Newbie here... so be gentle... Does anyone know what's the likelihood of a limit short sale at the bid working or vice-versa a limit buy taking out the ask on QQQ's at any of the ECN's or exchanges ? Thanks in advance..
QQQ can be hard to borrow (surprisingly) sometimes. This often blows peoples minds, but it is true. So if your broker can borrow the QQQ then it is very easy to sell on the bid and buy the offer, since there is no up-tick rule on the QQQ.
What is the timeliness of getting fills for QQQ at the AMEX vs an ECN if you do lift the bid or ask ? Milliseconds ? Seconds ? Minutes ? Thanks in advance again.
But what I have found is that the AMEX takes around 10 seconds on average? Not based on any hard facts... just what I noticed today. INET and ARCA less than 1 second. I would never use AMEX unless there is solid price advantage there.
ECN fills are instantaneous...and the market is very deep. don't waste your time with the amex. let those clowns go broke.
I agree! I am filled on mkt orders or "marketable" limit orders on QQQ in less than 2 seconds. ISLD/INET or ARCA are about as fast as can be!
Has anyone looked at arbing between the ECN's and AMEX ? I've looked at direct price feed connections to the exchanges(I work for a trading company) and it seems there are large time periods where the AMEX is woefully(for them) out of step with the ECN's.... curious me...
Never looked into it, but AMEX is known for holding onto orders too long, taking too long to cancel orders, and not filling orders in a reasonable amount of time. I would think any arbitrage opportunities there are are just phantom ones - they are suckering you into routing to them so they can screw you over.
For the highly-liquid-on-the-ECNs instruments like QQQ/SPY/DIA, you'd do best to ignore NYSE and AMEX completely. The quotes are hopelessly out of step with the real market and you can't get a fill against them anyway. If you send them an order, and the market turns and goes against you, they'll ignore your cancel and fill you. That's why there's no arb opportunity. The specs can see the ECNs too (or have the equivalent knowledge of where the real market is), and aren't going to give you anything for free.