Execution speed

I had done this before but turned it back on. Please explain. This delay is the time to get an acknowledgment they received the order. It's possible this ACK is not exactly what it seems and they are in fact searching dark pools during this 1,100 ms. But even then it's quite a long delay. When it works as expected you get a response in about 70 ms.

 

USA. Suburb of Atlanta. 1 Gbps fiber from AT&T. I'm 12.5 ms from the IB server.

 

I haven’t looked at this in awhile but I remember that I had to turn dark pools off to use SMART. Otherwise, orders went to never-ever land.

 

You shouldn't notice much of a difference. The idea is that you will find better pricing on average. IB does not explain why turning it off may create an advantage. What do you mean that orders when to "never-ever land"? They just did not execute?

 

While I have no proof, I would advise against setting this flag. This flag MAY cause additional compliance checks to be performed or reduce number of available venues to send to.

I gave up looking for explanations with IB, I adopted take-it-or-leave-it approach. Try directing your order to specific exchange and you should see the difference.

 

Another good idea I have not tried. But again, it's the acknowledgement of order receipt that is causing the delay. They are literally holding it. The execution part is fast. However, this acknowledgment coming back may not literally mean what it is documented to mean. Maybe the entire delay is the SMART router and a directed order fixes this.

 

Most likely it is your broker's infrastructure doing something boneheaded, since it's rare even for home internet to take 3-4 seconds to traverse across the ocean, much less within continental US.

You could first traceroute your broker's gateway to see how fast you're reaching it. Alternatively, if neither their IP is known to you nor their gateway device accepts ICMP, you can do a tcpdump and see how fast it takes for them to ACK your outgoing order message. Chances are, the ACK is within 10s of milliseconds, in which case you have a concrete reason to chase after your broker since you have evidence that the order message was delivered to them in reasonable time.

 

It is extremely unlikely that length of delay is IP network related. Check your logs. Talk to your broker.

 

executing from Rome, it, using a wifi conn, usually a couple of milliseconds or less

 

Data travels at about 122 miles per millisecond (light is 186 miles/ms). It is impossible to execute an order from Rome, Italy on any US exchange in 2 milliseconds.