A Million Dollar Reason Why Stock Trading Delays Must Be Fixed Fast

By Lance Jepsen

Delays in data center networks can now be detected that are as short as a millionth of a second. Computer programmers have created a clever software program that can save investment banks running automatic stock trading systems millions of dollars.

Purdue and the University of California computer science departments teamed up to work on the problem. They created a very small algorithm that requires no additional hardware to run.

This new programming method enables data centers to diagnose delays as short as millionths of a second in routers. The programming method also will detect packet loss as infrequent as one in a million at every router in a data center's network.

No new hardware is required. The team of computer programmers call their code the Lossy Difference Aggregator. The programming code has no speed penalty on the router in which it runs.

Institution stock traders and corporations that sell online stock trading platforms will go crazy for this technology. The reason is that if an online brokerage firm has a stock trading algorithm that reacts to an incoming market data feed even just 100 microseconds faster than the competition, they can buy millions of shares before their competitors.

Online automated exchanges like the American Stock Exchange use custom designed hardware boxes that are very expensive. These boxes are put on routers and key points in a data center network. These external hardware boxes are too expensive to put on every router within a data center network making it difficult to trouble shoot and find a problem router. By the time the problem is detected and fixed, it will cost the company anywhere from 2 to 4 million dollars because of delayed buy and sell orders.

This computer programming code will allow router vendors to add loss tracking on every router at no additional cost. This will completely eliminate the need for specialized external router monitoring devices.

The way a router's performance is measured now is that an external hardware device tracks when a packet arrives and when it leaves and then takes the difference of those times.

Instead of summing the arrival and departure times of all packets traveling through a router, the computer programmers new system randomly splits incoming packets into groups and then adds up arrival and departure times of each of the groups separately. As long as the number of losses is smaller than the number of groups, at least one group will give a good estimate.

Calculating the difference of the groups arrival and departure times and then dividing by the total number of messages gives a very accurate estimate of the average delay of a given router. This approach requires so little computer programming code that it really is about the same code as a simple counter.

With this computer programming code built into every router, a data center manager will be able to quickly pinpoint the offending router and interface that is adding extra millionth of a second delays or losing even one packet in a million. - 23210

About the Author:

By Lance Jepsen. Learn how to get your revenge on traders that have been taking your money. Get free expert stock trading analysis and tips by going to stock trading

Descending Triangles -Short Trading Strategy

By Jeff Cartridge

The descending triangle can be traded very successfully on the short side entering the trade as the stock breaks out of the pattern to the downside. The pattern forms when the two boundary lines that contain the price movement converge to a point. The top line slopes down toward the bottom line which is horizontal.

Descending Triangles Best Traded Short

Descending triangles are one of the most predictable patterns that are available to trade short. With 57% of the patterns breaking down descending triangles can deliver good returns when they do. The average gain is 0.92% in 9 days with about half of the breakouts (45%) being profitable. These results are good but selecting the right conditions can make trading descending triangles very attractive.

Improve Your Trades

When you look at the performance of a descending triangle in bearish market conditions you will see the results were stronger than they were in more bullish years. Trading descending triangles when the market is in a down trend or consolidating improves your trading results. The sector should be falling to make the best profits. Unusually the trend of the sector at the end of the pattern, prior to the breakout is less important than the sector trend at the start of the pattern.

A breakout from a descending triangle can occur anywhere on the way to the point of the pattern; it is not important exactly where the breakout occurs. The best trades occur when a down side break occurs after the stock bounces off the lower boundary and drops back before hitting the upper boundary.

If volume supports a descending triangle breakout then the profitability of the trades improves. For volume to support the breakout, volume when the stock is going down should be greater than volume when the stock is going up.

Descending Triangles Extremely Profitable

Following a series of simple rules to determine which descending triangle to trade can improve results dramatically. By applying these filters descending triangles are profitable on 48% of the trades and return an average of 2.55% per trade in 10 days. This is a very profitable pattern to trade.

Note: Statistics for this article have been provided by Patterns Trader after analyzing over 60,000 chart patterns on the Australian market from 2000 - 2008. - 23210

About the Author:

Jeff Cartridge is a private trader and created the website LearnCFDs.com Ways to Make Serious Money With A Small Investment

How To Find The Best Home Owners Insurance Combo Good Coverage Low Cost

By John Fagan

Remember that just as purchasing a home, insuring it for the right amount and getting more than average coverage is important for securing a good home insurance scheme. The best home insurance combination is a policy that offers good coverage at a low cost, but you cannot obtain this without doing your homework regarding the area you live in, your house and its safety and risk features, the state's insurance companies and other vital aspects that determine benefits of a good home insurance plan.

So, stay with the times, use the convenient online resources, e.g. search engines and state websites that are a wealth of advanced information on a variety of home insurance policies and help yourself buy the right plan today. Remember, it is imperative that as a smart home insurance shopper you conduct adequate research about providers, policies available with them, price lines and features of each and other important factors, like your budget before you decide to sign a home insurance policy!

Therefore, in this article, we will discuss about all the things that effect buying of the better home coverage policy for customers and how buyers can fix problem areas in their houses that affect cost of plan and good insurance likelihood. For, having necessary information about your home and its negative aspects is something that can help you take corrective measures to fix these and thereby, avail best home insurance policies at affordable rates. You can even consider calling in a home inspector to evaluate your house defects so you can improve on these flaws and rectify roofing, invest in storm shutters or secure your house further with latest safety devices to minimize risks for the insurer. These are just a few practical ways you can save a lot of money on buying the best home insurance plan in your mind!

You could help yourself purchase a better home insurance plan by firstly ensuring that your home is in fine physical condition and fixed with safety mechanisms. There should be enough outside lighting, burglar alarms, and video cameras at the entrances. These facilities will get you discounted premiums as they dissuade robbers from trying their luck.

Then you can also avail the services of a professional home inspector to discover any problem areas in your home (e.g. fittings and improvements) and fix these problems so you can make your home a lesser risk for the home insurance company to cover and they, in turn, give you a lower premium and wider coverage for your home insurance policy.

Once you have got the above details covered regarding the stability of your home, you can consult with neighbors and friend regarding the insurance service, especially if you are moving to a new locality. Finding the best home insurance plan combo - good coverage, low cost is not impossible, but also keep in mind that the company is a reputed one with a license to operate in your state.

Consulting with finance specialist will further enable you for shopping the right home insurance policy as the expert can guide you regarding budgeting and sticking to a comprehensive insurance plan, influencing factors like stock market decline and how this and other aspects affect your home coverage and personal budget. Lastly, try to maintain a good credit history to avail of the best home insurance plans, which offer you low premiums and wide coverage and if possible, buy your home and car insurance from the same provider to benefit from tie-up, discounted premiums usually offered on these. - 23210

About the Author:

John Fagan is a top insurance traffic producer who works with top team industry leaders. Free Quote Insurance Agents that work for you.

Forex News Straddling Strategy (Part V)

By Ahmad Hassam

The risk of slippage is usually very high when trading the news. Currency prices tend to move very fast during such highly volatile market conditions. Slippage occurs when the price you intend to enter or exit the market is different from your actual transacted price.

Placing stop or market entry orders under such times do not guarantee anything. Slippage is the biggest problem when the market moves fast. These orders do get filled but mostly at different prices than you had intended.

Sometimes, these entry orders may even get filled past your stop loss or profit target. This means that you would be left with immediate net loss. Many market makers will wait till after the big move is over. Then they will fill your entry order.

Many brokers will fill your stop loss or take profit before filling your entry order with wide slippage. It is a trick that many forex brokers use in order to make profit by filling your position with a negative spread.

Lets make it clear with an example. Imagine your profit limit for the EUR/USD is 1.2594. Your long entry stop for EUR/USD at 1.2564! The forex broker may first fill your take profit at 1.2594 and then fill your long entry stop at 1.2604 with a 40 pips slippage.

If filled at the prices you wanted, your trade would have resulted in a profit. But now you have a net realized loss. If the trade goes against you, the forex broker may fill your stop loss order first and then fill your entry order with slippage after that so as to widen their profits.

Now imagine you had placed your stop loss at 1.2544 and your long entry stop at 1.2564. Your forex broker could first fill your stop loss at 1.2544 and then fill your long entry stop at 1.2594 with a slippage of 30 pips. You now have a net loss of 50 pips due to slippage instead of planned 20 pips loss. You could never imagine that you would end up with a loss of 50 pips.

The larger the slippage you experience, the more you stand to lose and the more the forex broker stands to make a profit. As an individual trader, you should know that during news when the market moves fast, some forex brokers add slippage to any of your orders to increase their profits. Your orders will be kept pending till you get stopped out or your profit limit is reached.

Many forex traders readily accept the risk of slippage. Most news traders consider slippage as one of the realities of trading the news. However, you as a forex trader should know that slippage can eat up a huge chunk of your profits. In the end slippage can affect your overall profit and loss. Read more in the next article how you can overcome the problem of slippage through the use of stop-limit entry order. - 23210

About the Author:

Mr. Ahmad Hassam is a Harvard University Graduate. He is interested in day trading stocks and currencies. Know These Forex Broker Games. Learn Forex Trading!

Selecting A Forex Trading System

By Bart Icles

The foreign exchange market grows more and more attractive as each trading passes. Investors are not only attracted by the sizeable profits that it can offer, they also want to know if they can really cope with the changing trends of the market. To achieve a more manageable trading experience, investors - both beginners and seasoned traders alike - use forex trading systems. It can be tricky to select a forex trading system that would best suit your needs so it is important to take note of some basics.

In the forex world, investors cannot simply tell what lies ahead of them and those who do not do something about this end up losing money and they eventually give up on forex trading. However, a wise investor would not totally give up on trading if he or she loses money. Instead, a wise investor would just take a step back and review the situation at hand and then go back to trading again. In a situation such as this, it helps to have a forex trading system that can help you get off on the right foot. Doing so, you will be able to save some money for yourself and hopefully become the next most profitable forex trader.

Different kinds of forex trading systems are available and they are based on the different kinds of traders that exist in the forex world. There are three types of forex traders in the currency market. The short term trader, also known as the scalper, likes to open and close a trade in just a matter of minutes. This type of trader takes advantage of the smaller movements in forex rates and large amounts of leverage. The long term trader looks forward to holding positions for months and months on end, and sometimes even years by making decisions based on long-term factors. In between these two are the medium term traders who hold positions for a couple of days by taking advantage of technical situations that appear to be more opportunistic.

To determine which forex trading system would best work for you, it helps to know what kind of trader you would want to become. Short term traders can lose large amounts of capital in just a matter of minutes but they are also able to realize profits faster. Medium term traders can safely hold their positions but they can easily miss out on big opportunities. Long term investors reap in the largest amounts of profit but they also require large investments to cover losses brought about by unpredictable movements.

In choosing a forex trading system, choose one that can be adjusted to your trading personality and your needs. Do not choose a system based on the needs of other traders because this simply will not help. Choose one that will allow you to be more creative on your side of the market, one that can help you achieve your goals in your forex career. - 23210

About the Author:

Forex tip trading are powerful when coupled with a desire to learn and a drive to become a great trader. Learning a forex tip takes dedication and a good teacher. But once you learn how to trade and do so successfully your life will change and you have options and financial resources you never had before.