools available. With all of the options for electronic trading platforms, it is easy to become overwhelmed: X_TRADER®, J-trader, Global Strategy Trader, Strategy Runner, IQ-trader, CQG, RAN Edge and Turbo Trader, to name a few. Choosing the right platform is one of the most important decisions that a futures trader has to make. In this article, I will be introducing you to three platforms that I highly recommend: Global Strategy Trader, X_TRADER® and Turbo Trader. I will be comparing and contrasting the three platforms and discussing the top features of each platform.

GST (GLOBAL STRATEGY TRADER): GST does more than allow traders to just place trades electronically with single click order entry, it also provides them with useful and user friendly tools to help them understand market trends and manage trades within the market. If you are interested in Automated Trading: Global Strategy Trader features auto-execution of trading systems. GST’s main features include: integrated charts with off the chart ordering, high speed, bracketing, and Trading Pad (order execution feature with market depth).

CHARTS: GST features up to the minute integrated charts as well as historical charts (data going back as far as 5 years) for multiple markets. Included with GST’s charting are 40+ technical indicators, including: MACD, Bollinger Bands, RSI and more. These indicators provide traders a deeper understanding of how the market is trending at any given moment. A very powerful NEW feature on GST charts is "off the chart" order entry. Traders can simply click on the exact location of the chart where they want to place their trades, so that they can visually see their trades. "Off the Chart" order entry is a very new feature and is only offered on a limited number of platforms. Charting tools are crucial for understanding how the market is moving.

SPEED: GST TT (Trading Technology) offers extremely high speed execution. GST TT is a newly developed version of GST that has just gone live in the past year. X_TRADER® is one of the fastest futures trading platforms in the world, and GST connects to the infrastructure of X_TRADER®. As a result, GST is able to offer the same consistently fast and reliable execution speed as traders receive from X_TRADER®, a product that has been used by fund managers, floor traders, and volume traders for years because of its speed.

If you cannot view the Global Strategy Runner screenshot, go here.

BRACKETING: The GST platform offers multiple features for bracketing: a popular exit style. The screen shot above displays an OCO (One-Cancels-Other), a tool that eliminates a common trading problem with bracketing, where a trader is not fast enough or forgets to cancel the other side of his bracket after exiting the position, therefore accidentally re-entering the market. Many traders are familiar with the terrible feeling of waking up and checking their daily statement only to realize that they are upside down on a position. An OCO ensures that as soon as one side of a bracket is filled, the other side of the bracket is cancelled. All exit styles within GST are automatically integrated with the OCO function. In addition to the OCO, GST offers several additional bracketing tools, including trailing stops and scale outs. A scale out is bracketing on multiple targets. A trailing stop moves the stop end of a bracket when the market is moving in the traders favor, thus helping the trader lock in profit. The trailing stop feature has been enabled in the screenshot above (see insert at bottom left corner). GST allows users to utilize the above bracketing tools individually or in combination.

TRADING PAD: GST’s Trading Pad is a complex order execution feature that provides up to the second DOM (Depth of Market) and single click order entry. The trading pad also provides hot keys for "trade out" and "reversal" functions. The trading pad is a dynamic DOM with simple drag and drop order modifications with accumulative P&L and open P&L parameters; this allows minimal time to move a stop to breakeven (example: when you are manually managing a trailing stop).

X_TRADER®: For professional, high volume traders, there’s no better platform to use than Trading Technologies’ X_TRADER®. X_TRADER® sets the standard for trading screen performance. Loaded with advanced trading strategy support, extreme reliability and the power to trade reflex-fast, X_TRADER® is the front-end of choice for professional derivatives traders, brokers, and market makers the world over. X_TRADER® features include: high speed and Market Depth Trader (order execution feature with depth of market).

SPEED: The most desirable feature of X_TRADER® is undoubtedly its speed. X_TRADER® is one of the fastest trading platforms out there. While most platforms must connect to another infrastructure, which connects them to the exchange, X_TRADER® has direct gates to the exchange. This translates to order execution occurring in less than a second on X_TRADER®.

GST TT is one of very few trading platforms available that has been able to utilize the same infrastructure as X_TRADER®, promising top speed to its clients.

MARKET DEPTH TRADER (with STATIC DOM): The MD (Market Depth) trader is a static DOM that provides single click order entry, with drag and drop order modification. While GST’s Trading pad is a dynamic order execution feature, MD Trader is static . MD Trader is visually similar to the Global Strategy Trader with the price ladder down the middle, and hot keys and key calculator to the left. The windows are all customizable to fit your screen to your convenience. MD Trader allows you to track historical transactions intra-day on the exchange, when you enable "Times and Sales." MD trader allows you track all of your own current transactions through its "Audit trail." Below is a screenshot of a basic layout I have created with MD Trader (Market Depth Trader), demonstrating the order book window, fill window and also Audit Trail.

If you cannot view the X_Trader® screenshot, go here.

 GS Trader vs. X_TRADER®:

TURBO TRADER: Turbo Trader is a new front-end application that has been made available exclusively to customers of Global Futures. This platform is very simple to install and it offers a complete flash tutorial with voice instructions. The Turbo Trader platform offers the most popular platform features, ease of use and great overall performance! Turbo Trader’s features include: integrated statements, high speed and ABV (order execution feature with depth of market).

INTEGRATED STATEMENTS: Turbo Trader allows traders to view updated daily transaction statements within the platform, through the use of state of the art software, GMI. With most platforms, traders must log onto an outside website or wait for emails from the firm to view their daily statement. With Turbo Trader, the transactions are updated onto an online inquiry that is viewable within the platform itself. At end of the day you have access to prelims, daily statements, account balance, positions, transactions, orders, and fills. This is a great way of book keeping for each day’s trading session.

SPEED: Like X_TRADER®, Turbo Trader connects to its own infrastructure, providing extremely high speed trading. By avoiding the need for an outside infrastructure to connect to before executing orders, Turbo Trader can promise faster trade execution time than most other electronic platforms.

ASK-BID-VOLUME (ABV): The ABV window is a dynamic DOM that provides depth of market and single click order entry with drag and drop order modifications. The ABV window provides valuable hot keys, such as "Flatten", "Buy and Sell Market" and "Cancel all bids and offers." "Open P&L", net position, and working orders are visible directly on the ABV window. The ABV window also provides access to bracketing OCO capabilities with trailing stop and breakeven position management functions. A unique feature of Turbo Trader’s ABV is the "Thermometer:" this allows you to view the market movement in ticks from the time you have logged in. The screenshot below displays the thermometer feature in red blocks on the ask side.

If you cannot view the Turbo Trader screenshot, go here.

GS Trader vs. X_TRADER® vs. Turbo Trader: