i trade alot of light volume nyse stocks and have had 10 minutes go by while the specialist is working on a print. this is both buy and sell market orders.
NYSE Direct + NYSE Direct+ came out in February 2001 with the letter ¡§A¡¨ from the NYSE. Every week they added a few more symbols until the entire alphabet was done. NYSE Direct+ is electronic executions without any specialist interaction on the NYSE¡¦s quoted size at the bid or offer. Direct+ is only available on NYSE stocks. It¡¦s kind of like SOES but for NYSE stocks only. The conditions that must exist for a NYSE Direct+ execution is: The NYSE quote must be over 100 shares on the bid or offer. That means, 200 shares or bigger must be showing and then Direct+ works on that side of the market. If 100 shares are quoted NYSE Direct+ does not work on that side of the market. The sent order is good from 100 shares to 1099 shares and must be a limit order. Partial fills up to a maximum of 1099 shares can also be filled with Direct+ with the remaining being DOT depending on what¡¦s quoted. If you try to NYSE Direct+ an order that is over 1099 shares, then the order is automatically DOT. Also, the order has to be sent in the same stock and on the same side of the market in intervals greater than 30 seconds. NYSE Direct + is suspended one minute prior to the close, trading halts, or non-firm quotes. NYSE Direct+ orders are annotated on time & sales by your data vendor as: ¡§NX¡¨, ¡§e¡¨, ¡§auto¡¨, or ¡§+¡¨. Some vendor annotations may not be listed. If your not filled immediately then either somebody else NYSE Direct+ the order before you or the specialist was in the process of changing the quote. Remember, once an order is NYSE Direct+, you have to wait 30 seconds to NYSE Direct+ another order in the same symbol on the same side of the market again. If the 2nd order is sent in less than 30 seconds then the order will be a regular DOT order. Direct+ is a great tool to have. Advantages of Direct+: It¡¦s fast. Fastest I¡¦ve ever seen the NYSE execute an order. Average time is about a second or so. NYSE will never turn your order away. QQQ¡¦s, DIA¡¦s, and all other ETF¡¦s have NYSE Direct+ access. Disadvantages of Direct+: No price discovery. Example: B- 100 IBM 98.25 filled @ 98.25e Time of Entry: 9:40:20 Time of Execution: 9:40:21 S- 100 IBM 98.05 filled @98.05e Time of Entry: 9:40:38 Time of Execution: 9:40:39 SS- 100 IBM 98.06 filled 98.06e Time of Entry: 9:41:00 Time of Execution: 9:41:01 Prior Quotes: Time: Bid x Ask Price Bid x Ask Size 9:40:35 98 x 98.25 20 x 5 9:40:40 98.05 x 98.25 20 x 10 9:41:00 98.06 x 98.20 50 x 10 Prior Trades: Time: Size: Price: 9:40:21 1 â²our buy fill â³ 98.25e 9:40:30 3 98.15 9:40:35 10 98.09 9:40:39 1 â²our sell fill â³ 98.05e 9:41:01 1 â² our short fill â³ 98.06e The prints at 9:40:21, 9:40:39, and 9:41:01 are our examples of NYSE Direct+ orders annotated with the letter ¡§e¡¨. If you wanted to buy some IBM with NYSE Direct+ then your fill will be 98.25. You can buy 100 shares up to 500 shares. Now say you want to sell IBM with NYSE Direct+. You will get a fill of 98.05. The amount of shares that you can sell can range from 100 shares to 1099 shares. If you do more than 1099 shares then the entire order turns to a regular DOT order. Now say you wanted to Short IBM with NYSE Direct+. The only way that you can get a NYSE Direct+ short order executed is if the quote for IBM¡¦s bid changes from 98 to 98.06. Our third example shows a NYSE Direct+ short @ 98.06. The short order can range from 100 shares to 1099 shares. Jeff-- OES
With Direct+, the B/D has a branch and sequence on the order. The branch and sequence helps identify the give up broker and helps out when a problem arises. Kind of like a tag. Some B/D's have only 1 branch and sequence on the orders going down to the floor and some have mutliple branch and sequences for the firm. So when an order goes down of say AOL and ten seconds later another individual in that B/D sends an order to the floor in AOL, the second order may not be Direct+ if the B/D has only one branch and sequence. If the individual traders have their own branch and sequence, then the orders would be separate and the Direct+ would work on both of them. Most firms don't have Direct+ set up so that each trader has their own branch and sequence. The way to eliminate any confusions is to get many branch and sequences so that when a trader trades, the Direct+ rules only apply to him and not him and the rest of the firm.
it sounds like the issue is this: can a prop group legally be more than one account? My hunch is that it can't. Prop traders trade in aggregate for the firms <i>account</i> (singular).
If the firm is a JBO(joint back office) then it's a problem and the entire firm probably has to be stuck in one branch & sequence but if the firm is a broker/dealer then I don't think there is a problem. Broker/Dealers will have lots of branch and sequences. jeff--
But I wouldn't take this as something written in stone because I'm sure if they really want something they'll invent a way around it somehow.