Hi
@bull375, How are you? Virtual trading can be valuable for conceptual understanding only. Beyond a point, it does not give you the emotional roller coaster feeling that you will most likely experience with real money. At Futures First, I had a trading simulator which gave me the exact same trading infrastructure, quotes, orders, paper capital etc. Trading was very objective but doing the same thing with real money was definitely not the same. Generally speaking, your holding period gets severely affected due to volatility in the market to market P&L in trading. But yes, it can add value for the purpose of objective understanding.
The exchanges don't allow brokers to provide data to anyone else except their own registered clients. So the question of offering a simulator for everyone to use does not arise. By the way, NSE Paathshala is being revamped and will most likely be re-introduced by NSE. The older version was barebones and sort of useless. I hope the new one will be better. That should solve your problem.
Let me tell you something about GCI Financial / AVA Trade / CFD platforms in general: They are the equivalent of casinos / modern day bucket shops! Basically, when you trade on an exchange, for every buyer there is a seller and vice versa, right? An exchange is a marketplace. But a CFD platform is NOT! A CFD platform is just a software which shows you bid/asks from the real exchange and when you execute any trades on the platform, the platform itself is the counterparty to your trade! Please understand that. It's a HUUGEEEE difference. If you win, they lose! By that token, it is safe to assume that they will do as much as they can to ensure you will not win. Be rest assured that you will not get the same transparency as you will from an exchange registered under SEBI. It's easy for them to offer such paper trading platforms because they are unregulated. But I would strongly recommend you against using such platforms. I have nothing against any specific company but just the business model in general. Keep in mind that in a casino, the house always wins. The players don't stand a chance!
