NotAlwaysVolatile

Hi - I had some spurious data Monday evening, and corrected it in the history centre. Again, this morning I've got some strage data - the live MT4 data suggestes that GBPCHF hit 12234.8 overnight (2200 bar). Normally the data quality is fine, has been poor the last couple of days.

Just checked the platform status page and everything would appear to be operating normally.

OK - So i've now received an email saying that they (IG) are receiving unusually high numbers of calls and emails. Not sure if this is from the 1st or 2nd issue.

2 things have happened today.... First - I noticed that the price one of my option positions staying static (over several days) while the underlying fluctuated. (Issue raised with IG earlier this morning but no response yet). Second - a FTSE option appears to have automatically closed at 10.23 this morning. My plan had been to allow the option to expire. It may turn out that the early close of the option works in my favour (though currently it isn't). The option isn't supposed to close until 1630 today. Can anyone else comment - is this normal for IG (I've been on the platform for less than a year)? It is a real concern as I was planning on increasing my stakes quite considerably over the next few months.

Hi - I'm looking for information on dates when new option contracts become available. I'm sure I've seen this info previously but can't find it on the website. Thanks in advance.

Just looks like clickbait, or a biased journo, to me. Headline and summary look like they are taken from a Merck press release...just cutting the sentences down to me more sensational and create a bit of outrage to those willing to be outraged at everything. It's quite a catchy headline, and is bound to attract some clicks. I guess they rely on the outrage of a few doing their promotion work.

I found this sort of thing happening years ago and stopped trading due to frustration (and did OK with a buy and long only strategy on various funds) - City Index and Finspreads were constantly having 'technical issues' whenever the market got interesting. I assumed that things had moved on - are brokers still running their own tin? Surely there are some brokers that are using modern best practices for dev and ops to allow scaling to meet demand? We're not in 2008 now. Has there been an explanation of the nature of the 'technical issue' yet? Have IG (or any of the other 7 or so main retail brokers - listed by jlz above) said if the technical issue is an in-house issue or some other bottleneck in the wider system of systems'? If each broker is facing an in-house issue, then this points to underinvestment / sweating assets, and a complete lack of user focus. Alternatively there is something wrong with the wider system of system - but where and how do you fix it. If it really is the latter - my guess is it won't get fixed because it is sometimes very convenient.

This is quite far of the mark i.e. missing facts to be inflammatory. Merck dropped development of their vaccine candidates, following phase 1 trials. Their finding (which will be published for peer review to stop try and stop nonsense such as the article posted here), showed that their candidate vaccines were not effective. The immune response was inferior to those seen following natural infection ***and those reported for other SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 vaccines.*** Merck are continuing to invest in covid related therapeutics.

...but now nearly 11 months since the first death in the US, the figure is over 400k. Testing may be flawed but the end result seems to be fairly solid. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html

I've been trading options for a few months and have been building positions on a few markets. I'd like to reduce risk by building positions on other markets but the range of contract months available is fairly limited. For example, I can buy FTSE and SP September-21 index options but Nasdaq is limited to March-21, Dax to Jun-21, STOXX to March-21 etc. The same is true for commodities and to a lesser extent with FX (I'm not considering longer than 6 months at the moment). Is there an alternative account/platform or can these contracts be added to my account? Thanks