I invest in international stocks using IB. Overall, I am a happy customer. I have encountered this irritating experience several times when trading Hong Kong stocks on IB. There are several times when I tried to put on sell orders on HK stocks, the existing bid will disappear and a lower bid will appear. It happens much more frequently on a bearish day. It happens with a frequency that is high enough that I suspect someone is able to see my sell orders and lower the bid accordingly. I would like to check if any one of you encountered the same thing for Hong Kong stocks? I trade in stocks of other countries. I have much lesser of a problem in other countries' stocks.
It is the small-cap HK stocks which are illiquid and it usually happens in a bearish day. For sure, it is not the big and more liquid stocks. Bids cannot disappear and be lowered suddenly for liquid stocks as there are too many participants with different intention. In fact, I also encounter this problem for not-so-liquid U.S stocks sometimes but to a much lesser degree. May I ask if you are into HK stocks?
Not really but I do trade HK futures... I could have a look... HK market closed today though.... Do you have a specific code I can look at? Or a few?
Thanks for the offer but don't bother. From my experience, it happens on a terrible bearish day and most days aren't that bearish these days. It won't affect you because futures are too liquid. Do keep a lookout if you own HK small-cap stocks. I don't have specific stocks in mind because I have already sold them. Just irritating that the bid just slip away when I want to hit the bid. In the end, I bite the bullet and sold below the bid to get my sale done. Hits me below the belt. For those who sold HK small-cap stocks on IB during the middle of 2015 when the market started crashing, I wonder if they share the same experience.