Index trading vs forex trading

Why do the Pros Daytrade Futures?

The Powerful Advantages of Trading the E-Mini S&P 500 Futures over Stocks, ETFs and Forex.

Have you ever wondered why many traders prefer futures over equities and/or Forex? If your answer is "yes" and you are interested in daytrading this is definitely an article you should take a minute to read. Make no mistake, there are substantial risks involved with futures daytrading and it is not suitable for all investors, but I feel the following 20 points demonstrate the particular advantages of daytrading the E-mini S&P 500 over trading stocks, Forex and ETFs like the SPDRs and QQQs.

1. Efficient Market.

During normal market hours the Emini S&P 500 (ES) futures have a tight bid-ask spread of typically 1 tick or $12.50 per contract. With a current approximate contract value of about $50,000, that comes out to .025% of the contract value, which is one of the best spreads in the trading world. This spread should be considered your cost of entry (not unlike commissions) to enter and exit the market. The wider the spread, the more the trade has to move in your favor just for you to get to break-even.

Depending on the stock or currency pair you are trading the bid-ask spread may be much wider. Also, since Forex firms "create" the market and therefore, the bid-ask spread, they can widen it to whatever they see fit. Even when Forex firms advertise a fixed spread, they typically reserve the right to widen when they see fit. Typically, this spread is anywhere from $15 to $50+ depending on the currency pair and market conditions.

2. Central Regulated Exchange.

All ES trades are done through the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and its member firms where all trades are recorded in an official time and sales. All trades are made available to the public on a first come, first served basis and trades must follow the CME Clearing rules, along with the strict CFTC and NFA rules.

Forex trades occur "over the counter," (off any exchange floor or computer) where there is no centralized exchange with a time and sales report to compare your fill. Traders with different firms can experience different fills even when trades are executed simultaneously. Even more alarming is that in some cases the Forex brokerage firm you have an account with takes the other side of your trade and is therefore "betting" against you. Even for equity trades many stock brokerage firms direct your trades to brokers that give them a "haircut," rebate or kickback for your order or they go to dark pools or are shown to flash traders before made available to the public. Again, this can become a conflict of interest since your order may not be getting the best possible execution.

3. Low Commissions.

ES commissions are only $1.99 (not including exchange, NFA or data fees) per side and larger traders can even lease a membership to further reduce their fees. This low transaction cost allows daytraders to get in and out of the market without commissions significantly cutting into their profits, but of course the more trading you do the more this will impact your bottom line.

While most Forex firms do not charge a "disclosed" commission, they make their money by creating their own bid/ask spread and taking the other side of your trade, typically costing much more than the transaction costs of the ES. The average discount stock brokerage firm charges $5-10 per trade, which can really eat into your potential daytrading profits.

4. Level II Trading.

You can see the 10 best bids and 10 best asks along with the associated volume in real time and you are allow the placement of your order at any price you wish when trading the ES. This transparency of the market’s orders allows ES traders to see where and how many orders have been placed ahead of them. For short term daytraders this information may be very valuable and may be used as an indication of future market movements.

Most Forex platforms do not offer Level II type pricing and for the few that do, since there is no centralized market, it is only the orders that that firm has access to and not the entire market. Also, most Forex firms do not allow you to place an order within a few ticks of the last price or between their posted bid/ask spreads, further limiting your trading abilities.

5. Virtually 24 Hour Trading.

The ES futures market is open from Sunday night at 5p CST until Friday afternoon at 3:15p (it closes from 3:15p-3:30p and also closes daily from 4:30-5p for maintenance). This allows you to enter, exit or have orders working to protect your positions almost 24 hours a day, even while you sleep.

Even with pre and post market trading, the stock market is open less than 12 hours per day, and the liquidity during these sessions are not always good.

6. All Electronic Trading.

There is no trading pit for the ES which means there are no market makers, no locals and no floor brokers and all orders are matched by a computer on a first come-first served basis no matter how large or small they are. This means that all traders see the same level II market and bid/ask spreads with an equal chance to hit them.

While most Forex firms offer electronic trading, some manually approve each order at a trading desk because they are market makers against your orders. Many times larger traders are given preferential treatment and better bid/ask spreads.

7. Leverage.

Of course more leverage is a double edged sword since higher leverage equates to higher risk, but one Emini S&P contract currently has an approximate value of $65,000 and can be daytraded for as little as $500 which is 1% of its total value (about 100:1 leverage). Even if you hold a position overnight, the current overnight margin is only $5,625 which is still less than 10%.

Not all stocks and ETFs are available to be traded on margin, and the ones that can, require at least 50% margin to do so. US regulated Forex firms are not allowed to offer more than 50:1 leverage on the major currency pairs and 20:1 on the other currencies. This high margin requirement may be very limiting to daytraders who are only looking for small market movements.

8. No Interest Charges.

For futures trading the daytrade and position margins do not require you to pay any interest on the remainder of the funds. The $500 posted for daytraders is a performance bond and traders do not pay interest on the remaining value of the ES futures contract. No special type of futures trading account is required to be able to take advantage of the daytrade margins.

Stock traders typically must apply for a special account in order to be able to daytrade and/or trade on margin and for those who can use the 50% margin, they need to pay interest on the other 50% they are borrowing. Forex has a cost of carry associated with its trading which means interest may be charged or paid on positions taken, but in the end this interest is seen as a revenue stream for Forex brokers and works to their advantage.

9. No Pattern Day Trader Rule.

Futures daytrade accounts can be opened with as little as $3,000 and do not have any Pattern Daytrader Rules associated with them. Of course only risk capital should be used no matter what the amount is that you choose to start with.

The SEC describes a stock trader who executes 4 or more daytrades in 5 business days, provided the number of daytrades are more than six percent of the customer's total trading activity for that same five-day period, as a Pattern Daytrader. As a Pattern Daytrader you are required to have a minimum of $25,000 starting capital and cannot fall below this amount.

10. Liquidity.

The Emini S&P futures trade about an average of 2 million times a day which allows for great price action, volatility and speedy execution. At a current approximate value of $50,000, that is over $100 billion changing hands every trading day.

Not all stocks and Forex markets are as liquid which means movements can be shaky and erratic, making daytrading more difficult. Forex firms like to make the claim that the over the counter foreign exchange market trades more than one trillion Dollars in volume per day, but most people don't realize is that in most cases you just traded against your broker's dealing desk rather than the true interbank market.

11. Tax Advantages.

US Futures traders have favorable tax consequences for short term traders since futures profits are taxed 60/40, which means that 60% of the gain is taxed at the maximum rate of 15% (similar to long-term gains) and the other 40% is taxed at a maximum rate of 35% as ordinary income.

Securities positions held for less than 12 months are considered short term gains and taxed at 35%. Of course everyone’s tax situation is different and should consult a licensed accountant for their specific situation.

12. Diversification.

When trading a stock index like the Emini S&P futures your "news risk" is spread out over the entire market. Should a report or rumor come out on an individual stock it should have very little impact on the whole index you are trading.

When you take a position in an individual stock you are susceptible to stock specific risk which can occur without warning and with violent consequences.

13. Safety of Funds.

When you trade the ES you are trading with a Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) regulated and National Futures Association (NFA) member firm which is subject to the customer segregated funds rules laid out by the US government.

Even with regulated US Forex firms, funds are not considered segregated, so if a regulated firm goes bankrupt clients funds are not offered the same protections as they are in the futures market.

Many ES futures traders only track the ES market and find it is the only chart they need to follow. There are always opportunities and great volume throughout the trading day. When large institutions or traders want to take a position in the market or hedge a portfolio they usually turn to the futures markets to get this done quickly and efficiently. Therefore, why not trade the market the "Big Boys" trade?

Most traders agree that individual stocks and therefore, the market as a whole follow the futures indices, and not the opposite. In fact, many stock traders will have an Emini futures chart up next to the stock they are following. As a stock or Forex trader you may need to scan dozens of stocks or currency pairs for opportunities. Many times specific stocks fall out of favor so volume and, therefore opportunities dry up and traders are forced to find a new stock to trade.

15. Go Short.

There are no rules against going short the ES, traders simply sell short the ES contract in hopes of buying it back later at a lower price. There are no special requirements or privileges you need to ask your futures broker for.

Most stockbrokers require a special account with higher requirements for you to be able to go short. Some stocks are not shortable, or have limited shares that can be shorted. Also, up-tick rules could be re-enforced and in the past the government has put temporary bans on stocks that can be shorted.

16. Direct Correlation.

On average the ES futures are directly correlated to the underlying S&P 500 index in the short and long term. If you pull up an Emini S&P 500 futures chart and compare it to the S&P 500 index chart they should almost look identical.

Double or triple weighted ETFs do not track the S&P accurately over longer periods, and some currency ETFs have credit risks associated with them which could hinder their ability to correlate.

17. Deep Market.

The S&P 500 index is comprised of very actively traded stocks with some of the largest market capitalizations and with hundreds of billions of dollars invested in some fashion in them. With such large dollar values and high trading volume it would be very hard to manipulate its movements.

On the other hand sometimes it is easy to move or even manipulate a particular stock and even a foreign currency market. George Soros has been accused of intentional driving down the price of the British Pound and the currencies of Thailand and Malaysia and many stock "promoters," insiders and markets makers have been convicted of manipulating stocks.

18. Big Players.

The old adages follow the "big boys" and "smart money" are usually true when it comes to trading, and large money managers, pension funds, institutional traders, etc. tend to be very active traders in the futures markets. The S&P 500 futures contract is generally recognized as the leading benchmark for the underlying stock market movements.

Most active equity traders admit they first look to the index futures for an indication of what the stock they are trading might be doing, so why not just trade the leader of the market, the Emini futures?

19. Volume Analysis.

Volume can be one of the most useful indicators a trader can use, those little lines at the bottom of the chart are not just there to look pretty they should be used as another indication of the validity or lack thereof, of a particular move. In other words combined with other indicators and/or chart patterns volume can be used to confirm a move in the market. Most market technicians would agree that a move made on relatively light volume is not as significant as a move made on heavy volume and should be treated accordingly.

Since the Forex market is over the counter (OTC), there is no centralized exchange, no one place where trades take place therefore, there is no accurate record of volume and most, if not all, Forex charts will not show any indication of volume. So what might appear to be a significant move on a Forex chart, may just be a false move on low volume and could not be filtered out if you were looking at a Forex chart.

20. Clearing Reliability.

During the May 6, 2010 "Flash Crash" the Emini S&P futures continued to trade within a reasonable price range reflecting what the cash S&P 500 index was indicating. No trades on the Emini S&P futures were cancelled and all trades cleared.

According to the joint study by the SEC and CFTC, ETFs made up 70% of the securities with trades that were later canceled. Furthermore, there were about 160 ETFs that temporarily lost almost all of their value and 27% of fund companies had securities with trades broken. Had you bought or sold during this event you may had been notified after the market closed that your trade was no longer good and left with potentially dangerous consequences.

As you probably already know trading is hard enough, so why choose a market where the odds are stacked more against you before you even place your first order. The above mentioned 20 points clearly make the E-Mini S&P 500 futures the best choice for daytraders and will give you the most bang for your buck. Before you trade futures, though, please make sure they are appropriate for you and that you only use risk capital.

Online trading has inherent risk due to system response and access times that may vary due to market conditions, system performance, volume and other factors. An investor should understand these and additional risks before trading. Options involve risk and are not suitable for all investors. Futures, options on Futures, and retail off-exchange foreign currency transactions involve substantial risk and are not appropriate for all investors. Please read Risk Disclosure Statement for Futures and Options prior to applying for an account.

*Low margins are a double edged sword, as lower margins mean you have higher leverage and therefore higher risk.

All commissions quoted are not inclusive of exchange and NFA fees unless otherwise noted. Apex does not charge for futures data, but effective January 1, 2015 the CME charges $1-15 per month depending on the type of data you require.

Forex Trading Vs. Stock Trading.

One of the biggest reasons some traders prefer the forex to the stock market is forex leverage. Below, we compare the differences between stock trading and forex trading.

In stock trading, you can normally trade with a maximum of two to one leveraging. There are also some qualifying requirements before you can do this. Not every investor is approved for a margin account, which is what you need in order to leverage in the stock market.

Forex trading is very different. To qualify to trade with leverage, you simply open a forex trading account. There are no qualifying requirements. In the United States, you're limited to 50:1 leveraging, but in other countries, you can leverage as much as 200:1.

Liquidity Differences.

When you trade stocks, you are buying shares of companies that cost anywhere from a few dollars to hundreds of dollars. Market price varies with supply and demand. Trading on the forex is a different world. Although the supply of a country's currency can fluctuate, there is always a large amount of currency available to trade. In consequence, all major world currencies are highly liquid.

Paired Trades.

In currency trading, currencies are always quoted in pairs, so not only do you have to be concerned with the economic health of the country whose currency you are trading, but also with the economic health of the country you are trading against.

Your fundamental concerns also differ from one market to another. When you buy shares of Intel, your primary concern is whether the stock will increase in value -- you're less concerned with the stock prices of other companies When you're buying or selling on the forex, on the other hand, you have to consider the economics of two countries.

Does one country have more job growth than another, or better GDP, or political prospects? Therefore a successful single trade on the Forex requires analyzing two financial entities, not one. Forex markets sometimes exhibit greater sensitivity to emerging political and economic situations in other countries; the U. S. stock market isn't immune but is usually less sensitive to such foreign issues.

Price Sensitivity to Trade Activity.

The two markets have very different price sensitivity to trade activity. A stock purchase of 10,000 shares may impact the stock price, particularly for smaller corporations with fewer shares outstanding than, for instance, giants like Apple.

In sharp contrast, forex trades of several hundred million dollars in a major currency will most likely have little effect on the currency's market price and may have none.

Market Accessibility.

Currency markets have greater access than stock markets. Although in the 21st century it's possible to trade stocks 24 hours a day, five days a week, it's not particularly easy. Most retail investors trade through a U. S. brokerage with one major trading period daily, from 9:30 AM to 4:00 PM, with a much smaller "after hours" trading market with known volatility and price issues that discourage many retail investors from using it.

Forex trading, on the contrary, can be done six days a week, 24 hours a day, because there are many forex exchanges worldwide -- it's always trading time in one time zone or another.

No Bear Markets in Forex Trading.

When a stock market declines, you can make money by shorting, but this imposes additional risks, one of them being that (at least in theory) you may have unlimited losses. In reality, that's unlikely to happen -- at some point, your broker will end the short position. Nevertheless, most financial advisors caution against shorting for all but the most experienced investors, many of whom execute parallel stop-loss and limit orders to contain this risk.

In forex trading, you can go short on a currency pair as easily as you can go long and the two positions present similar risks. No additional precautionary trades to limit losses are necessary.

Greater Freedom From Regulation.

Stock trading on major exchanges has many regulations and limits; forex trading is less regulated. In some ways, the regulatory environment of the major stock exchanges imposes limits you may not welcome; it also protects you and other investors to a degree the forex does not.

It's Your Choice.

Most investors are more familiar with the stock market than with forex, and that familiarity may be comforting. The comparative freedom from regulation on the forex and its high degree of possible leveraging makes it easy to control large trades without special qualifications and with a limited amount of money. That's the upside of the forex market, but also the downside -- participation in the Forex increases both investment opportunities and risk.

Should You Trade Forex Or Stocks?

Today's investors and active traders have access to a growing number of trading instruments, from tried-and-true blue chips and industrials, to the fast-paced futures and forex markets. Deciding which of these markets to trade can be complicated, and many factors need to be considered in order to make the best choice.

The most important element may be the trader's or investor's risk tolerance and trading style. For example, buy-and-hold investors are often more suited to participating in the stock market, while short-term traders, including swing, day and scalp traders, may prefer markets where price volatility is more pronounced. In this article, we'll compare investing in the forex market to buying into blue chip stocks, indexes and industrials. (Learn about the forex market and get to know some beginner trading strategies; check out Forex Trading: A Beginner's Guide .)

The foreign exchange market is the world's largest financial market, accounting for more than $4 trillion in average traded value each day as of 2011. Many traders are attracted to the forex market because of its high liquidity, around-the-clock trading and the amount of leverage that is afforded to participants.

Blue chips, on the other hand, are stocks from well-established and financially sound companies. These stocks are generally able to operate profitably during challenging economic conditions, and have a history of paying dividends. Blue chips are generally considered to be less volatile than many other investments, and are often used to provide steady growth potential to investors' portfolios.

Want to start trading stocks? Check out which online broker offers the best tools here.

Volatility is a measure of short-term price fluctuations. While some traders, particularly short-term and day traders, rely on volatility in order to profit from quick price swings in the market, other traders are more comfortable with less volatile and less risky investments. As such, many short-term traders are attracted to the forex markets, while buy-and-hold investors may prefer the stability offered by blue chips.

Leverage is another consideration. In the United States, investors generally have access to 2:1 leverage for stocks. The forex market offers a substantially higher leverage of up to 50:1, and in parts of the world even higher leverage is available. Is all this leverage a good thing? Not necessarily. While it certainly provides the springboard to build equity with a very small investment - forex accounts can be opened with as little as $100 - leverage can just as easily destroy a trading account. (For more insight, see Forex Leverage: A Double-Edged Sword .)

Another consideration in choosing a trading instrument is the time period that each is traded. Trading sessions for stocks are limited to exchange hours, generally 9:30am to 4pm Eastern Standard Time, Monday through Friday with the exception of market holidays. The forex market, on the other hand, remains active round-the-clock from 5pm EST Sunday, through 5pm EST Friday, opening in Sydney, then traveling around the world to Tokyo, London and New York. The flexibility to trade during U. S. Asian and European markets, with good liquidity virtually any time of day, is an added bonus to traders whose schedules would otherwise limit their trading activity. (Just because the forex market trades 24 hours a day doesn't mean you have to. See How To Set A Forex Trading Schedule .)

Stock market indexes are a combination of similar stocks, which can be used as a benchmark for a particular portfolio or the broad market. In the U. S. financial markets, major indexes include the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), the Nasdaq Composite Index, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (S&P 500) and the Russell 2000. The indexes provide traders and investors with an important method of gauging the movement of the overall market.

A range of products provide traders and investors broad market exposure through stock market indexes. Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) based on stock market indexes, such as S&P Depository Receipts (SPY) and the Nasdaq-100 (QQQQ), are widely traded. Stock index futures and e-mini index futures are other popular instruments based on the underlying indexes. The e-minis boast strong liquidity and have become favorites among short-term traders because of favorable average daily price ranges. In addition, the contract size is much more affordable than the full-sized stock index futures contracts. The e-minis, including the e-mini S&P 500, the e-mini Nasdaq 100, the e-mini Russell 2000 and the mini-sized Dow Futures are traded around the clock on all-electronic, transparent networks. (To learn more, check out Forex Minis Shrink Risk Exposure .)

The volatility and liquidity of the e-mini contracts is enjoyed by the many short-term traders who participate in stock market indexes. The major equity index futures trade at an average daily notional value of $145 billion, exceeding the combined traded dollar volume of the underlying 500 stocks. The average daily range in price movement of the e-mini contracts affords great opportunity for profiting from short-term market moves.

While the average daily traded value pales in comparison to that of the forex markets, the e-minis provide many of the same perks that are available to forex traders, including reliable liquidity, daily average price movement quotes that are conducive to short-term profits, and trading outside of regular U. S. market hours.

Futures traders can use large amounts of leverage similar to that available to forex traders. With futures, the leverage is referred to as margin, a mandatory deposit that can be used by a broker to cover account losses. Minimum margin requirements are set by the exchanges where the contracts are traded, and can be as little as 5% of the contract's value. Brokers may choose to require higher margin amounts. Like forex, then, futures traders have the ability to trade in large position sizes with a small investment, creating the opportunity to enjoy huge gains - or suffer devastating losses.

While trading does exist nearly around the clock for the electronically traded e-minis (trading ceases for about an hour a day to enable institutional investors to value their positions), the volume may be lower than the forex market, and liquidity during off-market hours could be a concern depending on the particular contract and time of day.

While outside the scope of this article, it should be noted that various trading instruments are treated differently at tax time. Short-term gains on futures contracts, for example, may be eligible for lower tax rates than short-term gains on stocks. In addition, active traders may be eligible to choose the mark-to-market (MTM) status for IRS purposes, which allows deductions for trading-related expenses, such as platform fees or education. In order to claim MTM status, the IRS expects trading to be the individual's primary business; IRS Publication 550 and Revenue Procedure 99-17 cover the basic guidelines on how to properly qualify as a trader for tax purposes. It is strongly recommended that traders and investors seek the advice and expertise of a qualified accountant or other tax specialist to most favorably manage investment activities and related tax liabilities. (Trading forex can make for a confusing time organizing your taxes. These simple steps will keep everything straight. Check out Forex Taxation Basics .)

The internet and electronic trading have opened the doors to active traders and investors around the world to participate in a growing variety of markets. The decision to trade stocks, forex or futures contracts is often based on risk tolerance, account size and convenience. If an active trader is not available during regular market hours to enter, exit or properly manage trades, stocks are not the best option. However, if an investor's market strategy is to buy and hold for the long term, generating steady growth and earning dividends, stocks are a practical choice. Regardless of which instrument(s) a trader or investor selects, the decision should be based on which is the best fit.

Options or Forex Trading?

Two of the popular markets available to traders in the financial world are stock options and currency trading using the forex markets. The topic often comes up which one is better? They are both very different animals and a trader needs to be aware of those differences to make sure they are trading the market that best fits their trading style and profit goals.

First, let’s define each market. When trading options you are trading contracts that can control both the upside and downside movement in a stock, ETF, or Index product. Using a call option will give you control of the upside movement in a stock, while a put option will give you control of the downside movement in a stock. These are products that give the retail trader the ability to control 100 shares of stock for a fraction of the cost when compared to buying the shares of stock outright.

When trading the forex markets, a trader is looking to profit from changing currency exchange rates. Currency markets trade in pairs. A trader is betting on changing exchange rates between the two currencies that make up that pair. For example, when trading the EUR/USD the trader is making bets on the changing exchange rate between the Euro and the U. S. Dollar. Forex trading is also a great way for the retail trader to get involved in the markets with a smaller account size due to the leverage that these products offer.

Pros & Cons of Options Trading.

While these are both potentially very profitable markets for traders to look at, they both have their pros and cons. Let’s walk through some of those pros and cons of the options markets first. Options are great because they are highly regulated products that trade on centralized exchanges. When entering into a position with options, you have the peace of mind knowing that these contracts are backed by an exchange which means you won’t have to worry about the person on the other side of the trade not living up to their side of the deal. You also know that the price that you are looking at when entering into a trade on your broker platform is the same price that is quoted on a different platform. This is important to point out as you will see the difference when we get to the forex markets. Options are also the only financial product that give you the opportunity to make money in up, down, and sideways moving conditions. All other products require the markets to be moving up or down to make money.

On the downside, options are only traded from 9:30-4:00 New York time. For traders in different parts of the world this can be a problem depending on the time change. For a trader in Australia, trading the U. S. session can be a problem considering the time change. Options also have time decay which means they are wasting assets. The longer you hold them the less value they have, meaning you not only need to be right on direction but you also need the stock to move fast enough.

Pros & Cons of Forex Trading.

When looking at the Forex markets, there are also pros and cons. Let’s look at the benefits first. Forex markets allow a trader to get started with as little as a few hundred dollars, which is great for the small retail trader. This can also allow a trader to easily diversify their portfolio by being able to look at more markets. These markets are open 24 hours a day which is a great feature for traders all around the world. Given how active the world markets are these days, having access to the markets 24 hours a day can be a huge advantage. This access can allow a trader to react to news quicker than most other markets. Forex markets also offer different contract sizes. Traders can trade full, mini and micro mini size lots. This gives the forex trader the ability to manage risk easier than other markets.

On the downside, forex markets can also be tricky because they aren’t very regulated. There is no centralized exchange where these products trade like many other markets. This means a trader’s success or failure could depend on the prices being quoted to them by their broker. In many cases the forex broker is taking the other side of your trades causing a conflict of interest. This feature alone can scare many traders away from the forex markets. Forex markets being open 24 hours a day can be viewed as a benefit, but can also be viewed as a problem. Knowing that these markets are open 24 hours a day can lead to over trading.