OTA Stop Market Orders Don't Execute

[Doug Hayman]

Running the Latest Beta Build.

Trading IB, MES micro futures on the DOM, using conditional OTA orders (Auto).

On either Buy or Sell side, Limit OTA executes fine.  Conditional Stop order is created properly once Limit order executes (verified on IB back-end).  Subsequently, on both the Buy and Sell Side, the Stop Market order is run through price-wise without executing.

I'm sending you log file accordingly.

Edited May 11, 2020 by Doug Hayman

[Doug Hayman]

P.S.  More info, I have been alternating between OTOCA and OTA orders.  I just re-started MT, and now OTA Stop Legs are functioning correctly.  The log file I sent captured the state when things were not working as stated above.   I'll post more, if I can figure out what sequence of trade events caused this.

[Jerry Medved]

wait a sec- is the stop order showing in TWS as submitted? If so, it is out of our hands at that point. I will check log 

[Doug Hayman]

Yes, the Stop Market Order made it to IB and was active.   I cannot re-create this again; all working well.  Do you think this was an IB hiccup?

[Jerry Medved]

I don't know if something wrong on IB or something about the stop order before 9:30? but as far as the log, it shows the order was received by IB and IB was echoing it back. If it happens again, you may want to check with IB why the specific order is not being triggered. I checked in TWS and the MES symbol does not have an option for "Allow this order to be filled outside of regular trading hours" which would have been equivalent to sending DAY+Ext, so my guess is it is not that.

[Doug Hayman]

Thanks for the reminder on this - I didn't realize that I initially was attempting to execute order prior to 9:30 ET - definitely an IB issue. 

Just entered an MES trade prior to 9:30 AM ET this morning and again the price runs through the Stop order.  However, IB accepts the Stop order part of the trade.  On MT, I tried Both Day and Day+Ext TIF, and both behave like this.

In the past, at least for ES, IB would generate an error msg about not being able to accept a Stop Order outside of regular market hours, but for some reason for MES, they accept it, but don't execute it.  I'll contact them about this.

Thanks again for pointing this out.

[Doug Hayman]

OK, I did find a bug today playing in Paper Mode on IB using the DOM.  Trading 1 contract of MES.  Trading OTA AUTO.

On a Short, when I hover cursor in Sell column (but don't click to execute OTA Limit Order) where hovered price is above current market price, MT correctly displays "LMT 1" for this potential trade.  While continuing to hold cursor over that price, the Market price subsequently increases (overtakes) this pending hovered Limit Order price.  While the market price is above this hovered cursored LMT price, I click to execute the order and the Limit order is executed since the price is below current market price.  However, in this scenario, MT creates "2" OTA Stop Orders on the DOM (which is incorrect), while in effect, only one Stop order is sent to off to IB (which is correct).  If I Flatten or cancel Stop Order, the one correct Stop Order is correctly canceled in IB back-end and on MT, but one rogue MT Stop Order remains on the DOM (there are no Stop Orders on the IB back-end at this point), which cannot be canceled or removed from the DOM without restarting MT.

Analogously, on the Buy Side, the same issue occurs, and is readily repeatable.   Not sure, but I'm guessing that other conditional types may exhibit the same behavior.  I'm sending a log file over to you if this helps at all.

[Jerry Medved]

Doug - first of all, if in AUTO mode, the initial order will be either limit or stop, depending on where the cursor is at the time you click so it being submitted as a STOP is accurate and is a legitimate combo order. if you want to make sure it goes out as a LIMIT, then either select LIMIT explicitly as the initial order, or if you want, leave it on AUTO and hold down the SHIFT key thus forcing it to LIMIT temporarily. 

As far as canceling the orders afterwards, I could not recreate the issue and the problem with the log you sent is that I have no idea where to look - it wasn't sent directly after the issue happened and there are many similar orders, so it's like looking for a needle in a haystack. 

Also, on your screenshot, it looks like there are 2 capsules on the buy side, and at least one of them is not submitted (yellow left side). Are you not able to cancel them manually?

If you can recreate the issue (maybe put the orders sufficiently far away from the market so they will not execute), then do this:
1) Start MT.
2) Open both DOM and ACCOUNT VIEW window, on TRANSACTIONS tab
2) place the order via dom recreating the situation
3) confirm that both orders show in MT's ACCOUNT VIEW/TRANSACTIONS and in TWS. If not, send me screenshots
4) Try to FLATTEN. 
5) if the problem occurs, send me the screenshot of the DOM, the account view, and the log
 

but note - do not do any other transactions from start to the time you send the log - makes it easy to identify exactly what is happening in the log. 

[Doug Hayman]

Jerry,

Just executed this morning and sent log file after first starting MT.  I'm aware of how AUTO mode can be a Limit or Stop order depending on price execution; that is not the issue here.

Not sure if your Log file is cumulative for the day or not, but please LOOK AT 2ND LOG FILE that I sent you, since this contains the "Flatten" action (forgot to do this before sending 1st log file).

So, here's what I did.  

1) I hovered over a Sell price which was displaying "LMT 1" correctly.  Market price is below this hovered price;

2) Market price rises above the hovered Sell price.  Still displays "LMT 1", when in actuality it is really a "SELL STP 1" at this point;

3) I execute the Sell trade.  Trade fires off as a LIMIT trade (which is fine for me since I want this trade to fire at this price).

4) IB executes fine, and creates the pending Buy Stop Leg fine.  Your transactions screen (see picture below) looks fine with Limit Order executed and 1 Buy Stop order pending.

5) However, note that 2 Buy Stop Orders (at the same price) appear on the DOM (incorrect).  When I subsequently flatten, 1 STOP still appears on the DOM (and I can't get rid of it unless I restart MT).  However, MT Transactions screen and IB back-end don't know anything about this rogue Stop order.  It is a DOM issue only.

Edited May 13, 2020 by Doug Hayman

[Jerry Medved]

I was finally able to recreate.  it shows 1 placed stop order (correct) and one unsent stop order (NOT correct) and the unsent order is the one that you have a problem removing. 

NOTE: do not need to restart MT to get rid of it. you can just type in some other symbol on the DOM and then type in the original symbol, or close and re-open the DOM window and the bad order capsule will be gone

Will look at both the bad order capsule and the mouse cursor not switching when the price under the cursor moves.

[Doug Hayman]

Yes, correct!  I can live with switching symbol during live trading in the interim then.  Thanks in advance for looking into it.