Good question ... before I started this thread I assumed ISLAND hidden orders were native NASDAQ hidden orders, and that appears to be the case if you watch the orders go in and check TotalView ... also, all the non-ISLAND hidden SMART-routed orders I tried routed straight to ISLAND and stuck there without showing up in the depth ... but after plodding along with this thread for awhile I'm no longer sure of anything to do with this topic ... I'm thinking IB is going to do whatever they feel like doing with hidden order types and not bother telling us what they are doing, when, or why.
As a dma broker, IB should have FULL ecn functionality. That means whatever order type an ecn or exchange has, IB should support it. Unfortunately that is not the case and I've been asking for years for this switch and it hasn't happened. At the very least, enable full ecn functionality for ISLD and ARCA. I would love to be able to use those ecn's native smart routing systems rather than IB's own smart router which has its deficiencies.
I'm assuming all the exotic new order types introduced by the exchanges and ECN's are the exact ones we need to protect ourselves from HFT gaming.
I think they should support some major order types, but man, you have no idea how many crazy order options there are for each different exchange. You can't fault them for being choosy, because they'd have to pay some guy to add some obscure order and then if they focus on all these obscure features, our commissions will just go up. Is it possible to do a midpoint peg on IB, btw? That's the kind of "major order type" option I'd want.
I imagine a big part of the problem is that TWS is a dinosaur of a trading system whose core components were built in the late 90s. Rather than switch to a new updated platform, IB has chosen instead to keep patching and adding features with the result is that TWS is now a bloated mess. All the other standard DMA platforms like Rediplus, Instaquote, lightspeed, all share similar features, functionality, and looks TWS is the outlier with it being programmed in java. IB bought out futuretrade back in 2008 and that company had a state of the art trading platform and IB was supposed to roll that out to customers but nothing ever came of it. Don't get me wrong, I've been an IB customer for over 10 years and it gets the job done. But it could be SO much better.
Hidden orders on ISLAND are native. All other "hidden" orders are simulated, i.e., it waits for your order to become marketable before submitting it to the exchange. I am just guessing that ARCA has invisible orders based on the number of times I feel like I've been pennied invisibly on that exchange (based on the history of prints). If that is the case, it irks me that IB doesn't support a native hidden order because I lose a competitive advantage (and IB loses fills).
Unfortunately, if you believe the link to ARCA order types posted earlier in this thread, ARCA seems to be the ONLY major exchange that does not have a native hidden order type open to all users ... the documentation says their "Passive Liquidity" order type is available only to "Lead Market Makers". I, for one, would most highly value being able to use the NYSE "Dark Reserve" order type...
i said it long time ago in various threads..they have no incentive to do any upgrades. looks like they are in full blown SAVE MODE. cause most of retail or prop 'active' trading is dead
As strstpd points out our ISLAND hidden order type is native. We are going through the other venues that offer hidden orders and have scheduled the implementation of Smart native hidden.
If I'm reading you correctly IBsoft then this sounds like unexpectedly good news ... even though not mentioned previously in this thread, what I and probably most others really want is a "SMART native hidden order" that does the following: Wherever a normal (non-hidden) non-marketable SMART-routed order would be routed at any given moment in time, the hypothetical SMART native hidden (non-marketable) order would be routed to the same exchange(s) at the same time(s), provided that exchange has a native hidden order type (otherwise it would go to the "best" exchange as decided by an IB smart algorithm). Is this what we've got coming (or if not, precisely what is it you are referring to)?