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One thing that makes cryptocurrency trading special is that you get access to L2 trading data, for free. At least that's how it was when I was playing with it,

One thing that makes cryptocurrency trading special is that you get access to L2 trading data, for free. At least that's how it was when I was playing with it, when gdax existed. I'm not in this industry but, I suspect this level of access has a financial barrier to entry on the stock exchanges.

arberx 6y ago
Which is a huge advantage imo. Democratizing information that at the moment, only a few big players know/can use to their advantage in the traditional market.
jb1991 6y ago
Are you referring to seeing the depth of market? That's been free for many years in many stock and futures trading platforms as well. How is it different in crypto?
- RobRivera 6y ago
  real-time L2 feeds are not free for intraday trading. historical L2 data is free
  - jb1991 6y ago
    That hasn’t been through with my TD Ameritrade account for many years. I get level two depth on stock and futures for intraday trading, no additional fee.
    - waynesonfire 6y ago
      https://www.brokerage-review.com/expert/level2/td-ameritrade-level-2-quotes.aspx https://www.brokerage-review.com/expert/level2/td-ameritrade... > TD Ameritrade offers Level II quotes free of charge to both professional and non-professional traders. This is a very generous policy. Not all brokers offer Level II quotes at no cost. For example, TradeStation charges $10 per month for Level II quotes for non-professionals, while professional traders must pay a very steep $110 per month for the same data. Nice! competition is great.
      - jb1991 6y ago
        And it’s been this way for at least 10 years that I’ve been using them.
      - Scoundreller 6y ago
        Is there an actual cost to The provider in providing this data? Or do providers just charge because they can, as with commissions? (Turns out in a post Robin-Hood world, transactions could be zero-commission, but the commission charging providers just chose to continue despite other revenue available to cover the cost).
        RobRivera 6y ago
        exchanges charge for access to this data. standard data providers are Bloomberg, Redline, and then the execution shops sell their own products too.
        Scoundreller 6y ago
        So what’s different about TD that they can offer it for free while others charge for it ? Is the actual cost a drop in the bucket so they just eat the cost or?
        RobRivera 6y ago
        If so inclined I advise due diligence on latency and granularity of the free data sources
    - RobRivera 6y ago
      whats the lag?
- gruez 6y ago
  Which platforms provide L2 data for free? At least for major american exchanges (eg. NYSE) they're not free.
  - jb1991 6y ago
    I normally trade futures but I just checked and I’m also getting full level two depth on stocks with TD Ameritrade‘s desktop platform. I do not pay any fees to them for this.
  - rmah 6y ago
    Real exchanges do not take custody of assets (unlike crypto exchanges) and do not sell info to end users. In the retail space, brokers provide this data. Their policies vary. From free for all traders, free for active/fee for inactive, no level-2, etc.
- arberx 6y ago
  You have to pay a hefty price for real time info.
  - jb1991 6y ago
    That’s just not true, I guess TD Ameritrade is different?
- clipradiowallet 6y ago
  > free for many years in many stock and futures trading platforms Where can I get free depth of market for futures? eg for CME/CBOT L2, I pay roughly $50/mo as a retailer, or approx $500 for professional. It's not high enough that I would consider changing brokers, but I didn't know it was legal to redistribute Rithmic/CQG L2 streams(they are the only games in town last I checked, and everyone resells them). edit to add: To be clear, my L2 is 10-levels deep from both bid/ask. I know you can get infinite depth from Rithmic for absurd quantities of money, but don't see the value in it(for me).
  - jb1991 6y ago
    TD Ameritrade. Check out all of the sibling comments here.
tzone 6y ago
While information is public on blockchains and everyone has same level of access to it, transaction execution is not democratized. The premise of this whole reverse-exploit is that there are people who are extracting value by getting preferential treatment with their transaction execution by doing deals outside of the blockchain itself (which are hidden and not public by default).
- ImprovedSilence 6y ago
  Trading in exchanges doesnt happen in the blockchain though. But the exchanges provide apis to the order books and all the L2 data you'd usually pay $24k/yr for via a bloomberg terminal for the stock market.
- noxer 6y ago
  Its specific to the kind of blockchain/DLT that it runs on. If you use an DEX that doesn't rely on miners who can pick Tx then you dont have this problem. For example the XRPL DEX does not allow any party to pick which order to execute. There is also no mempool where someone could look for bundles of Tx. A DEX order is, once submitted, added to the state of the ledger (added to the blockchain) and executed as soon as possible.

arberx 6y ago

Which is a huge advantage imo. Democratizing information that at the moment, only a few big players know/can use to their advantage in the traditional market.

jb1991 6y ago

Are you referring to seeing the depth of market? That's been free for many years in many stock and futures trading platforms as well. How is it different in crypto?

RobRivera 6y ago
real-time L2 feeds are not free for intraday trading. historical L2 data is free
- jb1991 6y ago
  That hasn’t been through with my TD Ameritrade account for many years. I get level two depth on stock and futures for intraday trading, no additional fee.
  - waynesonfire 6y ago
    https://www.brokerage-review.com/expert/level2/td-ameritrade-level-2-quotes.aspx https://www.brokerage-review.com/expert/level2/td-ameritrade... > TD Ameritrade offers Level II quotes free of charge to both professional and non-professional traders. This is a very generous policy. Not all brokers offer Level II quotes at no cost. For example, TradeStation charges $10 per month for Level II quotes for non-professionals, while professional traders must pay a very steep $110 per month for the same data. Nice! competition is great.
    - jb1991 6y ago
      And it’s been this way for at least 10 years that I’ve been using them.
    - Scoundreller 6y ago
      Is there an actual cost to The provider in providing this data? Or do providers just charge because they can, as with commissions? (Turns out in a post Robin-Hood world, transactions could be zero-commission, but the commission charging providers just chose to continue despite other revenue available to cover the cost).
      - RobRivera 6y ago
        exchanges charge for access to this data. standard data providers are Bloomberg, Redline, and then the execution shops sell their own products too.
        Scoundreller 6y ago
        So what’s different about TD that they can offer it for free while others charge for it ? Is the actual cost a drop in the bucket so they just eat the cost or?
        RobRivera 6y ago
        If so inclined I advise due diligence on latency and granularity of the free data sources
  - RobRivera 6y ago
    whats the lag?
gruez 6y ago
Which platforms provide L2 data for free? At least for major american exchanges (eg. NYSE) they're not free.
- jb1991 6y ago
  I normally trade futures but I just checked and I’m also getting full level two depth on stocks with TD Ameritrade‘s desktop platform. I do not pay any fees to them for this.
- rmah 6y ago
  Real exchanges do not take custody of assets (unlike crypto exchanges) and do not sell info to end users. In the retail space, brokers provide this data. Their policies vary. From free for all traders, free for active/fee for inactive, no level-2, etc.
arberx 6y ago
You have to pay a hefty price for real time info.
- jb1991 6y ago
  That’s just not true, I guess TD Ameritrade is different?
clipradiowallet 6y ago
> free for many years in many stock and futures trading platforms Where can I get free depth of market for futures? eg for CME/CBOT L2, I pay roughly $50/mo as a retailer, or approx $500 for professional. It's not high enough that I would consider changing brokers, but I didn't know it was legal to redistribute Rithmic/CQG L2 streams(they are the only games in town last I checked, and everyone resells them). edit to add: To be clear, my L2 is 10-levels deep from both bid/ask. I know you can get infinite depth from Rithmic for absurd quantities of money, but don't see the value in it(for me).
- jb1991 6y ago
  TD Ameritrade. Check out all of the sibling comments here.

tzone 6y ago

While information is public on blockchains and everyone has same level of access to it, transaction execution is not democratized. The premise of this whole reverse-exploit is that there are people who are extracting value by getting preferential treatment with their transaction execution by doing deals outside of the blockchain itself (which are hidden and not public by default).

ImprovedSilence 6y ago
Trading in exchanges doesnt happen in the blockchain though. But the exchanges provide apis to the order books and all the L2 data you'd usually pay $24k/yr for via a bloomberg terminal for the stock market.
noxer 6y ago
Its specific to the kind of blockchain/DLT that it runs on. If you use an DEX that doesn't rely on miners who can pick Tx then you dont have this problem. For example the XRPL DEX does not allow any party to pick which order to execute. There is also no mempool where someone could look for bundles of Tx. A DEX order is, once submitted, added to the state of the ledger (added to the blockchain) and executed as soon as possible.