Data feed (Rithmic, dxFeed, CQG)
Also called: Market data feed, Rithmic, dxFeed, CQG, Tradovate data
In short. The data feed is the service that delivers the market's trades and order book to a trading platform: Rithmic, dxFeed, CQG and Tradovate's own are the usual ones for futures prop firms. The feed decides what the footprint and the heatmap can show (full depth or ten levels, every trade or aggregated) and whether a platform such as DeepChartsOFF can connect to a given firm.
A prop firm licenses one or more feeds; a platform supports some of them. A firm 'accepts DeepChartsOFF' when the two meet: the board lists, for each firm that routes DeepCharts, the feed behind it. Market data is billed per exchange on top of the platform licence.
For order flow the quality that matters is unaggregated trades and the depth of book; feeds differ on both. The article on prop firms that accept DeepChartsOFF lists the three questions to ask a firm about its feed before paying.
Questions traders ask
What is Data feed?
The data feed is the service that delivers the market's trades and order book to a trading platform: Rithmic, dxFeed, CQG and Tradovate's own are the usual ones for futures prop firms. The feed decides what the footprint and the heatmap can show (full depth or ten levels, every trade or aggregated) and whether a platform such as DeepChartsOFF can connect to a given firm.